Oh my! This tickles me in all manner of unseemly places...

Still, I'm not jumping the gun like I did for GalCiv 2. It's either GOG or not. Do the right thing, Stardock!

Pretty much my feelings as well.

I don't think Steam even gets to half but I do agree with you that they broke their bill of rights quite a lot. Although personally I'd name the release of Elemental as a shining example, and the selling of Impulse to Gamestop of all places ...

Indeed; they may have had a solid business reason for going Steam exclusive, but they'd been branding themselves as a DRM-free haven for years leading up to that heel-turn.


They're completely separate entities; Ironclad was the developer, Stardock was the publisher.

You might find this an interesting read then (go to the Stardock Sucks part).

Not really. They were against inconvenient DRM (like Starforce, Tages, and Securom), not DRM in general. Just take a look at GalCiv 2.
If you bought the retail edition, then you could install the game wherever you wanted, because there was no copy-protection on the CD and no DRM. However, if you wanted access to the patches, then you needed to register the game, binding it to an account (which also gave you access to the digital version).
If you bought the digital version, then it was already bound to an account, and each installation required a one-time online-activation.

Stardock helped Ironclad quite a lot during the development of Sins, even lending Ironclad some of their programmers at times.

It was possible to transfer the patched game from one computer to another manually by migrating all the files (there might have been a few other steps, but I'm pretty sure there was no need to re-authenticate). It's less a case of DRM and more a case of no automated way of doing the transfer. I had multiple Sins installs on the same computer (for modding purposes) back in the day. It's true that they worked closely on the project, but they're still different entities who went their separate ways afterwards.

FWIW, Wikipedia says:

"The first third-party game Stardock published was Sins of a Solar Empire. The publishing arrangement worked out between Stardock and Ironclad Games was unusual in that the two companies integrated their teams at every level."

See http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/132039/postmortem_ironcladstardocks_.php?page=3

I forgot this part from the article: I'm thinking of picking up the sequel then based on what I've read about it.

Could? Is that not possible anymore?

*Can. Sorry.

I think people here would like to know that I have added a wishlist entry for Galactic Civilizations 3. I'm trying to show Stardock that there are many people who care about getting non-Steam version of this game. I'm hoping for at least 10k votes (as soon as possible) to try influence their decisions. More votes later down the road would be helpful.

I tried to post a link to where to vote, but this website wouldn't let me. Instead, you can find it if you go to the community wishlist and enter into search:

Galactic Civilizations 3

http://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/galactic_civilizations_3


:)

@ ne_zavarj

Thanks for providing a link for me. I'm not used to using these forums yet.

Great news in general. I must have overlooked a possible release date. Was one announced already?

Steam only sucks for me, and I would be interested in the single player part mostly but nevertheless expected given the history of Stardock. I'll make an exception but not buy right away as I did with GalCiv2. But since I loved the predecessor particularly for the combination of Civilization game mechanics and customization of fleet, I guess I have to like it in whatever dress it comes.