'Tis my implication, good sir!

While this annoys me as well because I regularily have to wade through countless fantasy books I have no interest in when looking for sci-fi stories I might like in pretty much every book store (online and retail), there are actually many authors where the border between the two genres is very thin.
In my experience especially modern American sci-fi authors tend to write "fantasy stories in space" sometimes - not that there is anything wrong with that, mind you. Usually those who seem to follow the school of thought (maybe inspired by Tolkien et al?) of "world-building" with extensive history and detail as the most important area of their writing.
Take Jack Vance for example (who incidentally had written both, fantasy and sci-fi stories), his (sci-fi) 'Demon Princes' novels could easily be turned into fantasy with very little actual changes to them IMO. Heck, one of the books even partly takes place on some kind of medieval-fantasy planet.
Then there are books like Stanislaw Lem's 'Solaris' or 'Fiasco' which would be much harder to "convert" to fantasy without completely losing what they are all about, I think. Some of his stories about the adventures of Pilot Pirx and Ijon Tichy would make good fantasy tales again, though.

Anway, "fantasy in space" kind of stories might be the reason the two genres get thrown together so often (or maybe it's because both are wrongly seen as inherently inferior compared to "real literature" by some people).

EDIT: Oh, also thanks to the OP for linking the list, didn't know all mentioned games. Very interesting read.

Has anyone played the Worlds of Magic alpha? I was thinking of trying it in case it has a tutorial or some easy-early mission.

Is there a true successor to masters of orion? I love gal civ but it plays quite differently to moo (IMHO).

I haven't, but I'm thinking about it as well. Still, I see no reason why you shouldn't be downloading it right now ;)

Haha! Except I WANT my wallet to be pregnant! :)

A [url=http://pcpartpicker.com/]wallet is also a [url=http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu_list.php]responsibility. Take care ;)

Thanks OP for the link
Nice list. Some Kickstarted games. Not sure how many if any are coming to GOG though :/

Backed

Maia
M.O.R.E
Xenonauts

Ones im interested in (maybe)

AOW 3
GalCiv 3
Warlock 2
Horizon (reading through threads - this is better than Star Lords (combat is more solid and tactical - SL is more along lines of Endless Space) - both are by same publisher)
Distant Worlds 4th expansion (this game apparently from what ive read is one of the best out there, however they use their own drm , only sold in their store AND quite pricey)

* Stardrive Unity - isnt Stardrive by the same dev who basically abandoned development/didnt finish Stardrive?.
* Planetary Annihilation - dont understand that hype about this (expensive Alpha aside) isnt it mainly multiplayer game?

Look through the Steam threads on Horizon - Apparently people are finding this game is closer to MOO2 than most others out there. Shame it seems Steam only though :/

Did X - Rebirth stop being shit at any point? Or is that not one of the games in play?

That game is completely beyond help. Patches won't fix a problem like this :(

I know, but I loved X3, and thought it was a relevant place to check up.
Sad to hear. It was so easy to make that concept into a really good game.

Yeah. You can be forgiven for thinking that it just needed patching. Egosoft games are notorious for buggy releases, but they have a great track record of consistently patching and supporting the game for years after release.

Rebirth, while full of bugs as you'd expect, has much deeper, fundamental problems with gameplay, design, core game mechanics, aesthetic and optimisation. A series of very bad decisions were made here and the only solution, in my mind, is to make a new game. Very sad. I've been such a fan of the whole series that it's hard to believe this was the same developer!

They forgot to mention Planet Explorers, which I've backed =)

You suggesting that it's not magic that makes spacecraft fly or guns shoot beams of light?