Excellent ship designer
Mentioned in ~1 in 6 positive reviews
“Great gameplay but most of all I enjoyed designing my own ships!”
Steam review · 537.5 h played ↗
Galactic Civilizations III
Worth buying? What 300 Steam reviews say.Worth buying? Here’s what 300 Steam reviews actually say.
Mostly Positive · 77%Mostly Positive · 77%Stardock Entertainment20154X · Turn-Based Strategy · Sandbox
$29.99
Open on Steam ↗US Steam price, checked 5 h ago
The verdict
A deep, accessible space 4X with a superb ship and race designer and big replay value, but hurt by weak or cheating AI, old bugs and DLC dependence. Skip it if you want polish or multiplayer.
Great for
Solo turn-based 4X fans who love designing ships and custom races, ideally buying on sale with DLC
Main risk
Cheating, unbalanced AI plus long-standing bugs and a base game that feels stripped without paid DLC
What players love
Deep custom races and customization
Mentioned in ~1 in 8 positive reviews
“The race creation is probably the most robust (and rpg like) that I've seen in a x4 game”
Steam review · 441.8 h played ↗
Improved a lot through patches and DLC
Mentioned in ~1 in 10 positive reviews
“After getting all of the DLC and installing a few mods, I can say this is one of the best 4x Space Strategy games ever made”
Steam review · 307 h played ↗
High replayability and depth
Mentioned in ~1 in 11 positive reviews
“The replay value of the game can't be overstated.”
Steam review · 29.4 h played ↗
Strong mod and Workshop support
Mentioned in ~1 in 15 positive reviews
“The modding community is strong and health.”
Steam review · 209.5 h played ↗
Accessible and relaxing compared to Stellaris
Mentioned in ~1 in 21 positive reviews
“Like Stellaris with training wheels, not as much effort and not as much detail bogging you down but with all the fun elements.”
Steam review · 248.2 h played ↗
What players complain about
AI cheats and is poorly balanced
Mentioned in ~1 in 6 negative reviews
“the AI in this game is as dumb as a bucket of herrings, only stronger than the player because it simply cheats.”
Steam review · 313.9 h played ↗
Worse than GalCiv 2 and stripped features
Mentioned in ~1 in 6 negative reviews
“This game feels like a pale shadow of GC2.”
Steam review · 35.9 h played ↗
Too much paid DLC, base game feels incomplete
Mentioned in ~1 in 6 negative reviews
“took everything great about gal civ 2 ripped it out and sold it piecemeal.”
Steam review · 24 h played ↗
Crashes, freezes and stuck turns
Mentioned in ~1 in 6 negative reviews
“there is a really annoying and widely reported bug that causes the game to freeze (or sometimes crash) between turns.”
Steam review · 778.5 h played ↗
Confusing UI and poor tutorial
Mentioned in ~1 in 9 negative reviews
“This game is really lacking in in-game resources to explain how certain things work.”
Steam review · 40.8 h played ↗
Broken multiplayer
Mentioned in ~1 in 19 negative reviews
“Well here it is 2020 and the multiplayer is still unstable and buggy as all get out.”
Steam review · 213.5 h played ↗
System requirements
From the Steam store page
Steam Deck: Playable12 GB
Minimum
OS64-bit Windows 10 / 8.x / 7
Processor1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo / AMD K10 Dual-Core
Memory4 GB RAM
Graphics512 MB DirectX 10.1 Video Card (AMD Radeon HD5x00 Series / Nvidia GeForce 500 Series / Intel HD 4000 or later)
Storage12 GB available space
Recommended
OS64-bit Windows 10 / 8.x / 7
Processor2.3 GHz Intel Core i5 Processor or Equivalent
Memory6 GB RAM
Graphics1 GB DirectX 10.1 Video Card
Storage15 GB available space
OS64-bit Windows 10 / 8.x / 7
Processor1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo / AMD K10 Dual-Core
Memory4 GB RAM
Graphics512 MB DirectX 10.1 Video Card (AMD Radeon HD5x00 Series / Nvidia GeForce 500 Series / Intel HD 4000 or later)
Storage12 GB available space
More games to check
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Mostly Positive · 77%
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− Weak real-time combat and ship design
analyzed 3 d ago
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Overwhelmingly Positive
+ Best Civ in the series
− Won't run or crashes on modern Windows
analyzed 4 d ago
Galactic Civilizations® II: Ultimate Edition
Very Positive · 80%
+ Runs on old and low-end PCs, nostalgic classic
− Boring, slow and shallow gameplay
analyzed 5 d ago
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Very Positive · 86%
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analyzed 5 d ago
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