Every so often [it's about every 3-5 weeks now] I get a little tired of coding or a little itchy for gaming, and either pickup a game I already have [Civ3-4, sim city sort of things work well] or get something from the store, play it for a week or two until I get the coding urges again. Coding then goes quickly as the designs/ideas build while gaming.
I picked up GalCiv2 for the most recent iteration, as the original got good reviews, and the second even more. A little tedious at times, and the interface is a bit awkward, but good overall. The balance required between peace and war is quite good. The research tree is humorous but ultimately linear. The race customization seems a bit more balanced than usual, but is bland. Ship customization is very interesting, even with the limited choices in functional parts. The orginization of the designs is poor [come on, not even a 'sort by Beam Power' tab?]. The campaign (all I've played so far) is fairly diverse, which is an interesting addition to 4x-es; also you can play an 'alternative mission' to progress along the campaign if you don't like the original. Quite nice.
I need to decide soon if I want to try that month trial job. I don't mind the month trial. I just wish the job were closer and/or the company was a bit less... entrepreneurial.
