This time around we’re going to look at another of the original Civilizations from the Galactic Civilizations series: the Arcean Republic, a carbon-based species of 12 foot tall warriors gifted with nobility and a stalwart, keen-sighted sense of honour. It was the Arceans that spread the Stargate technology to the other civilizations in the Centauron region of space, beginning the great race for galactic supremacy and unleashing the dreadful might of the Drengin Empire upon the sector, a move that ultimately led to their own conquest and subjugation. Liberated once more, and led by a great leader of the resistance to the Drengin occupation, Lord Verga, the Arceans are ready to take their place on the galactic stage once again!
Like the Yor Singularity, the Arcean Republic have some nifty new Improvements available at the start of the game.
The first is the World Engine, an enormous power generator boasting a huge +20% Manufacturing boost and an adjacency bonus of +3 to Manufacturing and Military. Standing as a mighty centerpiece of the Arcean’s industrial might, these powerful bonuses do come at the cost of a huge increase in Pollution and a hefty monthly running expense of +3 Maintenance.
Next, the Neural Link allows the Citizens on the planet to share their thoughts with one another, increasing their individual Intelligence by +3 each, with this number gradually increases as time goes by.
Now the Arceans have a choice: do they kickstart their industry with the huge Manufacturing bonus of the World Engine, which continually scales up in effect along with the growing industrial density on the world it is is located on and suffering the large Growth and Approval penalties that come with part and parcel with such a big rise in Pollution? Alternatively, they could rely on more limited industry, instead focusing on rapid Citizen growth and unleash the huge benefits to Research that they’ll get from populating Arcea, and then the rest of their Core Worlds, with high IQ Citizens?
There’s nothing to stop you building both of these on Arcea at the start of the game, of course, but we feel that these kind of early game choices allow you to play each civilization in different ways, with different playstyles informed by the bonuses you’re picking at the start.
To further shape your playthrough if you own the Tales of Centauron DLC, an early Event gives you a choice between three homeworld improvements for Arcea.
The Expansion Celebration grants a large Approval bonus to the colony and generously supports attached Wealth assets too. Perhaps with some creative use of the Arcean Republic’s Civilization Policies, this might help offset the worst of the effects of the Pollution you’re getting from the World Engine?
Alternatively, you could cut to the chase and choose the Colonization Program, which improves Growth +33% and increases Arcea’s Population Cap by +3 too, with another nice Income boost to surrounding districts and nicely support the flooding of your empire with egghead Arceans.
Finally, here’s the Resistance Center, allowing your 12 foot space-samurai a better than fair chance of surviving an invasion, if do they happen to start close to one of the less neighborly species in the sector, and gives you some early-game Military adjacency boost too.
Right from the very first Galactic Civilizations game on OS/2, the GalCiv series has always been about playing the game your way, and we hope to demonstrate that by combining these early Improvements, along with are enough to inspire a whole new way of approaching a Civilization’s playstyle, game by game.
Hope you enjoy the Arcean’s new toys, and look forward to more Civilization spotlights in the future!
Cheers!
