First, a little history. MOO2 - purchased at GOG, own the disc, and have many hundreds of MB in add-ons and updates - was and is one of the best 4X space games ever made. It has strategy, tactical combat, endless tech tree, ship design, decades of replay variety, humor, challenge, alternative ways to win, etc. In other words it struck a perfect balance with all the main "wants" a gamer might have for such a game. It was an archetype that helped define the 4x space strategy game genre. And it was fun, so much so that the late game micro-management grind that tends to bog down and unhorse such games from delusions of grandeur did but little to shoebox this game into the forgotten past. Much like Heroes of Might and Magic III, it was not perfect, but about as perfect as a game of its ilk could be. And has withstood the test of time. But NOT this game, MOO3. Read the media hype and falsehoods for years before buying it, had a bad gut feeling, but still bought it. Almost like when considering Heroes V of Might and Magic, another mega-turd. It was MOO, how could one not buy it? When I saw planets and ships that didn't look right, more like soap bubbles and those little plastic flags they put in your steak at Ponderosa, I knew there was something horribly wrong. I delved into the meat of the game to find the diplomacy, ship design, options... and was greeted with a massively obtuse and unintuitive menu system (GUI). In MOO2, what took a few clicks, now took an atlas, prayer, and luck. And the game wasn't fun. At all. And the humor wasn't funny. And the AI has the strategic genius of a Roomba. What a disaster, a complete sham. I feel sorry for anyone involved in wasting their lives programming this waste of magnetic media, and even more so for those who paid money for it, including myself, who have been better off investing with Bernie Madoff than purchasing this game. At least Madoff is exposed to some sort of justice, however weak, and your gut feeling of "too good to be true" could be backed by many people who probably "told you so." Well, I am telling you so now. Buy this game to support GOG, or as a collector to complete your space game or MOO collection, but no matter what, don't buy it to relive the glory days of MOO2, those are past history.
