One of the toughest game review sites on the net, GameSpot, awarded Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar an amazing 9.1/10 and Editors' Choice Award! Jeff Lackey took the expansion pack through its paces and decided that it could be called an "expansion" only on a technicality, that it felt practically like a new game.
In addition to commenting on the improved graphics, extent to which you can mod the game, and the power of the ship builder, Jeff has this to say about the new planet terrain types feature:
Planets exhibit a wide variety of environments; thus, your choice of what to research is critical: You may spend weeks developing the capability to tame a radioactive world, only to find that there is only one radioactive planet but three prime planets that require aquatic capabilities. If you're a civilization with the native ability to populate a certain type of hostile planet, you'll have to debate the value of trading that valuable capability against keeping it to yourself.
The review goes on to talk about espionage, super abilities, mega events and the all-new campaign. It's a great review and worth checking out. And once again, Dark Avatar manages to consistently beat our Dread Lords original review scores, proof that the this expansion definitely improves on an already great game.
Click the link below to read more.