Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar

"Dark Avatar does what a good expansion pack should -- it makes it tough to imagine ever playing the base game without it. It makes a great game greater, even if its achievements are measured in pinky widths instead of leaps and bounds."

"The new features in Dark Avatar elevate the already superb Galactic Civilizations II to the title of undisputed best turn-based space strategy game on the PC."

"Conquering the universe just got a lot tougher with Dark Avatar, the brilliant addition to our 2006 turn-based strategy game of the year."

"Having spent the last few days playing through a few campaigns, we're reminded of just how much Dread Lords did right. Happily, the designers haven't tampered with the basic design of the game. The addition of new races and some new gameplay elements aren't going to be enough to win you over if you didn't like Dread Lords in the first place but Dark Avatar is a surefire winner for anyone who has ambitions of building an interstellar empire -- which we're pretty sure is most people."

"Dread Lords was great and Dark Avatar is even better. The new additions enlarge the experience considerably, even if they don't exactly change the overall purpose or personality of the game. The inclusion of tech-prerequisites for colonization of certain environments is probably the most significant change here but there are plenty of other new features here that force the player into new and interesting situations. That you get some ample improvements in graphics and AI is just icing on the cake."