The basic concept behind Galactic Civilizations II is the same as the first one -- to build an interstellar civilization. But how it goes about accomplishing this is very different. For this reason, we believe that many players will still enjoy playing Galactic Civilizations (the first one) because it's a very different game in how it plays.

So what's different about Galactic Civilizations II over the first one? Here are the bullet points:

1. Ship Design. In (I), players researched technology which gave them access to new ships. In (II), players research technology and then use that technology to design their own ship classes. So instead of having a "Battle Cruiser" and a "Dreadnought" players instead come up with their own ideas. The user will also be able to literally visually design much of how their ship looks.
2. Unique Planets. In (I) there were 26 different planets. The higher the planet class, the better. Simply colonizing the planet automatically gave the player all kinds of benefits. In (II) each planet will be unique -- visually and while they will still have planet classes (1 through 30) that will determine the amount of usable land on the planet to build on. Players will have pick and choose what they use their planets for. Moreover, some planets will be rich in minerals, others may have ruins filled with precursor technology.
3. New Map System. In (I) the sector map was filled with stars. A player would click on a star and a planet list would be displayed. Then the player would click on the planet to interact with it. In (II) the planets are part of the map. That means different players can share the same star system. That also means player influence is planet based instead of sector based. Moreover, asteroid fields and other interstellar objects can now be placed on the map to be made use of.
4. Play as any race. In (I) players had to play as humans. In (II) the player can pick any of the 10 alien races (including humans) to play as. Each race will have its own unique advantages and disadvantages. On top of that, players will be able to create their own unique races and play as that in the event that they want a truly custom civilization.
5. 3D Engine. In (I) the game engine was sprite based. This allowed it to run on very low end graphics cards as long as they had at least a Pentium II 600Mhz machine. In (II) it has a 3D engine which will deliver vastly superior visuals than the first one. It also means that players with relatively low end hardware (Pentium II 400Mhz or better) can play it as long as they have a decent video card (Geforce 2 or better type card). Moreover, the game's 3D models will automatically scale based on how powerful your video card is. So the graphics will actually get better automatically over the years. Stardock's hope is that people will still be playing this game many years from now.