Space Empires news from 2023.

24 December 2023:

Happy Holidays! The Balance Mod v125 Beta has been posted. This makes a number of fixes on the recently posted Alpha plus updates a portion of the AI to use many of the new additions in v125. The beta should be quite stable for game play. The focus will now switch to making significant updates to AI diplomacy and ship/planet orders. Download the v1.25 Beta HERE. The changelog for the release can be viewed HERE.

19 December 2023:

An update to the Balance Mod v1.25 Alpha is available. It's mostly fixes for typos and bugs, but there's a few other items added like minefield sabotage. You can download the patch if you already have a copy of the v1.25 Alpha or just download the complete version if you haven'table ready. Download the v1.25 Alpha patch or full version HERE.

16 December 2023:

An alpha version of Balance Mod v1.25 has been posted. The version 1.25 series is a major update and includes quite a few items in terms of technology, including the additional of a new racial trait, Interdimensional. There's also been a major overhaul to how unit sizes are handled, changes to how units are launched, an updated PD ecosystem and a whole set of new sounds. AI players have been lightly updated for most changes, but major AI updates are pending in the beta/final release. Note the v125+ series installs in a new folder and is not save game compatible with the v120+ series. You can download the v1.25 Alpha HERE. The changelog for the release can be viewed HERE.

I encourage interested parties to join the Discord channel (link above!) and take part in the discussion or even just report bugs or other issues with the mod.

18 October 2023:

I've posted a working changelog for the pending v1.25 which can be viewed on the Steam community site HERE. Lots of tweaks, modified unit sizing, a new racial trait and updated sounds are some of the highlights so far. Check out the Discord channel to participate in some of the active discussions around the changes and possibly other tweaks. The plan for November is to have some sort of playable beta, so the focus right now is updating the AI scripts to incorporate the changes.

02 June 2023:

An update has been posted for the mod. Version 1.24 focuses mostly on changes/additions to quadrant creation, tweaking a number of the system types, adding some new ones, making adjustments to quadrant type ratios and adding a few new types of stellar objects. There's some pollution adjustments and some small tweaks to small weapons. You can download v1.24 HERE. The changelog for the release can be viewed HERE.

14 April 2023:

A new Play-by-Web website has been created for Space Empires IV and V. PBW3 can be found here HERE. Thanks to Bearclaw and other Space Empires community members that have helped to get a PBW site back up and running.

07 April 2023:

I've posted an update for the Balance Mod. Version 1.23 makes a few small changes to AI research, adds extra background images and makes some changes to stellar ability types. It also includes its own Maps folder and a map called Milky Way Local, which is a semi-realistic depiction of known bright stars and other objects in about a 1,000 lightyear radius around our solar system. Download the update HERE.

20 February 2023:

There's a new update for the mod. Version 1.22 makes a few fixes and tweaks plus adds Research Breakthroughs/Setbacks and Facility Pollution into the mod by default. Both can be turned off in a new data file called ModEventSettings.txt. Continuing games started in v1.21 is no problem, but you might see dramatic changes over the first few turns in planet conditions. You can download v1.22 HERE. The changelog for the release can be viewed HERE.

15 January 2023:

Balance Mod version 1.21 in its final form is finally posted! Better late than never. There's quite a few fixes in this version, along with a lot of graphical updates to systems and the usual assortment of AI fixes. While technically save game compatible with v1.20, some of the solar system updates might result in incorrect pictures displayed or visual errors in rendering of some systems. I'd recommend starting new games. You can grab v1.21 HERE. The changelog for the release can be viewed HERE.