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There's also The Corporate Machine

Before there was The Political Machine there was The Corporate Machine. A real time strategy game in which you start a company and try to crush your opponents. This criticially acclaimed (ex: Gamespot review ) strategy game allows you to pick a chosen market (cars, computers, aircraft, etc.) and then puts the company in your hands as you compete against other companies (either controlled by the computer or others via the Internet) for world wide dominance. Research new technologies, ... [read more]

8/27/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Gamespy: 4 stars!

The Political Machine gets another positive review, this one from Gamespy. A very in depth look at the game on both its pros and cons. http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/the-political-machine/541810p1.html [read more]

8/25/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

San Francisco Chronicle: The Political Machine is a winner!

The San Francisco Chronicle has taken a look at The Political Machine. It concludes with "The Political Machine is another winner, in an election year or any other time. " Read the whole thing at: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/08/24/DDGIH8CH0P1.DTL Meanwhile, Gamespot has posted The Political Machine on their home page as a recommended title: "We put our vote behind Stardock's charming new political strategy game" [read more]

8/24/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

The Political Machine 1.01 is available!

The Political Machine 1.01 is now available for download for those who purchased the retail boxed version. The new version adds a multi-save game manager and now includes much better multiplayer support (a built in lobby is now available). It also fixes some bugs that users have reported. Most notably, the save game during a campaign game bug is fixed (if you saved a game during the middle of a campaign and came back, it wouldn't count it as a victory). We also improved the load time... [read more]

8/19/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

The Political Machine in Wired

Wired News has reviewed The Political Machine. "The game itself, at least at intermediate levels, is quick-moving and addictive. I was able to hustle through the 41-week election cycle in about three hours. That's all the time you'll need to win at the beginner's level. But as you boost the difficulty (the levels are labeled "tough," "painful," "masochistic" and "crippling" -- enough to dissuade anyone from going pro), each decision requires considerably more thought and research." ... [read more]

8/19/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Time Magazine, CNN and The Political Machine

Pick up the August 23rd edition of Time Magazine or check out CNN ( http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/fun.games/08/18/political.machine/index.html ) and read some reviews on The Political Machine. The game should be generally available at most retail outlets that sell PC games. [read more]

8/18/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Galactic Civilizations updated

If you like The Political Machine, you may want to check out Galactic Civilizations, Stardock's award-winning space based strategy game. In it, players take on the role of leader of a United Earth and must expand into a galaxy that is filled with hostile alien civilizations. Players must balance diplomacy, manufacturing might, economic power, and military skill in order to survive and eventually win. The game won editor's choice awards from most of the major PC game publications. ... [read more]

8/17/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

The Political Machine Availability

On August 10 The Political Machine began shipping. What this means is literally the manufactured retail units began shipping from the manufacturer to stores and other resellers. If you pre-ordered just The Political Machine after June 1, we expect to receive our boxes imminently at which point your orders will get charged and units sent out to you. If you pre-order just The Political Machine before June 1, we should have the gold version available via Stardock Central for you to down... [read more]

8/11/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Wage your campaign for President with The Political Machine

San Francisco, CA–August 11, 2004–Ubisoft, a leading company in the multimedia industry, announced with Stardock Entertainment the release of The Political Machine, which ships today to retailers nationwide. A PC-CD strategy game based on data collected from surveys, exit polls, and the 2000 U.S. Census, The Political Machine users are challenged to spend 41 weeks on the campaign trail, serving as a campaign manager for a presidential candidate. In an effort to secure a spot in the Oval Offi... [read more]

8/11/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

The Political Machine is released

Stardock Entertainment is pleased to announce the availability of The Political Machine (published by Ubisoft). The Political Machine is a strategy game in which players take on the role of campaign manager for a US Presidential candidate. In it players compete against either the computer or against other players via the Internet in a contest to win the White House. Candidates must campaign, raise money, take out advertisements, win endorsements, and even go on cable TV news shows such as Th... [read more]

8/10/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

The Political Machine is released

Stardock Entertainment is pleased to announce the availability of The Political Machine (published by Ubisoft). The Political Machine is a strategy game in which players take on the role of campaign manager for a US Presidential candidate. In it players compete against either the computer or against other players via the Internet in a contest to win the White House. Candidates must campaign, raise money, take out advertisements, win endorsements, and even go on cable TV news shows such as Th... [read more]

8/10/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

August 10 is here!

The Political Machine is scheduled to be shipping to retailers today. Those users who pre-ordered the retail package should be getting theirs shipped out to them shortly. Those of you with TotalGaming.net should have the 1.01 version of it available later today! Have fun! [read more]

8/10/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Jive reviews The Political Machine

Jive Magazine has reviewed the final release of The Political Machine. Their verdict? 5 out of 5. They lauded it as being both a good strategy game as well as having enough inside track political detail to satisfy political junkies. The Political Machine will be released next week in stores across North America as well as on TotalGaming.net [Read Review] [read more]

8/5/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

ATI and Stardock Launch the ATI Theme Manager

Theme Manager from Stardock is rapidly emerging as the premiere tool for putting a corporate message on the desktops of millions of PC users. “Theme Manager is emerging as the preeminent desktop marketing tool, used by some of the largest companies in the world,” said Larry Kuperman, Vice President of Sales and Marketing at Stardock. “While Theme Manager is a relatively new solution, we have seen our client list grow to include companies such as ATI, Alienware, Marvel Comics, NVIDIA Corporati... [read more]

8/2/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

The Political Machine Release Date: August 10

The official release date for The Political Machine is August 10. Just a little over a week from today. Stardock & Ubi Soft are also working on the "BonusPak" (1.01) for release at the same time. For those who are familiar with Stardock games, Stardock attempts to release a free update to its games that add new features as a way of thanking users for buying its game. These updates aren't bug fixes (i.e. while there are "bugs" fixed in the update, it's unlikely anyone will run ... [read more]

8/2/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Spider-Man Desktop Released!

Stardock in conjunction with Marvel and FIS has released the Spider-Man Desktop. This new suite has been in development for months by a design team at SkinPlant. Under license from Marvel, the suite includes the software necessary to change the look and feel of your Windows GUI. The entire suite is only $8.95 (there is a discount for Object Desktop users). Check it out for yourself at https://www.stardock.com/products/themes/spider-man/ [read more]

7/27/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Object Desktop 2004 Fall Preview

Visit JoeUser.com to get a first glimpse of all the cool things being done with Object Desktop this Fall. Object Desktop is a suite of programs that can completely customize the look, feel, and functionality of Microsoft Windows. It''s like having a future version of Windows today. And there are some really cool things in store for the rest of this year. Check it out here: Link [read more]

7/26/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Object DEsktop 2004 Fall Preview

Visit JoeUser.com to get a first glimpse of all the cool things being done with Object Desktop this Fall. Object Desktop is a suite of programs that can completely customize the look, feel, and functionality of Microsoft Windows. It''s like having a future version of Windows today. And there are some really cool things in store for the rest of this year. Check it out here: https://www.joeuser.com/index.asp?AID=22485 [read more]

7/26/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Galactic Civilizations 1.21 released

Stardock has continued to enhance its award winning PC strategy game with the new version, 1.21 now being available via Stardock Central (http://www.sdcentral.net). The new version has some tweaks in it that make it tougher to cheat on the Metaverse (the massively multiplayer virtual universe scoring ladder) along with dozens of tweaks and fixes suggested by or reported by players. To learn more about Galactic Civilizations, visit https://www.galciv.com [read more]

7/22/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Bush vs. Kerry JibJab fun!

Atom Films proudly presents a hilarious satire of Bush and Kerry in a duel. A duel of songs and dancing! Must see: http://www.jibjab.com/ [read more]

7/21/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

TotalGaming.net launched!

Livonia MI – July 20, 2004. Stardock Entertainment, best known for its award-winning PC strategy games such as The Political Machine and Galactic Civilizations launched a new gaming network today called TotalGaming.net. TotalGaming.net allows users to purchase PC games and immediately download them individually or as part of a subscription. Users obtain the games through a powerful yet easy to use program called Stardock Central. “This is the closest thing I’ve seen to iTunes for Games,” s... [read more]

7/20/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Kerry picks Edwards - good or bad?

AI Kerry and John Kerry don't agree on the VP choice. AI Kerry is only concerned with winning enough electoral votes. It doesn't have to deal with party bosses, public pressure, personal relations, etc. So today John Kerry announced Edwards would be his VP choice. Good idea or bad idea? [read more]

7/6/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

The Kerry VP sweepstakes!

Some of you may recall that back in very early May we predicted that Kerry would pick Richard Gephardt as his running mate. Why? Because in The Political Machine simulations, the AI version of John Kerry kept wanting a running mate to win Iowa or Missouri. AI controlled John Kerry realized that he only needed to win one of those two states in the election to essentially wrap up the white house. At the beginning of June we noticed that that the governor of Iowa was a Democrat so we ad... [read more]

7/6/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

The Kerry VP sweepstakes!

Some of you may recall that back in very early May we predicted that Kerry would pick Richard Gephardt as his running mate. Why? Because in The Political Machine simulations, the AI version of John Kerry kept wanting a running mate to win Iowa or Missouri. AI controlled John Kerry realized that he only needed to win one of those two states in the election to essentially wrap up the white house. At the beginning of June we noticed that that the governor of Iowa was a Democrat so we added Tom... [read more]

7/6/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Galactic Civilizations & Altarian Prophecy both updated

Just in time for the holiday weekend is a fresh update to Galactic Civilizations and its expansion pack, Altarian Prophecy. Galactic Civilizations is a space based strategy game in which players must compete against several alien civilizations for control of the galaxy. Fight wars, conduct trade, research technology, negotiate treaties, manage your economy on the path to becoming the leader of the galaxy. The game won several editor''s choice awards in 2003. Altarian Prophecy is the recent... [read more]

7/2/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

New Screenshots, Info on The Political Machine

New screenshots and game information updates have been made to the Game page. Check them out! https://www.politicalmachine.com/game.asp [read more]

6/18/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Altarian Prophecy

LIVONIA, MI (June 15, 2003) – Independent game studio, Stardock Entertainment, released its expansion pack for the award winning strategy game, Galactic Civilizations. The expansion pack, called Altarian Prophecy, has been in development and testing for some months to get all the features and enhancements put together just right. “Our goal with this expansion pack was not just to add new content to Galactic Civilizations but add in the kinds of features and tools thatwould give the game, ... [read more]

6/16/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Galactic Civilizations: Altarian Prophecy now available!

LIVONIA, MI (June 15, 2003) – Independent game studio, Stardock Entertainment, released its expansion pack for the award winning strategy game, Galactic Civilizations. The expansion pack, called Altarian Prophecy, has been in development and testing for some months to get all the features and enhancements put together just right. “Our goal with this expansion pack was not just to add new content to Galactic Civilizations but add in the kinds of features and tools that would give the game, as ... [read more]

6/15/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Tentative release date

The Political Machine is very close to going gold. At that point, it goes off to manufacturing and then to the stores. Ubi Soft, the publisher, plans to have it in stores in between the Democratic and Republican conventions (first couple weeks of August). Not much time until release. [read more]

6/9/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Kerry and Bush neck and neck according to PMachine model

The Political Machine's statistical model is not poll based. When we designed it, we concluded that since ultimately it's a video game, we should only concern ourselves with the macro-based statistics. That meant not worrying about day to day fluctuations in polls. Instead, the goal was to use data (political party registrations, exit polling, census data, etc.) that was publicly available to get a clear understanding of the people who live in the states. From there, we then look at the... [read more]

6/3/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

GUI Olympics Week 4 results

The 4th week of the GUI Olympics has been completed. The GUI Olympics is an international user interface design contest featuring many of the best graphics designers from around the world competing in a series of user interface challenges. This week saw the best OS user interface design (using Stardock's WindowBlinds ) and best themed media player skin designed for Nullsoft's Winamp . Visit here for the full results of this week. [read more]

6/2/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

The Political Machine: Beta 4B now up!

Beta 4B of The Political Machine is now up with lots of bugs fixed, play balancing, and more interview questions. PLEASE try this beta out and let us know how it's working for you! We are getting pretty close to going gold so we want to ensure that everything is working. We have done various things to the videos to see if we have improved video compatibility. [read more]

6/2/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Reuters interviews Wardell about The Political Machine

With The Political Machine heading towards its Summer release date, Reuters interviews Stardock's Brad Wardell regarding the game mechanics and why they think this game will be fun for both political junkies and casual players. Full story: http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=technologyNews&storyID=5327231 [read more]

6/2/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Ubi Soft & Stardock build The Political Machine

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – June 2, 2004 – Ubisoft, one of the world’s leading videogame publishers, today announced that they have signed a deal with Stardock Entertainment to publish The Political Machine , a strategy game where players take on the role of campaign manager for a presidential candidate. Players must raise money, take out advertisements, win endorsements and appear on popular TV news shows to answer tough questions about today’s most pressing issues. &nbs... [read more]

6/2/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

WindowBlinds and Games

FileFront has conducted a battery of tests to determine the effects that WindowBlinds has on the performance of PC games. The results are pretty interesting and you can see them for yourselves at the FileFront site.Definitely worth checking out. [read more]

5/27/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

The Political Machine Beta 4A released

Stardock has released Beta 4A of The Political Machine to its beta testers. The Political Machine is a strategy game in which players take on the role of campaign manager in the upcoming US Presidential campaign.Users can become beta testers by subscribing to Drengin.net (http://www.drengin.net). Beta 4A provides a host of bug fixes and new content as the game heads towards its "gold" date. [read more]

5/26/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Stardock Announces Microsoft Gold Certified Partner Status

¡§Only companies that have demonstrated the highest levels of customer service, proven their experience and attained advanced certification receive the designation of Microsoft Gold Certified Partners,¡¨ says Allison Watson, vice president of the Worldwide Partner Sales and Marketing Group at Microsoft Corp. ¡§Today, Microsoft recognizes Stardock for its skills and expertise in providing customer satisfaction with Microsoft products and technology.¡¨¡§We are very proud to have received this cert... [read more]

5/24/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Stardock Announces Microsoft Gold Certified Partner Status

"Only companies that have demonstrated the highest levels of customer service, proven their experience and attained advanced certification receive the designation of Microsoft Gold Certified Partners,¨ says Allison Watson, vice president of the Worldwide Partner Sales and Marketing Group at Microsoft Corp. "Today, Microsoft recognizes Stardock for its skills and expertise in providing customer satisfaction with Microsoft products and technology.¨ "We are very proud to have received this certifi... [read more]

5/24/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

The Political Machine: Beta 4 available

The beta 4 series will be the last set of public betas of The Political Machine. After that, it'll be on an individual basis based on feedback and such. Hopefully this version corrects any remaining technical glitches. Just a reminder: 1) This game requires DirectX 9 2) It needs a 3D video card with typically 16 megs of RAM or more on it (so some laptops or very old machines may have problems) Remember: At this point, the game is running flawlessly in our internal compatibility l... [read more]

5/20/2004 By Frogboy in Political Machine News

Stardock TV: May 2004

This month's Stardock TV takes a look at the GUI Olympics, widget making, DirectGUI and how to do other really cool things to your Windows desktop. [read more]

5/20/2004 By Stardock Central in Political Machine News

Stardock Game News