[Tomgs]

No the minerals and the planet locations were the same. The alien locations were different and one race was added from the first time.

The high difficulty just makes the game Last a bit longer I can still beat it in this Version. I do get challenged from time to time but human improvisation will win over formula building most of the time. If I see one race is using a lot of missles I can research the point defence or if there are a lot of mines I can build sweepers much faster than the computer can respond to my attacks. I do see that the computer will research point defence earlier now but I just counter with longer range beam weapons when that happens and still prevail. Actually the ones that mine everything take the longest to beat but they will still lose because they stay relatively static and let me outgrow them. I almost never get the AI attacking me in my home system after the first few turns because I take the fight to them before they get on the offensive. Long range Recon is a key to victory. If you know where they are and they only see your scouts they can't possibly become a threat. This isn't to say its easy to beat in this Version and I haven't give the computer a bonus yet I am still saving that for the full Version.