EotFS and MoM improved remarkibly when patched. They were good on their own, but a few patches really expanded their scope. Emperor was 100% less buggy and MoM was like a completely different game. Shows that when designers stick with their product the fans will stick with the company. Gotta love anything distributed by Shrapnel.
Voting in Emperor was one of the most ingenious twists I've seen in a game. Being forced to reward your enemies was brilliant. Stealing votes was fun too!
When I found that "Galactic Civilizations" had a voting model I bought the game. Wished I'd saved my money. Here is an example of reviewers loving an Empire building game with slick graphics... but nothing 'under the hood'. Lord knows I tried to love it, but it just didn't happen. Dom2 hooked me right away, spelling errors and all.