[Slick]

I'm not going to defend who I speak for; I speak for myself with reference to the extremely numerous comments I've read on this board. There have been several threads about this game (I had a poll or 2) where the majority of responses were hopeful, but not positive. Check out the big threads since the game was released last year.

As for bugs, I wish I could provide more, but when the game suddenly gives me an exception error or some such giving some memory address that is meaningless to me and goes to the blank screen that can only be closed with ALT-F4, it is kinda hard to provide feedback to get them fixed. I have to admit that the number of crashes under 1.20 has lowered significantly, but they still happen, they still seem to me at least to not be very reproducable, but once I get one, even if I load a previous saved game (auto save on) the game still tends to crash around the same point even when I try to figure out what the problem is and change numerous settings/orders/whatever.

If you are not experiencing crashes then you are lucky and/or not performing the same operations that lead to the crashes as other people; which again seems impossible to reproduce or narrow down. I sure don't have the time to meticulously bug hunt. At 3 months past (overdue) release and 20 versions past release, soon to be ~24, I would be embarrassed as a developer to still have hard crashes. Besides, this whole thing is a side issue; crashes are getting admittedly rare, but they do contribute to the overall frustration and lack of fun.

The key here is fun, "just one more turn", looking at the clock and saying "<EXPLITIVE DELETED>!!! I CAN'T BELIEVE I'VE BEEN PLAYING SO LONG!!!

SE:IV had all of these for me and SEV has none.

Lastly, PES, from your tone, it appears I have offended you in my last post even though I hoped not to. If so, I am sorry and it is not my intent. Please keep in mind that all opinions here on these boards are part of a terrific community who is just DYING to enjoy this game. Trolls die here from lack of food, so don't forget who the "good guys" are...