Get ready to blast back into space to ward off the evil Korath, as Stardock Entertainment is pleased to announce that the public beta test for Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar, the massive first expansion for the acclaimed space-based strategy game, will begin on November 16th.

The beta will be open to all players who pre-order the expansion via Stardock’s TotalGaming.net service. Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar can be pre-ordered from TotalGaming.net, and as with all games on the service, it will ship without intrusive copy protection.

Scheduled for release in February 2007, Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar truly redefines the scope of what an expansion can offer. Much more than an incremental update, Dark Avatar greatly expands the gameplay of Galactic Civilizations II by introducing custom opponents whose play styles can be completely defined by the player, espionage agents to engage in sabotage and destabilization, special worlds which require specific technology to colonize, and much, much more.

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