I won on brutal with the Germak on a small and normal map.

The 1st time around I ran the universe into a stalemate, having only 3 other factions alive and me being super friendly with them all
The 2nd was a lot more fun. I got the upper hand pretty quick and expanded in a small universe pretty fast. I managed to make peace with an empire that could have easily killed me, to which they went to war with another powerful faction at war with me as well. When they had all but beaten each other into the ground, I came in and conquered.

The Germak ability to trade slaves was a massive help to me. With the ability to get some Ashdar Colonials and liberate them upon coming to my planet, I was able to make some pretty powerful ship making worlds. Also changing my game play from hunker down and hold the line, I expanded right up to the point I was reaching into the area of other empires and stopped.

All in all I got to say, I felt the same way when playing Masters of Orion 2 when I first got it. I really am excited to be a part of all this and can't wait to see what's next.

Thanks again.

Nice report! I have an Orthin game going on Brutal and I managed to beat the humans off and even take a couple of their worlds and now I'm in a grinding war of attrition with the Phidi of all races. The Brutal difficulty certainly is as advertised! I agree, the game has shaped up into one of the best examples of the Genre out there right now! I'm playing it more than I play anything else on my machine currently.

-Will