The game isn't basically dead...it's just in the last stages of it's coma, it's about to wake (1.2) and then it's going to go through some physical therapy (1.3) and it will be back out on the playground in no time!

Well, the thing is, the 1.2 patch isn't a very exciting patch, it's all fixes and stuff.  1.3 is the real test in my mind.  I really hope they knock it out of the park with it.  I really don't think it would take a lot changes, just the right changes.

I look forward to 1.2 because it should run as fast as 1.11 did on my old laptop.  The debugging code really slows down the interface performance compared to 1.11, but that is the price of progress.

I have been using primarily one strategy to win this game, and have barely scraped some areas of the tech tree ( siege warfare and other advanced warfare techs).  My feeling is that when the tactical AI gets competent, people will have to choose their fights more carefully, and even adapt their favorite strategies.  I am looking forward to that challenge.