The official release date for The Political Machine is August 10. Just a little over a week from today.

Stardock & Ubi Soft are also working on the "BonusPak" (1.01) for release at the same time.  For those who are familiar with Stardock games, Stardock attempts to release a free update to its games that add new features as a way of thanking users for buying its game.  These updates aren't bug fixes (i.e. while there are "bugs" fixed in the update, it's unlikely anyone will run into any of them and none of them are significant).  The new features including a multi-game save game system and a lobby server for multiplayer. 

The multiplayer aspect of the game got a boost during gamma when we found that the multiplayer part of the game was far FAR more fun than we had ever anticipated it would be. So we decided to focus more attention on that aspect of the game.

For those of you who have pre-ordered the game on CD, it will be shipped to you prior or on that date.  Users of TotalGaming.net or others who pre-ordered the electronic version will be able to download the final game (which changed a great deal from the beta version) on August 10.

To clear up any pricing quesitons: The SRP of The Political Machine is $19.95.  The version sold on PoliticalMachine.com is $29.95.  That is $19.95 + the Political Operative's Kit which includes editors for creating your own campaign issues and creating your own interview questions.  User created issues and interview questions will be able to be uploaded to the library (which will be in the download area).  Users who don't have TotalGaming.net or purchased the game at retail will be able to get the political operative's kit for $10 later on.

The other benefit of the political operative's kit is that those users will be able, after January 1, 2005, migrate to electronic management of the game. That is, you'll be able to download the game from Stardock Central so even if you lose your CD in the future, you'll be able to redownload the latest/greatest version.