First, thank you devs (Brad) for the opportunity.

I've started 3 games, played to only about turn 25 just to get the feel for the new format. Will play a longer game this weekend.

For Tech Support: Having Protected Folders turned on in Win 10 Security will prevent the game from launching until the game is whitelisted. The security feature prevents the creation of a user folder, if I read the popup message correctly.

The Epic site shows 2 versions of the game: GalCiv4 and GalCiv4 Test. Which one should we be using? I downloaded both and used GalCiv4.

I like the ability to customize my starting race.

Starting the game multiple times, I noticed that it remembered my galaxy settings but not my race customization settings. Possible I did something wrong, but would like the game to remember them, with a "reset to default" option.

The new UI took a little getting used to, but not too bad. By the third start I understood where (almost) everything was and how it related to past versions of the game. I do miss being able to watch my universal approval change as I raise or lower taxes. It also took me a bit to find my Control Points, and at one point I collapsed the highlighted item UI in the lower left corner and couldn't figure out how to get it back.

In my final play through (only about 25 turns), I selected a large map and went with the default races. Three races started in systems adjacent to mine. One even colonized the outer planet in my solar system before I could. I hope this is a function of Alpha. I like a little room between my starting star system and the AIs.

I have to say, I really like the characters and leaders. Wasn't sure at first I would, but it grew on me quickly. I would like some feedback in the UI showing the change a leader brings, particularly ministers and diplomats.

Old complaint: On the diplomatic screen, when I offer a trade (i.e. tech), I would like the game to tell me how many credits I have to add to make the trade instead of having to figure that out myself. It takes time, multiplied by all the races I've met, and it's not fun. I had the same complaint in GC3.

Early on, I didn't understand the relationship between population and food. My people starved until I colonized a world with 14 food. However, the 14 listed for the planet only added 4 food to my civilization total (from -2 to 2). I didn't have time to figure out why but I'm assuming improvements are needed to increase it.

Balance: There are more things early game that a shipyard needs to build now, but fewer shipyards than in past games (I would have one shipyard in every star system in GC3). Haven't played deep enough into a game to see how this impacts early game.

I do like being able to buy a colony ship with Control Points. Wish the reset timer was shorter. I also like Control Points for money early game and hope there are ways to reduce crime later in the game.

The new tech system is fine. I would still like the option to see all techs so I can plan better which ones I want when they become available.

Bug: On my initial survey ship, I selected auto-survey and it did auto-explore instead.

Thanks again. Will have more to say after playing a longer game.