Master of Orion II
Battle at Antares XXXX

FAN PATCH 1.50.24

Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares (Master of Orion 2, MOO2) is a turn-based strategy game set in space. The game was developed by Simtex, who also developed its predecessors Master of Orion and Master of Magic. Master of Orion 2 was published by MicroProse on November 22, 1996.

The game received several official patches. The last one was patch 1.31 from April 1997.

Fan patch 1.50.x is a series of extensive patches with numerous fixes and improvements. It is the most current and feature-rich version of the game. Development started in 2015, and is still ongoing. The first version of the 1.50 patch (1.50.0) was published on February 6, 2016. The latest version is 1.50.24.


Highlights of the 1.50.24 update:

  • With new hotkey 'H' in combat, you can let ALL your ships wait at the same time. This saves a lot of clicks, especially in the larger battles with many ships involved. In classic ship initiative, if both parties use 'H', the defender moves last!
  • The Galactic Lore skill no longer reveals planetary defenses.
  • The population graph now includes freighted population.
  • Updated mods.
a m b d p h e m k s t

Bug Fixes

-- 12 critical crash bugs --
-- 9 networked multiplayer bugs --
-- About 30 interface bugs --
-- Over 100 game-rule bugs --

New Features

-- 6th ship design slot --
-- Customizable build lists --
-- Unbuy function --
-- Ships ALL WAIT hotkey --

MOO2 Launcher

Included with the download is MOO2 Launcher, a GUI program for easy installing, configuring and running the patch. Auto-detects GoG and Steam installations.

Requirements

A working copy of MOO2 DOS version 1.31 or higher. The MOO2 game directory should contain ALL game files (full installation).

Compatibility

The 1.50 patch is an ADD-ON. All original files are preserved. Supports English, German, French, Spanish and Italian DOS editions of MOO2

Installation

While installation with MOO2 Launcher should be easy, we do advise to carefully read the installation instructions before starting your adventure.

Download 1.50

Grab the latest version of the 1.50 fan patch here:


Patch 1.50.24
Dec 24, 2024   |   11903 kB zip file   |   install instructions   |   changelog

Download 1.31

If you are running a version older than 1.31, please update to 1.31 first!


1.31 English   1.31 Deutsch
Apr 11, 1997   |   3205 kB zip file (EN)   |   2342 kB zip file (DE)

MOO2 Game Manual

In the initial release version 1.1 of the game, a couple things were changed and added after the manual had already gone to print. So the original game manual in essence is a description of a 'version 1.0' of the game. That same manual (albeit with a different cover) was shipped with the version 1.2 EU release. Game version 1.3 made a couple of notable changes to the user interface and version 1.31 introduced ship initiative. The manual was obviously missing all these things. So. We have now updated and error corrected the original manual for Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares, bringing it up to the level of patch version 1.50.24.

  • Corrected errors.
  • New segments about added/changed user interface functionality of patch 1.30.
  • New segment about ship initiative (patch 1.31).
  • Added descriptions of new user interface functionality of patch 1.50.
  • Added weapons and special systems of Antarans and monsters to ‘The Big List’.
  • Added an overview of all mercenary leaders.
  • Added an overview of all random events.
  • Replaced original crappy greyscale images with crisp colored ones.

Get the game manual (pdf) here:


Game Manual
Dec 8, 2024   |   5086 kB pdf file

1.50 Patch Manual

The 1.50 patch manual describes in detail all fixes, improvements, new features, modding options including integrated mapgen functionality, Lua scripting support and game mechanics of the 1.50 patch.

This manual is included with the 1.50 download as a nice pdf, but can also be found as a web page here:

1.50 patch manual

MOO2 Mods

Included with the 1.50 patch

1.50 improved
Proposes gently tweaked race pick valuation. Introduces new combat mechanics like Ship Initiative 2.0, Interactive Combat Stats (ICS) and Simplified Beam Formula. Makes various tweaks to weapons and special systems. Special care was given to improve AI ship designs. The Excel manual included with the download explains it all.

1.50 multiplayer
Based on 1.50 improved but with race picks that are better tuned for multiplayer, no Orion system & no unguarded splinter systems on the map, and various other multiplayer options enabled.

ICE
Designed for single player games / multiplayer with AI. ICE makes the AI much more challenging, changes race picks extensively and also brings a modded Tech Tree. The sole difference between ICE and ICE-X is AI strength: ICE-X Impossible has the strongest AI, you'd better know what you are doing!

VDC
This mod is designed for 1v1 multiplayer. Included is mod variant GM3-NR60. 'GM3' means always 3 planets per system. 'NR' means that tech breakthroughs only happen at 100% each time! Latest version of this mod can be found on the MOO2 Discord server.

Version 1.2 mod
Little mod that approximates MOO2 version 1.2 as close as possible with current 1.50 config: Creative costs 6 picks again, Psilon race design restored, original Guardian and Antaran ship designs, Plasma Cannon, Ion Cannon and Gyro Destabilizer weapon stats set back to original version 1.2 values.

Melee mod
Experimental mod that does away with all economy, and is designed for pure 2-player tactical combat. The map has only 4 systems: Orion, 2 home systems, and a neutral system. Each player builds 30 command points worth of ships. Both players send their fleet to the neutral system and duke it out!


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MOO2 Downloads   ↓

More Mods

Spiral galaxy mod 1.0 for 1.50.18+
Mod by Epirasque that creates a spiral galaxy, one arm per player with their home world at the tip.

Techtree mods 1.0 for 1.50.19+
Bundle of Lua mods by Epirasque. Contains several mods that alter the research tech tree or otherwise interact with how players acquire tech through research. Follow the installation instructions from the included readme.

Miniaturization report 7.1 for 1.50.22+
Lua script that explains miniaturization and summarizes the current and future state of space-reduction of technologies in a comprehensive in-game report. Runs when you press '4' in the Main screen. Place the file in 150\scripts\main\ (no need to restart). A readme is contained within the file.

Artificial Advisor 1.1 for 1.50.23+
Lua script that pops up a wide variety of information for overview and optimization for individual colonies and the empire as a whole. Has many toggles. Runs when you press '7' in the Main screen. Place the file in 150\scripts\main\ (no need to restart). A readme is contained within the file.

Tools

Zodiac 1.2 for 1.50.23+
A new tool to manually 'draw' galaxies for Master of Orion 2 games. 8028 kB zip file.

Corion2 1.1.1
Savegame Editor. Corion version 1.1.1 has been optimized for the 1.50 patch, but still works just as well for versions 1.31 and 1.40. 153 kB zip file.

MoO2 Workshop
LBX editor suite by Grig de Griz. Handles text, picture and font files. Includes a leader editor. Note: If the included HMTL Help comes up blank, then go into file Properties and unblock. 2713 kB zip file.

fmoo2-tool
LBX graphics viewer by Marco. Easy scanning of contents of LBX files. Other work by the same author can be found on Github. 20377 kB zip file.


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MOO2 Patch History   «

Pre-release version

Press copies were made available in the months leading up to release. There may have been different versions. At least the existence of a build dated Sept 18, 1996 was confirmed.

Version 1.1

Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares version 1.1 was released on cd-rom in North America on November 22, 1996. The game files were finished in the evening of November 9, so the pressing, packaging and distribution to retail stores of the first batch of cd-roms was accomplished in just 12 days.

Version 1.2

On November 25, only three days after the game was published, the first patch, version 1.2, was released to the web. This patch was distributed as a patcher program that would patch six version 1.1 files.

Version 1.2 was the basis for the European cd-rom release mid December 1996.

Version 1.3

Patch version 1.3 was released to the web on March 3, 1997. This was a big patch and not only corrected bugs, but also introduced new features and balance changes. The patch was quickly re-released on March 4 to include the readme file that was missing from the March 3 release.

Version 1.3 was the basis for the cd-rom release of the German translation of the game.

Version 1.31

English and German 1.31 patches quickly followed on April 11, 1997. This version introduced the ship initiative mechanic. However it was turned off by default.

French and Spanish cd-rom releases were based on this version.

A Spanish+Italian cd-rom was released in May, with an integrated executable (2-in-1) that featured in-game language changing thru the Game Settings window and also contained a couple undocumented bug fixes, but still carried the same version number 1.31.

At the end of 1997, the game was reissued under Microprose's PowerPlus brand. This cd-rom contained a 5-in-1 multilingual exe, again as a version 1.31, bringing the undocumented bug fixes to the English, German en French languages, but this final official version was never released as a patch.

Version 1.31 BP

In 1998, a Portugese language version was released by BraSoft for the Brazilian market. In this version, not only the text files were updated, but game-graphics containing (English) language were also redone.

Version 1.40

The 1.40 fan patch fixed a number of bugs and introduced some new multiplayer features. The patch was built on the English DOS version 1.31 of the game. For the longest time version 1.40b23 from 2006 has been used by the online multiplayer community and has even been included into Steam and GoG distributions.

Initially based on 1.40, the 1.50 fan patch incorporates all of its fixes.

1.31 changelog
1.40 changelog
1.50 changelog


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