I know I'm a little behind the times for this particular podcast but I only recently listened to it. This podcast drove me crazy because Rob Zacny, whom I have a lot of respect for, just comes off as totally contrarian and arbitrary. The person who posted the information about MOO3 was absolutely correct in that, by Zacny's logic, this game basically checked off just about every bullet point he complained about (bugs and terrible UI notwithstanding).
Nevertheless, what drove me nuts about this podcast in particular is that he knocks Space 4x for things that all 4x have in common, and some complaints like tech improvements only offering a +1 only really apply to a small subset of space 4x (like GalCiv 1 and 2). However even GalCiv 2 employed a rock-paper-scissor approach to weapons/defenses so even if techs incremented them by +1 there was still nuance there that he's overlooking.
I wonder if Zacny ever revisited this topic because IMHO he didn't treat this subject with the respect it deserved, at the least, he should have had another guest that acted as a counterpoint for his arguments.
