Hmmm, so I finally got some time to burn and broke this game out of its plastic wrapping and tested it out (version 1.08)... and it was pretty much what I had expected. After a few dozen turns, it crashed. Gave it another go, same thing a few turns later... if it's not one thing, it's another. Guess I'll just have to wait for the next patch that's supposedly coming out on the 6th, maybe I'll finally get somewhere in order to judge the game then.
As for the 2D/3D map thing, I don't think it really makes any difference, especially since you even have the option to represent the map as 2D or 3D. What I would really like is the ability to modify/reorganize the interface because if you play on any resolution other than 1024x768, the interface gets broken up into pieces and it looks really odd. The ability to grab some pieces of the interface and move them around, or hide portions of them completely (like the orders panel)would be great. As for the graphical "look" of the UI, you can change that along with all the other graphics in the game. I don't think the 3D thing is really that bad, once you get used to the scrolling it's actually pretty convenient, IMO.
As for the supposedly horrible new AI, I'm not sure I can properly judge them with how far I've gotten, but there are options to give bonuses to the AI in the advance game setups. And while I don't think they will ever "wow" you with their intelligence, it should be okay until some mad geniuses comes along to mod the AI to perfection, since you can script that as well.
In the end though, SE V is about its modding potential. It provides all the necessary parts for you to build a really good game from if you're devoted enough to the task. There are a lot of "neat" stuff to play with or to remove from the game (should you want something simpler, to make better AIs), but it's there to allow you to do what you want with it (just try modding in sphereworlds in GalCiv and you'll know what I mean). The default "game" isn't really all that different than SE IV, so if you're just looking for that, then you're much better off getting SE IV, and playing that instead. SE V allows more room for customization and modding, so that a few years from now people will still look back and say, "Oh man, you've got to try this new SE V mod!" (a better graphics engine helps tremendously here). And on that front, I think Aaron did pretty well. Of course, the bugs will need squashing first before anything can be done...
