Blind Galaxy is a variation of Russell Wallace's Galaxy game. Like
it's parent, Blind Galaxy is a multi-player, computer moderated PBM
game of interstellar conquest.

You start off as one of an unknown number of empires sharing a
torus shaped (wraparound) map (i.e. if you go too far to the left, you 
end up on the right side of the map) with several hundred solar systems. 
You start with one large, resource rich system. Your goal is to conquer 
the galaxy, through whatever means you can.

You are able to design your own ships, which have 5 characteristics-
drive (i.e. engines), attacks (how many times you can fire), weapons
(how strong each shot is), shields, and cargo (space for shipping around
colonists, raw materials, and capital). Each of those characteristics
(other than attacks) is modified by the corresponding technology, to
determine it's effectiveness.

Combat is a duel to the death affair. Only one side will be left
standing afterwards (except in those rare circumstances where the 
remaining ships can not damage each other). Combat is divided up into 
rounds, where every ship potentially gets an opportunity to fire. Firing 
order, and targets are totally random- your heavily armed warship could 
end up firing at an unshielded enemy probe, while his lightly armed 
probe killer might end up firing ineffectively against one of your
best shielded warships.

Via cargo ships, systems can have colonists, capital (industrial
capacity), and raw materials shipped to them and unloaded, or produced
and shipped elsewhere, as well as being used locally.

Diplomacy plays a major part in the game, as the empires that tend to
make it to the end of the game are the ones who can either talk their
way out of a tough spot, or encourage someone else to help them dig
their way out. The present GM's have double blind mail forwarding set
up, so that new players can (if they choose) conceal their lack of 
experience from others (and so us veterans can keep from getting
ganged up on (:-) )

To be a successful galaxy player, one needs to be a diplomat,
shipwright, economist, and tactition. A good diplomat can talk his way
out of situations, while an ace tactition can arrange for your
warfleets to suffer a slight, um, accident, on their way to liberate
the oppressed.

The game mechanics are designed to only give out information that
you can actively observe. Empires may rise and fall without your ever 
encountering them. On the other hand, an empire that you saw many turns 
ago but haven't seen since (but which still appears on your turn report) 
may be down to a handful of ships orbiting distant, worthless systems, 
or gathering strength at systems where your ships aren't out observing....

A second design decision was to allow the player as much flexibility
in the data presented on his turn report as possible. At present there
are more than 20 options which affect how reports are generated. My
intent has been to make the reports have all the information that a
player might want in a form that is usable. I dislike the thought of
having a game that in order to play as well as the better players you
have to have fancy tools. Have I succeeded? I don't know.

I believe that Blind galaxy is slightly more difficult that standard
galaxy. It certainly encourages one to use subtlety more (partial
techs, are a prime example). Due to the limited information provived
by the Status section, one is never certain if the empire one is
attacking is as powerful as one believes, or not.

With the 2.40 release of Blind galaxy, I believe that all major
standard galaxy features are emulated from the player viewpoint, if
not actually integrated into the code.
