Stardock Sales told me by mail that

Once Galactic Civilizations II is released, we will likely be making CDs of the game or copies of the retail version available to TotalGaming.net customers for a media and handling charge. This has not yet been announced or arranged.

I didn't want to wait and ordered a physical copy on a different channel. I felt like robbing the game before, not paying anything for it.

While it certainly does feel, in some ways, like stealing, I'm a cheap enough man to just smile and enjoy my good fortune. Sure, I may not get a nice little manual or box or CD, but I DO get the game without having to pay anything extra for it.

Hell, I honestly didn't even know I GOT GCII until late last month when I decided to open up my Stardock Central and see if the original had any updates to it. I'll tell ya, that was a bit of a surprise of good fortune. I mean, I'm not complaining or anything, but it was like 'What the hell? I thought my totalgaming.net account expired, like, last year...'

Well... As long as I get the pretty preorder edition, I'll be happy to pay whatever Stardock wants... Heck, I might even go ahead and buy myself another copy directly from them, so that I can encourage my roommate to try it.