The original Anacreon was a multiplayer, turn-based, 4X game of galactic conquest. The first version was released in 1988 for DOS-based PCs; it was sold as shareware, with a preview version available for free on BBSs, and a full version sold for $49.95. Though sales were modest (to say the least) it captured the imagination of many players who were passionate about its depth and richness.
In 2004, Moromisato ported the original game to Microsoft Windows and distributed it for free. Though updated for a modern GUI, the basic game mechanics stayed more or less the same and the game could even load scenarios written for the original DOS version. The one advance was the ability to play multiplayer games on the Internet.
The current version of Anacreon, called Anacreon 3 internally, is a complete re-imagining of the game, designed for modern HTML5 browsers and for massively-multiplayer scenarios.
Anacreon is currently undergoing open alpha test, running a single multiplayer scenarios with roughly 20 or 30 players competing in a galaxy of 5,000 worlds.