That sounds like a good trade off for most 4X (not all).
Fantastic game indeed.
I have a LEGO hobby project and I really wish I was good enough at math (or tools) to design nice looking terrain that still works in terms of game-like play. For instance, LEGO terrain would have to remain “in-system”, but it’s also desirable to keep the number of parts to a minimum.
I’d be more enthusiastic for this game if the studio had not left Endless Space 2 in such a buggy state. The lackluster later expansion packs introduced a slew of bugs that have never, and likely will never, be fixed.
It’s rare the release of an expansion I didn’t buy actually makes the game I do own worse, but they managed it.
I’m thinking that ES2 did not sell well and neither did the expansions. I bought the base game on sale and never really played it much. I did 25 hours, which for me and a space game is dismal.
The problem then becomes ROI, and since they will likely want to continue to be a company, there is no use in pouring money down the drain.
I liked Endless Space 2 a ton… and played it a ton… (i was literally firing up a game of ES2 now to putter around with for a few minutes) but i almost never finish a game. In fact I hardly ever reach the point where conflict happens. I tend to settle my neighborhood then quit. The Rock Paper Scissors thing is annoying to me, and i find the AI kind of kicks my ass on even moderate difficulty levels because it tends to out produce me and even after 100 hours of gameplay and many hours of YouTube strategy videos I’m still not completely sure what exactly the contours of strategy are, how aggressive I’m supposed to be, how best to capture planets, what kinds of “things” should I be aiming for, etc.
The AI tends to outcolonize me then outproduce me then tends to start hard countering me - the AI almost always has the exact counter to my fleet because it always seems to have perfect knowledge of my composition. Or, if i do beat it one battle, it immediately shifts production to what counters mine. That kind of behavior is incredibly annoying, to the point where i don’t actually like playing, because basically ever 10-20 turns i have to rebuild my fleet composition, over and over, lasers to misses, back to lasers, back to missiles. The meta strategy in ES2 is for me sort of a black box which I’ve never really figured out.
But what i appreciate about ES2 is that it’s not the kind of catass gameplay like Stellaris, which requires so many tiny decisions.
I don’t remember the AI being that tough. I likely only played normal difficulty though. Yeah, if you can’t outsettle the AI, it will be tough to beat it.
That’s way too much pressure when I’m mainly just trying not to run out of paper towels.
Some alpha videos are popping up. Looking good!
If you signed up for the opendev pre-alpha testing, first scenario is now up this weekend (basics of exploring, building and tech). Looks to be a good contender for civ.
Thanks for the heads-up! Downloading now.
Well, the first scenario is kind of dull – just explore for 25 turns. The map is pretty, but the units move slow, and WASD doesn’t seem to be fully implemented yet. The tech screen is pretty. Not sure I love the city-build screen. But my biggest concern is whether there’s innovation here. “Old World” hits you with innovations (like Orders) right away. I didn’t see as much here, but then again they haven’t shown us much yet.
That’s kinda how I felt, but am cautiously optimistic it will improve as we see more features / content.
I’ve been racking my brain to figure out what this means
And in my mind I think I decided it means W, A, and S work but D does nothing!
LoL, that’s exactly what it means! The W and D work; the A and S, not. At least, that’s how it was for me. I guess someone got tired after typing out the two lines of code for W and D.
I was away over the weekend and just downloaded the OpenDev version but none of the scenarios are unlocked. Was the first scenario time limited or something and I’ve missed the window?