70.8 hours played
Written 1 month and 8 days ago
Hey hey, people. Jay here, and I want to talk to you about the greatest competitor against Stellaris, Distant Worlds 2, and Galactic Civ 3.
What makes this game different is its beautiful artwork, the choir that sounds like something right out of Crusader Kings 2, and how quickly you can get right to the genocide. >:3 Special thanks to custom factions, which is a must for any 4x game even worth looking at, because here we can make humans into more than Starship Troopers; they are now also capable of stealing alien genes and learning how to improve the human form without turning into chimera abominations. It's the best of both worlds, baby. And they also start with the first 2 whole tech tiers entirely unlocked, with 2 additional population slots for each and every planet, and can be min-maxed in some very amusing ways.
Speaking of planets, I haven't yet gone to endgame levels, and this takes some getting-used-to, but I like how all the "management" of my empire is system-scale. Specifically, if you have 1 to 5 planets colonized in one star system, you don't need to tediously rummage through the menus of each of those colonized planets individually, it's all consolidated as 1 solar system entity. (And more importantly, so are the base-building upgrades. So 1 upgrade can enhance a solar system housing 5 lairs of human shenanigans - with some valid colonies having 0 pop but the game is totally OK with that - and all those colonies get the benefit.) But the game defaulting to arrow keys for map movement instead of WASD does irk something in my muscle memory, and double subversion since right clicking exits menus in this game. It's a very mild bit of weirdness but it won't outweigh all the extinction you're going to enjoy. >:3
There is only one warning I must give you, though. THE "Definitive Edition" (a.k.a. the only REAL way to enjoy the game) costs a nickel over precisely a hundred dollars. (Yes, the 6% Maryland tax did raise it almost beautifully to that exact dollar figure, so your local taxes may vary and you may not see as well-rounded a figure.) But, if you're unemployable and have more time than you know what to do with, I'm sure you'll make it count. ;) And if you ever find the whole bundle on sale for 50% off, I envy you. Because it looks and feels like a AAA game, so it's fair to command the price of one, but nobody is going to question the fact that...such a price is indeed steep.
There is a secondary caution, but unless you're a tech nerd, this one is not applicable: modding is...not fun. You can't change the voice and face of the Terran Emperor whats-his-name into the majestic and adorable Empress Scarlet (though rumor has it somebody figured out how to transform the egotistical big-brained Horatio into the guy from CSI Miami), and the only tool I found readily available was a hero creator that does not even have an "Open" feature so you can't return to any heroes you created with it (not without digging into the My Documents folder and reopening specific fragments of said hero thanks to Notepad++). Though I do like the power to create "custom skills", but because I prefer mods that do NOT make my game crash, I will NOT be playing with that, thank you very much. Plus, if you make a second hero with it, the hero will be stuck in The Void while your first hand-crafted hero will loyally spawn by your side every time - I don't know if this is a bug or a balancing hard-cap (since it does give you a slightly unfair advantage of starting the game with 1 hero more than the opponents), but it's very annoying.
You see the 10 hours I spent enjoying consuming the lizard milk jugs (yes, the only thing those lizard-people are good for...IS BEING CONSUMED >:D ), and I have not been able to figure out how to mod any other aspect of the game.
Now, if you excuse me, I need to get back to having Scarlet "work from the shadows" stringing along Emperor whats-his-name like a literal puppet (much like how the human controlling Kermit the Frog doesn't get the credit deserved, Scarlet also doesn't get her due credit...and also like with Kermit, Scarlet's going to control him by sticking her hand up his as-) so she can consume the genes of all the other xeno filth to create a truly perfected "Human Master Race". Glory be to the sentient plush doll!