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[Retropunch]

Yeah interface is very confusing - They've just got way too many different screens. As others have said, it seems as though they've basically just said 'how can we jam in as many mechanics as possible', but none of them really make much of a difference.

My issue with Endless space is that you tend to end up with loads of planets, and you can just make it so they produce lots of everything - there's no real need to specialise them or anything, you can just buy most of the improvements on most of the planets until you just sort of swamp the AI in sheer size. There's no need to specialise or pay much attention to it, just buy everything that's an improvement.

I've always wanted a 4x where you have to actually carve out a niche for yourself in the galaxy. You're not trying to conquer everything, you're instead just trying to be the best at what you do. Distant worlds is the closest, but it still all boils down to an end game slugmatch between everyone.

[Ultimuh]

Just bought Endless Space 2, because it was on sale.
Mostly posting here to keep an eye on the thread.
But I have one question..
How complicated is the game? Is it a case of "Easy to learn, hard to master."?

[umiman]

"Easy to learn, hard to master."

[Wiles]

It's one of the simpler 4X games released in the last several years. Very easy to learn if you've played similar games in the past, and the game does a good job at teaching you concepts that are unique to the series.

[Ultimuh]

Good to know, thanks.

[Majestic7]

DLC came out a little while ago, it features the Vaulters, a faction familiar from Endless Legend and Endless Dungeon. They are kind of nice, a turtling faction featuring teleportation gates and special defence buildings. The patch that game with the DLC changes game balance for the better by heavily tweaking various resourches and their effects. Plus pirates are now actually a faction you can interact with, including paying them to attack others.

[Retropunch]

Agreeing with others - it's easy enough to learn, although the interface can be a bit confusing as there are a lot of different screens you have to hunt through to find what you want.

[Majestic7]

I'm still a little confused about trade. Does it only count the trade company systems or do the systems the trade route passes through count? I've only been building the trade bonus buildings in the trade company systems.

[Radsoc]

I played ES1 so finally decided to check this game out for real. Got 10h now. However, it's super "demanding". The tutorial is too obtrusive to be helpful. Heroes require your attention for uninteresting ability upgrades all the time. You get prompts to build something (but I don't want to - why can't I just convert production into dust or something (I could just sell off ships I build otherwise, but that would be a manual chore)). Then there's the hacking prompt when I already assigned all my bandwith.

The UI is all fancy looking but relatively impractical.

The tech tree is a complete mess. I fielded swarms of scout ships as my main battle force for what's probably a good part of the game, and naturally got beat by solitary medium class ship once they appeared. Began to wonder if I had access to other ship designs. I found the "Behemoth" which apparently is some kind of special limited ship, which went on to be my second design type in the fleet. Most definitely turned the tide though. Eventually I had to google it (turns out normal designs are in the non-military part of the tech tree - and even then it's hard to make out from the icons).

Stellaris with all its flaws feels more satisfying. Someone wrote that ES2 is a 4X for Call of Duty players, but please tell me there's more to the game

[Sirus]

My biggest gripe is that the game is apparently rather unstable. One of the pieces of advice given frequently on the Steam forums is to only save when you absolutely must - say, closing the game - and keep reloads to a minimum. Otherwise bugs and glitches creep in. The AI loses track of what it wants to do and becomes more erratic. Things can go horrifically wrong on the player's end as well, especially as the turn counter ticks higher.

I had a long-running game more or less in the bag, approaching the technological victory, when without any warning my government changed form and my empire went into rebellion. Not just one or two systems but the entire damn thing. I asked for help and was told what I just mentioned above. Haven't gone back since, despite the fact that I do rather like the game. I don't want a game that I put several hours into fall apart because the programming is held together with scotch tape and hopeful wishes.

[Orb]

It's a decent game, but I think they did much better with Endless Legend.

My main issue is multiplayer balance. The new Juggernauts just kind of ruin everything. You can unlock an ability that destroys *every* other fleet in a system, including other Juggernauts. This is of course completely broken. It boils down to, when two fleets meet, whoever can click the button first (since it's simultaneous turns).

There were ways to balance this, such as every ship besides juggernauts being destroyed (you could use normal combat juggernauts to counter them), but that is not the case. At least last I played.

[Retropunch]

I loved the first one, but the second one just didn't draw me back in. It looks great and it's quite fun that there are lots of very different factions that play differently, but in the end it just felt like every turn was this massive checklist of things to do (all of which were pretty unsatisfying) and a lot of just micro'ing planets and boring combat. I never had any instability issues - but then I only put 20 or so hours in.

I don't think it's super shallow, but the whole point of a 4x is complexity (or at least lots of interlinking systems) and it doesn't really manage that - there's just not enough going on (other than micro) to make it good. Endless Legends was much better in that regard and I'd strongly recommend that. Also if you're hankering for a 4x and haven't already, play Distant Worlds