Reviews are meh, but what are your first impressions?

[Baron Jukaga]

And it would be nice if I could just keep scrolling out from system to galaxy map without having to press another hotkey but that's minor I suppose.

This is the number#1 interface tweak we needed yesterday. Even after 6 hours I was still trying to do it.

 

[LavaWurm]

First of: I like the game!

1. By the midgame you need to click lots of things repetitively. No automation of things that require no thought, like surveying battle debris. No easy way to access spaceports from the galactic view.

That's something that will probably be improved in a patch in the future.

3. Species and empire customization feel relatively bland. There are some neat differences for xenophile / xenophobe, spiritual/materialist, but all of these end up paling in comparison to the way different races/empires play in other games. My mammalian xenophile materialists who use warp driver play pretty much like my arthropoid militarist spiritualists who use hyperlanes.

I quite like that: It's your ethos that determines your playstyle, not your race - after all, there is no realistic way to predict differences in species evolved from different ancestors, so no verisimilitude, just "so guy thinks it should be this way", which might clash with what I think... (Well, maybe mandatory hive mind qualities for some insect-people, but you know what I mean...)

 

[Bakes0310]

Too early for me to give a descent opinion, but it does seem promising. The tutorial was very good but I found the ui very easy to navigate and understand, so felt if the tutorial was lacking I would still get by. I also like the idea of having one planet and heading out to explore. I truly felt like I was venturing off into the great unknown. From this I feel I could quite easily roleplay which I don't actually tend to do in games.
Like I said I've barely touched the game so I haven't had any bugs or to reach mid game boredom that's being reported. So yes, it gets a thumbs up from me for now.

 

[baffa]

I'm having a blast, finally a good 4X I can enjoy.

 

[klingonadmiral]

Pretty meh, the earlygame is just atrocious:

1. Buff initial fleet strenght to ~300 at least

The few corvettes you start with are just absolutely useless. The weakest hostiles you encounter are 128 in strength, and it can go up to the 900 or so. The hostile critters heavily impede early exploration and expansion, and you need something to get rid of them fast.

2. Get rid of the events that spawn hostiles or at least make them occur later

Space pirates : you lose
Those Cults/Terrorists that can spawn in your home system: you lose

3. Balanced Starts please

Starts were you don't get any of the 5 ressources suck.

 

[The Number 9]

I played 6 hours yesterday. I didn't want to stop but I've got a busy week.

I really like it. It's my first 4x so I can't compare but I love the feeling I got when I play. This game is like a story, the narration through events is really great.

There is an improvement room, the game is far from perfect. But I enjoy every moment when I play it. And I want to play it more.

 

[Deaghaidh]

I'm really into it. Don't suppose I've reached what they call midgame.

Diplomacy needs fleshing out, but its more an opportunity for growth than a weakness.

 

[Maizel]

Pretty meh, the earlygame is just atrocious:

1. Buff initial fleet strenght to ~300 at least

The few corvettes you start with are just absolutely useless. The weakest hostiles you encounter are 128 in strength, and it can go up to the 900 or so. The hostile critters heavily impede early exploration and expansion, and you need something to get rid of them fast.

2. Get rid of the events that spawn hostiles or at least make them occur later

Space pirates : you lose
Those Cults/Terrorists that can spawn in your home system: you lose

3. Balanced Starts please

Starts were you don't get any of the 5 ressources suck.

Just because you find it hard is no reason to get rid of things.

I think the earlygame is fine. Balanced start would be okay as an option, but I would find it very boring if they forced me to start in more or less the same system every game.

 

[klingonadmiral]

Just because you find it hard is no reason to get rid of things.

I think the earlygame is fine. Balanced start would be okay as an option, but I would find it very boring if they forced me to start in more or less the same system every game.

I think it's more than anyhting else a Ai issue. If Science Ships retreating would cancle their entire order queue I wouldn't have to send out my tiny fleet to pre-scout all systems around me.

Also, could we talk about how awful the ship system is?

 

[Umega]

I really wanted to like Stellaris after seeing tons of gameplay videos. But now actually playing the game, I realise how unnecessarily clunky the user interface feels. Hmm, not clunky, but it just feels to overly complicated when they can just make the interface much more fluid and convenient. I feel there is too much zooming in and out of systems...

 

[karloss99]

Pretty meh, the earlygame is just atrocious:

1. Buff initial fleet strenght to ~300 at least

The few corvettes you start with are just absolutely useless. The weakest hostiles you encounter are 128 in strength, and it can go up to the 900 or so. The hostile critters heavily impede early exploration and expansion, and you need something to get rid of them fast.

2. Get rid of the events that spawn hostiles or at least make them occur later

Space pirates : you lose
Those Cults/Terrorists that can spawn in your home system: you lose

3. Balanced Starts please

Starts were you don't get any of the 5 ressources suck.

1. It's kinda the point. You can't take on the galaxy with three tiny ships. Also, there are quite a few hostiles <128 strength. You must have had quite the bad luck.

2. You spend no resources/time into a proper fleet : you lose.

3. NO! The semi-random starting conditions add a lot to the game. My empire struggled to expand across the outer rim of the galaxy, where minerals and science is aplenty but energy deficit is ever-present threat. Dealing with big empire/galaxy-level problems would be trivial if everyone had what they wanted/needed when starting the game. Not to mention boring.

First impressions? Why is there light coming through the east window? I haven't been playing for that long? Have I?

 

[romothecus]

I quite like that: It's your ethos that determines your playstyle, not your race

No... just the opposite of what I said. Ethos doesn't determine playstyle; playstyle is mostly the same no matter what. Sure, there are a few percentile differences for the various ethos (and narratively they are quite different). But in terms of how you play the game, it's all the same.

All Stellaris factions are relatively similar. Compare the differences in other games; even the factions in MoO2 are more different from one another. Civ and the Endless games take it even further.

 

[klingonadmiral]

I realise how unnecessarily clunky the user interface feels. Hmm, not clunky, but it just feels to overly complicated when they can just make the interface much more fluid and convenient

This so much. The worst offenders are certainly ship design and planet management. The first is really just an unnecessary element of the game, I'm a interstellar Emperor, I don't give a damn if Cruiser #492 in Fleet Alpha-C uses A/AM Missiles or Missiles with Microsingularity Warhead. This is the stuff i have ministers and admirals for. But no, I have to update every design manually whenever I research some new stuff, confirm that I really really want to overwrite my new design, and then manually order every ship in my celestial realm to plese fly to the nearest spaceport and get the newest longrange sensor.

Planets are much the same. I don't care if pop#327 (Human, Materislist, Fanatically Xenophile, member of Loyalist Faction) works in a Power Plant II or a Power Plant III. I hire people whose job it is to care about that so that I no longer have to care. Also, for some reason it is good UI design to put tiles and total tile yield on two different tabs.

 

[Smiles_]

We've heard the feedback on mid-game, and this is where we will put our focus to begin with. Doomdark is hard at work coming up with ideas on how to improve that aspect of the game. I'll let him talk more about that himself later.

We know that there are some other areas of the game that aren't as fleshed out as they could be. But you need to stop somewhere when you make a game, or it won't be finished ever I can guarantee that we will continue developing the game and expanding on different areas of the gameplay as we always do.

Good to hear. I look forward to the patches and updates and dlc items, so I can sink lots of hours into Stellaris like EU4 or CK2.


Smiles

 

[Sonereal]

I actually like the ship designer, but even with just five planets (additional planets in sectors), improving tiles is just so much of a pain in the ass.

I would almost love it if I can create a "core" planet sector and just have the AI deal with that stuff while I handle the spaceports. The thought of manually combing through my homeworlds everytime I get a new building upgrade or tile blocker remover is eh. Thankfully, you don't have to work dozens of worlds like this.

Those Cults/Terrorists that can spawn in your home system: you lose

What are you talking about? All you have to do is literally build one additional ship and you're fine.

Also, perfectly balanced starts don't exist in any 4x game I have played. Probably because they wouldn't be fun.

 

[safe-keeper]

After six hours of play:

First impressions are very good. It's a difficult game to stop playing for sure. The music and graphics create a great atmosphere. It does a very good job at portraying you as a new player on the galactic exploration scene, eager to learn as much as you can about the universe around you. Gameplay is fun, too.

Overall, it's very fun, and shows great promise. Can't wait to play it MP with siblings and friends.

At the same time... I'm looking forward to it being improved by patches and DLCs. It doesn't have the depth and functionality of Europa Universalis 4, and doesn't feel quite as immersing. As fun as anomalies are, sending research ships on endless survey missions does get a bit tedious after a while.

My #1 wishlist item right now is all the functionality that's in EU4, such as a message log, ledger, more exhaustive outliner, etc.

 

[klingonadmiral]

What are you talking about? All you have to do is literally build one additional ship and you're fine.

My Corvettes are out scouting the galaxy because science ships are shit at scouting.
I play with Wormholes, if the events happens in the time my Corvettes are jumping through the neighbouring systems those CUltists just wreck my Construction Ship that's building stuff in my home system.

And in the early game I don't have the Minerals to spare for either Corvettes or a new Construction Ship, all minerals go in assets that make me get more Minerals or Energy. Everything else is just a waste of ressources.

 

[Sonereal]

It isn't a waste of resources if the alternative is you get your face stomped in by cultists.

 

[kulw]

And in the early game I don't have the Minerals to spare for either Corvettes or a new Construction Ship, all minerals go in assets that make me get more Minerals or Energy. Everything else is just a waste of ressources.

You have the minerals to do so, because if not you loose the game. That's the same for all people playing it.

 

[klingonadmiral]

It isn't a waste of resources if the alternative is you get your face stomped in by cultists.

The event is far from guaranteed, in about ~20 starts or so I got it three times. If the event does not occur, every single mineral put into a corvette is wasted because a mining platform working 2 minerals for the standard 90 (?) cost pays off in just under 4 years, which is much sooner than the earliest realistical date for a war to break out (I haven't fought one before 2245 or so).