My thoughts on the game having played it for a while

[hardcoregamer]

You have seen me make some threads on the forum for a while now. Now I am actually going to tell you what I think of the actual game.

I have somewhat mixed feeling for it. On one hand the scale is bigger then any other game and you can really feel like you are running an actual empire because of it. But on the other hand, I feel the game lacks depth.

The game is BIG sure, but BIG is not the same as having depth. There is actually very little colony/planet managment to speak off, and the diplomacy feels very basic. The most complicated aspect of the game appears to be ship design, and even that sometimes feels lacking because of how all ships seem to behave the same regardless of shiptype.

The biggest problem with the game is that I too often feel like I am just playing a very simple game but on a huge scale. Having to tweak a policy or 2 on 40 planets instead of 4 planets is not depth, its tedium. I can of course just let the AI do it, but then I am not playing the game.

Don't get me wrong, I have enjoyed my time with Distant worlds and its expansions, but I can't help but feel a little bit underwhelmed after being this is suppose to be one of the greatest space 4x games ever made.

[Buio]

ORIGINAL: hardcoregamer
Don't get me wrong, I have enjoyed my time with Distant worlds and its expansions, but I can't help but feel a little bit underwhelmed after being this is suppose to be one of the greatest space 4x games ever made.

Everyone are entitled to their opinion.

Personally I think Distant Worlds with expansions is the best space 4x game so far. And by quite some margin. Even with the bugs/annoyances.

After getting used to the real time/pause type of game I have a hard time going back to turn based games. Uninstalled GalCiv2 a while a go, after buying it a second time on Steam (on sale). When I was younger I liked turn based games a lot, now when I'm older I do not enjoy them as much anymore, although some are still great like Civ V.

[zenkmander]

When it comes to colony management, I think it's a bit deeper than you say. You also have to consider population and how that plays a role in tax revenue and empire stability; will you enslave certain races and lose face with their respective empires, or assimilate them for their empire traits but also opinion modifiers, or resettle them to 'third-world' colonies or other empires (and therefore deal with a smaller population on certain planets and slower growth), or simply consider a particular race too much of a hassle and exterminate them? Will you colonize a low-quality planet for a resource that you happen to have little access to otherwise? Or colonize it for purely strategic/military value and deal with the negative cashflow? Colony management can use improvements of course, but that doesn't necessarily make it bad in my opinion.

As for diplomacy, it will look subpar if you're coming from a game like CK2, but you also have to consider that CK2's scope is a bit smaller. It doesn't have anything like DW's private sector for example, just an abstract version of trade (which is fine for that game).

No game is perfect, but like Buio I also consider this the best space 4x available. You can point out similar flaws in many other great games as well.

CK2 is good, but it sucks that there's no naval combat.
Civ 5 is good, but it sucks that there's no tactical element, you can't go on to rule a space civilization, in space, and that you can't really customize your units.
Total War series is good, but it sucks that the strategic element isn't as good as Civ.


I don't think anyone will find a more complete space 4x than Distant Worlds. Some might be better in certain areas (GalCiv 2's ship design for example, since you can actually change the appearance of the ship as well), but overall I think DW is the best.

[ASHBERY76]

Civ city building in space is what most 4X designers cannot seem to get over.At this scale it's laughable that movie theatres and farms have any impact.The game is about macro choices and organising ships and not what your local councillor would be doing.Elliot got that spot on.

Diplomatic depth like EU is what the game is missing but all the space 4X games I have played are simplistic in that area due to once again copying Civ gameplay.

[Darkspire]

If you ask someone to tell you the all that will happen in a book that you have not read properly yourself then you will lose interest in the book and not want to read it.

Darkspire

[Timotheus]

"Civ 5 is good".

I am pretty sure you meant Civ IV with all the expansions.

Anyways, I am not sure how deep this game is, really.

It is great fun, but it seems to me that designing good ships and teching for them is 90% of the game.

Sword of the Stars 1 (I do not acknowledge the SOTS2 disaster) has a very simple diplomacy mechanic, especially with the dolphins who once slighted, stay that way, and other races being more or less aggressive depending on their racial setup.

I really like the SOTS1 asking for opinions, saying that I want that planet, bug off buddy to the AI ally (and the AI ally either responding "OK" or "We will do what we want" is REALLY cool).

Also, RTS space pew pew with a really cool combat system.

To be fair, I just started DS, and it seems like great fun, but am wondering whether the politics and alliance system here is a bit deeper than I realize or if it is as shallow as it seems.

[Plant]

What is depth? What does it mean? Does it mean that it is complicated for the sake of being complex? In that case Distant worlds has plenty of that. Does it mean it has difficult to understand game mechanics becuase information is witheld? Distant Worlds has plenty of that too.

By the way, the ship roles do act differently if left on automaton.
Explorers really do explore (somewhat inefficiently).
Some military ships "escort", some patrol and others form up in fleets.
The ships can also be designed to act differently when facing different strength of enemies too.
So all ships do not act the same way as you said.

You say you don't want to tweak a policy on 40 planets instead of 4, but isn't colony/planet management in other games exactly that? Tweaking a policy by building buildings 20 times for each world.

Des the game lack depth? Yes, maybe. But what it does have is the very nebulous concept of atmosphere. It has a feeling of a living galaxy.