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Stark wrote:I hope Stravo isn't still looking; at this point I'd probably recommend Distant Worlds, because it's interesting if a bit cheap and nasty... wait... they want HOW MUCH for it?

As an update I've come to realize there just isn't anything out there on point with what I was looking for but was intrigues by Edi's suggestion about getting MoO2 on Good old games and gave it a whirl for $5.99 what did I have to lose? The purchase and download process was painless and within 10 minutes of purchase had the game up and running. I was nervous that I was going to be disappointed with the combination of dated graphics and touch of rose colored glasses about the game. Well, as 3am rolled around and I thought, just one more turn, I was a happy old gamer. Gameplay does indeed transcend things like graphics and interface. Thanks everyone for helping out and thanks Edi for suggesting Good ol games, I even went ahead and downloaded another oldie - Call to Power 2 and look forward to taking that out for a spin.

I am surprised though that a 4X space game worth a damn just isn't out there right now. Hell, just take MoO2 and update the graphics and add some mission elements and you have yourself a game. It's kinda depressing that we have first person shooters up the ass and all other kind of games but no one can seem to put together something for us old space expansion fans.

Stark wrote:Distant Worlds has some good ideas (and some awful art) but I haven't played enough of it to know how the UI stands up lategame. The high level of optional automation means you can play any individual aspect of the game without worrying about the rest, though, which is pretty awesome, and with everything set to 'suggest', you basically get pressured by the military into starting wars with everyone. The game also has extremely dynamic factions (ie, new factions will constantly form out of inhabited worlds, rebel worlds, recently conquered worlds etc) and in one game a planet that changed hands a few times simply became independent as soon as nobody was looking and started securing its own system, which is neat.

the UI late game becomes pretty sluggish, what with all the shit the game needs to keep track of, but with the ability to automate everything, its still super light on micromanagement. the only other annoyance is the difficulty fleets have of refueling sometimes. seems totally random. the lack of borders in the game is a bit vexing, as always.

Stravo wrote:I am surprised though that a 4X space game worth a damn just isn't out there right now. Hell, just take MoO2 and update the graphics and add some mission elements and you have yourself a game. It's kinda depressing that we have first person shooters up the ass and all other kind of games but no one can seem to put together something for us old space expansion fans.

Look at how hard it is for people to remake XCOM.

Any MoO2 remake would need to introduce concepts like 'balance' and 'AI' and 'diplomacy' that make the old game such a bland cheesefest; even the modern Civ games are actually modern as opposed to simple rehashes of a broken game from 1988.

It's actually depressing you describe yourself as a 'space expansion fan', when the very definition of a '4X' game is what drove the focus on unbalanced combat and colony rushes in the first place. Ironically that's probably why the hilariously unbalanced combat of MoO2 is so fondly remembered; you can lose the colony rush and be doomed, but still win anyway because the AI is so amazingly stupid.

Artemas, I've played a few games to the point where the biggest challenge is coordinating troop deployment, and it's a laugh how many games have this same problem. 'Troops' are even the only ingame resource you need to manually move, and they made it as annoying as possible. I've noticed your ships will only use 1/4 speed when docking, so when you tell a ship with no fuel to refuel, it'll move at 1/4 of its reduced speed, slowly gaining on the planet as it orbits. It can take months of gametime!

Stravo wrote:Hi guys, I was wondering if there are any space conquest games currently out there worth a damn to play. I'm not looking for the next Master of Orion because I'm sure its not out there. I played the hell out of the GalCiv II games and loved them but now the bug has bitten me to play one of these and I want to try something new. I don't mind if it's old or obscure just as long as it's entertaining. Cheap would also be helpful as my budget is not set to pick up a full priced game based on a weekend boredom's urge. I was on Steam perusing and saw a game called Star Ruler that seemed interesting (and cheap) let me know if that would be good enough to cure my craving. Thanks.

Star Ruler is basically Space Empires in real time, in real 3D (ships can move in 3D, systems are arranged in 3D), with a much less clunkier interface, better modding support and more developer support in general. It's actually not technically going to be 'released for real' until this Fall, and is still actively being developed with new features and improvements getting added fairly regularly.

On the other hand, there is so much less actually in the game. Far fewer components, far fewer racial options, far fewer game options in general, far fewer shipsets (they just added their second one), not everything is documented or configurable that should be. Diplomacy isn't as developed, there's no espionage system, and the system doesn't handle megascale objects like ringworlds or ridiculous ship scales very well yet. There are very few special systems or situations, like nebulae or black holes (though they obviously want to add these),

A lot of the problem is simply a lack of comparable content, even though the game has the ability to handle most of it, and even do a few things Space Empires can't (like create a galaxy-destroying superweapon). I could certainly see it surpassing Space Empires eventually, after enough content gets added, but I don't think that's going to happen for awhile.

How would Distant Worlds compare to Armada 2526?

It's much less clunky, the combat is less fiddly, and it is less ugly. However, Distant Worlds uses some very bizarre way to draw the screen, so when things get 'busy' with many units it can look a bit poop. 'Colony management' is also basically restricted to what structures you build in orbit, and the building sequence either has hidden stuff going on I don't know about or sometimes simply breaks and stops happening.

It has a very different feel to micro-heavy games like 2526, which is worth mentioning. You can play Distant Worlds by agreeing with advisors and intervening where necessary (generally around troop management, ugh) and be relatively competitive with the AI.