I would like to add my 2cents in also.  I am a long-time strategy gamer with thousands of hours in Civ4&5, Stellaris, GalCiv 2&3, and your Endless Space 1 and Endless Legend.  I have learned to wait a while to buy any game, so I just purchased Endless Space 2 about a week ago also.  I have 76 hours in, so you can tell that I enjoy it greatly.  I also watched a bunch of videos on youtube and read as much as I could to understand things.  I also did my favorite Civ5 trick which is I find a map I enjoy and replay it with all the different races and custom races.

Anyway, I expected greatness since Endless Legend was so original and beautiful and able to be customized.  Endless Space 2 surpassed my expectations.  It's interesting how quickly folks give things thumbs up and down without digging deeply into how games are to be played.  As a 4x veteran I appreciate all the small things and just am amazed that the developers of your game and Endless Legend were able to not only learn from other games but have great original ideas. Also the interface and artwork are the best I have ever seen. I am a hard sell on most things in life so hopefully your team will appreciate my praise of this fine game.  Well done.

@minurominerwin: i can see your points and more than that i can even agree and argue on them. I for one think that battle is okay just because it's not my main interest in the game, tho i'd love to see some hero system rework for sure and on and on and on. The whole point of this forum is about this. It's just this thread wasnt's for it. It might be really challenging when u work hard for a long time and not (or rarely) getting any appreciation for it. I can tell game feels and plays way better than 2 months ago for example (for me mainly because of the better ship movement progression and minor factions interaction changes, also new rewards are nice). So it's nice amplitude provided us the place to share all this and listens to us all. 

lilyophelia wrote:

I think that it takes a lot of work and passion to create a game, and that if you have not tried it, you don't understand the sheer amount of effort and energy that goes into it.

I think that it's very easy to pick at a game, and to want to bully other people into doing what you want. I think it's natural, human behavior; but also very base and selfish.

There's definitely room for improvement, and I'm sure the team is already thinking about how to improve the next iteration of the game. Big changes need to be made early in the design of a game, and there are limits to what can be done to address percieved problems (which people might not even all agree are problems to begin with).

ES2 is leaps and bounds ahead of ES1, EL, and a great majority of other games on the market. There's so much innovation and refinement.

With all that said, I thoroughly enjoy Endless Space 2! It's beyond amazing.

I'm sorry that it offends you that I love the game just the way it is.

And finally, to be constructive, I will say that I feel like ES2 captures lightning in a bottle. The game is tight, and the design is as much functional as it is spritual and artistic. I can feel the passion that the team had when they designed this game. It feels like an extremely intimate (and successful) experience. It makes me go, 'Wow!"

It is possible that I know as much, or better than you, how difficult it is to develop a game, and at no time have I disdained the Amplitude effort. I know perfectly what it is to be whole days working and thinking, from morning to night. Do not judge me without proof. I'm sorry if it bothered you what I said about your favorite game, but I did not bully anyone. I have not disrespected anyone. I only have a different opinion to yours. And of course, it does not bother me that for you, the game is perfect, what bothers me is that your vision of perfection could make developers believe that the game, in fact, is perfect. Therefore, it should not be improved.

With regard to "innovation" and "refinement", there are many threads and ideas that speak of this, and I could easily tell you about the myriad of games that came before ES2, and what things they did better. But this thread is not for that, so I will not comment further.

Noone is saying here that the game is completely perfect (well it is, but in a sense lilyophelia meant it) of course there are little bugs here and there and there is room for improvement. But just look through the forum: devs always thank us for our feedback, have u thanked them once? oh u bought it? well the way i see it they earned every penny u paid just as is. 

I wrote up 2 notebooks already because of the amount of information and mechanics i need to keep in my mind while playing. And that's just from playing. I simply can not apprehend the amount of intellectual effort behind it's absolutely grand design (clearly devs are exposed to the great amounts of Dust and have some inhuman capabilities). And if u can't simply appreciate that kind of hard work i'd say u have no voice on the matter. Because when i try to imagine what it's like to create and think through all these designs, formulas and mechanics

Unfortunately. Work is not synonymous with quality. That the game has a lot of effort behind does not mean that the result is good.
And once again I repeat: I do not despise anyone's work. I just point out that the game is NOT perfect. The game has lots of bugs. The combat system is the weakest part of the game (without discussion), the balance is not perfect, neither. And the management of the heroes it does not contribute anything to the game, except for a layer of unnecessary depth. I appreciate depth in diplomacy, combat or trade, but heroes do not currently benefit the game at all. It only makes you waste your time, because its mechanics are boring and repetitive. Amplitude has always wanted to force the presence of heroes in their games, maybe as a way to give them personality, but in this game they do not contribute to making it more fun, rather on the contrary, it is another management in the complex development of your galactic empire, a management without interest.

Despite this, I like the game, it has potential and I do not deny the effort it has behind it, but if the Zealots are at home and dedicate themselves to preaching the perfection of this game and to detract the criticism of other less satisfied players, in the end, the situation becomes toxic, and transmits the wrong message to Amplitude.

minurominerwin wrote:

Forgive me for adding a bitter note to this beautiful thread, but I feel obliged.
It is sad that such a polarized and unconstructive opinion has so much credit, however "sweet" it may be.
Other users, like me, we are also in love with this title. We round this forum often and sometimes we dedicate more time to write than the game itself, all with the aim of improving it, commenting on things we do not like and contributing ideas.
Unfortunately, such messages rarely have as many points as this one. Normally this type of posts are the ones that seem to "pierce" the most for both: users and developers, and yet this can be very toxic, because although pointing out the good things in the game is important, it can be very harmful lose the critical sense and generate a environment of "this game is wonderful", because although it has an INMENSE potential, it is also true that it has serious design errors that undermine the game experience for many players, who get fed up and abandon it.

I just want remember, in case someone had forgotten, that dissatisfied players also count.

After this, I do not want to leave you with a bad taste.
I also play non-stop until it's dark, and I imagine I'm in the game. I let myself be carried away by his designs, his lore and the history of the galaxy that I create myself while I play. I stop to observe the planets, the illustrations and I taste each turn, thinking about the strategy to follow. Because it is true that this game has something special. Something that immerses you inside him and makes you feel that this imaginary world is, while you play, more authentic than the real world. I do not know how you did it, but it shows that the game, at least, has great charisma.

I hear and understand what you say. I'm having only 65 hours in but i have saw little things that bugs me around. It even surprise myself to be around a forum since i don't really like that but with ES2 i feel like my voice count somehow here and i tend to roam in the ideas section to upvote what i feel usefull or reply when i don't have the same opinion.

I guess if that sort of topic got popular both ways, it's also maybe because people love what they have in front of them because it's somehow rare now to see a product constantly followed by his dev team and his community. At least i feel it like that in an era of "devs" who tend to publish unfinished games and leave it like that or put a s**t-load of DLC at any coast.

Of course your voice count and i believe if more people would/could do the same it would help a lot, again in both ways. For exemple, during the 2nd stream of the "Sophon menace" few days ago, i was talking with devs and asked a lot in the chat. Often they told us that we could give our feedback here to have a trace and report everything.

It's maybe not noticeable as it is here since they come to thanks us for our message (i understand it since it's always nice to have a pat-pat in the back from the people you somehow work for) but i strongly believe, again, that your efforts are seen. Keep it that way. :)

Forgive me for adding a bitter note to this beautiful thread, but I feel obliged.
It is sad that such a polarized and unconstructive opinion has so much credit, however "sweet" it may be.
Other users, like me, we are also in love with this title. We round this forum often and sometimes we dedicate more time to write than the game itself, all with the aim of improving it, commenting on things we do not like and contributing ideas.
Unfortunately, such messages rarely have as many points as this one. Normally this type of posts are the ones that seem to "pierce" the most for both: users and developers, and yet this can be very toxic, because although pointing out the good things in the game is important, it can be very harmful lose the critical sense and generate a environment of "this game is wonderful", because although it has an INMENSE potential, it is also true that it has serious design errors that undermine the game experience for many players, who get fed up and abandon it.

I just want remember, in case someone had forgotten, that dissatisfied players also count.

After this, I do not want to leave you with a bad taste.
I also play non-stop until it's dark, and I imagine I'm in the game. I let myself be carried away by his designs, his lore and the history of the galaxy that I create myself while I play. I stop to observe the planets, the illustrations and I taste each turn, thinking about the strategy to follow. Because it is true that this game has something special. Something that immerses you inside him and makes you feel that this imaginary world is, while you play, more authentic than the real world. I do not know how you did it, but it shows that the game, at least, has great charisma.

I have also been itching to write something like this :-) It is very rare that a game has impressed me in so many aspects, and so many times, by its sheer depth and quality.

The excellent soundtrack, athmosphere and art designs is what first drew me in, but what impressed me the most is the sheer number of game mechanics that still manage to interact in a meaningful way without feeling gimicky. In one turn you can hit that sweet spot of extra high prices on the galactic market, to get the dust to influence the next election, to be able to push the pacifist party through, to better establish a stable alliance with your galactic neighbour that offers the best opportunities for those sweet extra-long trade routes -- it feels amazing :-) And then your next game as the Cravers is completely different, without being any less interesting.

A lot of games these days make the promise of interesting decisions every turn, but I cannot remember a game that so thoroughly delivered. I believe the only reason this game does not (quite yet) have the even larger popularity that it deserves in my eyes is that it took me at least quite a while to understand that yes, there actually are meaningful mechanics behind almost every aspect of the game. In the beginning, the sheer amount of mechanics and details can feel overwhelming. But this results in the rare gem of a game that actually gets more and more enjoyable after your twentieth playthrough. I can now still discover new things. Endless space 2 is, in my eyes, a truly excellent game, up there with the classics of the genre.