Hey everyone I wanted to share some of my thoughts on Endless Space 2 and wanted to know what you thought and if you agree or disagree. Hopefully if Endless Space 3 is made in the future they can touch on this stuff in the future.

Wow there are space battle cinematics in this game? Who watches that? :-D

Hacking is ok. I mean I am not overwhelmed with awesomeness, but it does what it is supposed to and it is not unreasonable.

Map design more EL1 ish or stellarisih, rearely scroll out to maps ok.

I don't watch space battles.

Tech tree, not being a tree is new and innovative very cool and wow and is ok

So by me, ok ok ok ok.

I would mostly say it works for me. I mean sure there could be more depth at times but there also could be less unnecesary depth at times.

What i can add is the abundance of enforced eye candy, this game could run on a potato without all this stuff and it would have been awesome, instead there is clutter of eye candy you can't disable and it drains performance.

And of course the lack of MP balancing, stability, matchmaking, competitive options...

I think pushing it slightly towards something that could me competitive would in fact give it a bit more of recognition.

koxsos wrote:

And of course the lack of MP balancing, stability, matchmaking, competitive options...

I think pushing it slightly towards something that could me competitive would in fact give it a bit more of recognition.

Well I actually like the space battles and eye candy. So I would like for there to be more of that not less. I bought a gaming computer to be able to render all the nice stuff. So why would I want to turn it off?

And for me pushing it more toward multiplayer is a turn off and I'm not interested in that aspect at all. So there are two camps here and I speak under correction but mine is (the last time I checked) the larger camp. However, future titles are up in the air so maybe you'll get your wish and I'll find a different title to play.

I'm not sure what this video was supposed to be, aside of a rant. The first think you look back into is... hacking. Like really? Of all the things ES2 has to offer, first thing that come up to your mind is optional mechanic from 3rd expansion?

Can't even see how is this different in principal from classical espionage. It's the same principle but with other kind of minigame. You still have undercover agents, they still perform sabotague and diversions, you still get punished when they get caught etc. Hell, sometimes I'm still not sure who exactly hacks me.

Map design? What is this even in a space 4X game? Most, if not all of them are just 2D graph plots. The only noticeble difference between Stellaris and ES2 is size. And if you think ES2 would benefit from bigger map size, you've probably barely played it on largest map settings.

Expectation of better scale for battles and better tech tree is reasonable, perhapse it will improve in ES3, if it's ever made.

I appreciate the feedback. I understand that while the expansion is optional, this was the chance for an espionage system that could have been really fleshed out and improved upon from Endless Legend. Disabling it takes both another interesting faction and a mechanic out of the game which I prefer not to do. I know I could simply do the "If you don't like it, then don't play it" but just ignoring it won't help address a problem I see with the game and my hope to see a different system in the next game wouldn't be heard. To summarize, while it may be the same in principle, its execution is where it was lacking in my opinion.

When it came to map design Im talking about more density not a need for a bigger map. While ES2 can have density, from all the time i've played it seems very dependent on the map and random map seeds. While I could crank up the density setting it doens't seem to make a hge difference. I even spent a whole day messing with the setting trying to fine tune a map to my liking and I only got it with a randomly generated seed instead of trying to mess with the settings.

While I understand that I could just make the map bigger, that still doens't fix the whole "empty, yet lmiting" feeling I get from it. Like I said, I'm not saying its a bad game, I just thought some stuff could have been better.

EmilioT wrote:

I appreciate the feedback. I understand that while the expansion is optional, this was the chance for an espionage system that could have been really fleshed out and improved upon from Endless Legend.

What's funny to me is that this is the exact system that we, as in modern times civilizations, use to steal stuff and sow chaos. It's the information age. Endless Legend is set in a pseudo-medieval setting. So sending an agent to sabotage the enemy government is more fitting there. Right now the Chinese, Russian and North Korean hacking and manipulating of information in foreign governments are exactly this. (And the US too) Hack into the sensitive areas and upset things like the power grid and steal data on new technologies?

It's always amused me that space based 4xs all want to default to getting an agent into the deepest parts of a foreign alien environment and doing stuff that way. Its just so silly and risky when you could have spotted a back door and raided their systems without anyone leaving the safety of their planets.

I think their hacking system is pretty much spot on. People don't like it, I suspect, because the AI can and does do it to you as much as you do it to them.

Slashman wrote:

EmilioT wrote:

I appreciate the feedback. I understand that while the expansion is optional, this was the chance for an espionage system that could have been really fleshed out and improved upon from Endless Legend.

What's funny to me is that this is the exact system that we, as in modern times civilizations, use to steal stuff and sow chaos. It's the information age. Endless Legend is set in a pseudo-medieval setting. So sending an agent to sabotage the enemy government is more fitting there. Right now the Chinese, Russian and North Korean hacking and manipulating of information in foreign governments are exactly this. (And the US too) Hack into the sensitive areas and upset things like the power grid and steal data on new technologies?

It's always amused me that space based 4xs all want to default to getting an agent into the deepest parts of a foreign alien environment and doing stuff that way. Its just so silly and risky when you could have spotted a back door and raided their systems without anyone leaving the safety of their planets.

I think their hacking system is pretty much spot on. People don't like it, I suspect, because the AI can and does do it to you as much as you do it to them.

Which is true to an extent, but spies still exist in the real world as well. But hacking seems so lackluster and tedious in comparison. I think these two systems working in tandem would have been great.

CaptainCobbs wrote:
Hacking is a mediocre mechanic in my opinion, it's not good, it's not bad, it's there. It's not something I want to manage each turn because it's not fun, so I play with Penumbra off.

But would you really need to manage it each turn? You set your target and let it go...mostly these things take several turns to return a positive unless your neighbour is right next to you. Even if they are right next to you actually. But hey you bought the expansion...turn it off or on as you wish.

Since this thread becomes a hacking discussion again, I d like to add that you don t need to manage hacking every turn if you play it safe and hack over long distances. Agents still make sense in a setting with modern tech that's true, but I wouldn't like to be an agent who has to infiltrate a completely different race. I mean you stand out by design right? :D Hacking is more sensible there IMO.

I have way over 2000 hours in the game so I guess I like it (except fpr penumbra - It seemed like a seperate game within the game to me so I do not use it). The things in the game that do bother me a lot are (1. The AI logic is terrible in many places. If I have a truce with an AI enemy he can go to any of my systems throughout the truce but I am not allowed to go to any of theirs. That should not have made it out of beta. (2. When the AI requests a truce about 80% of the time they demand I give them my best technologies (usually 3-4 of them) and/or dust and resources. This seems pretty silly when I have just destroyed several of their fleets and taken several of their systems. (3. Who went crazy with the tiny planets? Originally there were not too many and usually in systems with larger planets. Now they are everwhere and they really handicap you when all your early resources are stuck on them. (4 The map generation is far worse and more unbalanced than it was originally. Since the "balance patch" I quit about 90% of the games I start after 10-15 turns because my starting location is so poor on resources and habitable planets for early gameplay and I am blocked into a small area by another race. It is not much fun when you have no hope of winning. For example starting system has one boreal with no strategic resources, 2 toxic and a desert with acid rain. In your entire cluster there is one other system with one immediately habitable planet. It has starting strategic resources but it is TINY! You start to explore the next cluster and it already has an outpost from an opponent. Game over....  (5 I wish they would quit making the specialty planets tiny and putting them in systems with no other resources. Wasting a system slot on them to do the quest so early in the game is frequently just not worth it, 

The latest "balance" patch really unbalanced the game. Even when I get a decent starting area there are usually several AI opponents that were stuck in a position like I described and add almost nothing to the gameplay, I cannot figure out how it balanced anything for anyone, It also appears that all of the AI opponents use pirates all the time. That does not make much sense. Each AI race should have a percentage chance of using them. Lumeris maybe 100%, Unfallen and Riftborn probably 10% or even zero. One other issue I want to mention is the battles. They really need to seperate the battle tactic and the route flown by the ships. Currently ship position in the battle far outweighs the impact of the tactic. I believe allowing them to be set independent of each other would make the battles much better. There are way too many completely worthless tactics currently that could be replaced with route options.. 

Anyway, love the game but hate what they have done to it recently.