Hi there,



since this is my second post in this forum, i have to warn you for two reasons:



1. i am a 47 year old gamer, playing pc-games since, well, a long time ago in an other millenium and due to my top4-alltime games:

- Master of Orion 2

- Xcom: ufo defense

- Civ-Series

- Master of Magic



2. i am a german so i have to apologize for my english



I bought Endless Space on january the 1st, 2013, steam says 90h playtime so far and still cannot believe how it was possible that this jewel has slipped below my radar for half a year. Last advice - a wall of text is incoming so maybe now is a good time to click away.



I. Current State of the game



The graphics are pure eyecandy to me like the spartan GUI does its work perfectly. Nearly everything i need is just 1 or 2 clicks away. Sometimes i am looking at my planets just to watch them rotate und dream of a few hundred ways to improve the game (of course in my purpose) while i am listening to the wonderful atmospheric soundtracks of endless space. Surprisingly the gameflow itself has no hugs i was able to complete several games without any deadend. With increasing difficulty settings i found myself more and more to be overwhelmed by the damned pirates spawning permanently in all locations and situations rather than one of the other factions - on the other hand they are the best xp-food my heroes could find in the whole galaxy.



II. technical issues



On my machine the game freezes from time to time in varying situations but since its not very often and the autosave is just 1 round away no big problem for me. The entries in the output_log.txt arent very useful. The possibility to select a higher loglevel in unity3d's debugger could be helpful.



III. Expectations/Suggestions for future patchs



Hopefully the multiplayer will be fixed. Following a list of minor changes and wishes that could fit in patches:



- while selecting a technology to research which itself unlocks new tech its nearly impossible to know what these will change - thus the player is not really able to decide which research is most viable without having open the endless space wiki. That situation renders the searchfunction in lower right corner of the research-screen, well, lets say useless. Atleast a list of the new building and their bonus in the description would be very handy.



- while in the systemview we can see in the bottom left box all possible things to build. Theses items are ordered by type via a small colored triangles. An option to order them by price would save me a huge amount of scrolling time



- lets say i have explored all the galaxy and have a colonist by the hand and must decide which system is next to colonize. Do you really want me to click through every white system in the galaxy view just to find a HUGE TERRAN planet over and over again? A list of all uncolonized planets sortable by size,climate,enemy presence and would come in extremly handy.



- i like to win my games thus knowing how far my competitors are in relation to the different victory conditions is crucial for me - the numbers are there please make them visible. Currently i hover the left topmost icon in the galaxyview just to puzzle how far they are.



- more factions/traits would be nice but i ended up to always create my own race (eg selecting all posivite sciencetraits) because i cant see a strong story belonging to each of the predefined factions.



- scraping ships should yield a (small) return.





IV. Addon / DLC



Since i like E.S. really because its the one title that comes imho very close to MOO2 i cant wait to spend, lets say 20€, for more of it. Speaking of money, i bought E.S. via steam for 17,50 € which is in my opinion extremly cheap. So, if dreaming is allowed what would i want to have for 20 more bucks? Here we go:



- new events - the current events are nice but weak. I want one of my systems going supernova - if not resolved by researching a suitable, suddenly accessible research. Deploy a hero on a neutral system sieged by pirats which have to be beaten to save this "unique" hero for your empire. Let a mystery creature (ok this is from moo2) threaten the galaxy. why not activate the left wonders from the infinites? Having 5 wonders under control opens a gateway to a hidden infinity-system (aka guardian in moo2). If a mysterious virus breaks out give us the possibility to research a cure while the virus expands visible in galaxyview system by system instead of a simple popup. Generally i would prefer events that gives an opportunity for me to react properly. Ever thought about a riot in a system event? Or let the corrupt admin of an enemy system contact the player with the offer "collect 5000 dust for me an we will join jour empire"?



- i now use by default imperium aeterna mod - resizing planets, converting asteroid fields in tiny planets is pure fun to me.



- right now i think a system with 6 planets is not only worth 6 systems with 1 planet but its much much more worthy. So hunting early for these system is very important to me. Let us change this a little bit to bring it back in a balance. The ability to create an asteroid field at an empty planet slot maybe? Or even better each empty planetslot can be used for something else - let us develop some "galactic transmitter" as a travel shortcut between 2 systems which needs an empty planetslot to be build. A systemwide shield would also need a planetorbit. moduls that block or at least slow down (remember ascendency?) a connection between 2 stars also would need them.



- of course i want to be able to destroy planets or even better make a star going supernova - which can be useful to interrupt interstellar travel.



- Heroes. Currently they are done with lvl20 all future xp is lost. How about letting them start with just 1 trait and having every 10 levels the option to select another specialization? Leveling heros is a great source of fun - please dont stop it in the midgame.



- please resolve the biggest current downside of E.S. in my opinion - the missing spacefights. The first time a battle occurs i press "manual" to enjoy a fantastic cinematic but after the 5th battle i always press automatic because its nothing more than a loss of time - the outcome of a battle is nearly completely predictable. Btw am i the only one who is always selecting 3 autorepair battlecards and everything is fine? To me it feels like buying a porsche - without tyres. Everybody who is fine with the current battlesystem can use automatic or manual furthermore but please add a third button called "tactic" and let us do something in the battle. I dont expect epic battles like in moo2 but give us something like select formation or predefined patterns for each ship after every phase (defensive, offensive). Just loosing ships because their captains name sounds like 'Schettino' nearly breaks my heart everytime i click manual!



- lack of endgame. to my opinion the outcome of the game decides relatively early. so the last 30+ rounds of a game are more something of a cleanup than something i need to worry. If you are unwilling to give us something like the antarians how about a bonus for every homesystem that makes it really hard to conquer an enemy completely?



- as i already said while being in the systemview i even enjoy just viewing the rotating planets. What a fun would it be to klick on such a planet and an interaction would be possible - hm - groundtroops for invasion maybe?



- new weapons that can cleanup an occupied starsystem for a solely new colonization (fighters / bomber for example)



- bigger shipclasses please (beyond 5 cp) name it doomstar if you like



- everytime a system is completey evolved its production can be set to bonus-dust or bonus-science - what a waste of precious productionpoints! I want definitely the ability to convert them to food (food->production is already implemented) for popgrowth! Even better would be a way to redirect them somehow to weak systems by expanding colonizationmoduls with the ability to be unload on populated planets? Or remember the transmitter suggestion build on an empty planetslot? Maybe these transmitters could redirect production to a fresh colonized system via conversion in (a new resource called) energy? Of course at a very very bad ratio - lets start with 1:100 and give us researchable technique to improve these over time?



I stop better for now - i disbelief that somebody read up to here ...



V. Final



Amplitude Studios have made a game that i was looking for years - at least it comes very close to it. A small company in the heart of france - i take my hat off to them. Because i am a curios person some questions came into my mind - i am not to expect to get answers but here they are:



- how long did Amplitude Studios work on that game?

- how many copies have been sold?

- was it a (financial) success in your eyes?

- since you used unity3d pro - have you used c#, javascript or boo for scripting?



Thats all for now - but be warned - i'll be back!

ordoban wrote:
I stop better for now - i disbelief that somebody read up to here ...

Still there. Good post!

Hi Ordoban and welcome to the forums!



Thanks for your warm comments on Endless Space. The positive side of finding out the game in January, is that you got an improved version of the game (thanks to the community feedback) than the game released in July (which was still already great ).



I will answer your final questions here, and let other experts handle the rest of your post.

- how long did Amplitude Studios work on that game?

About 18 months of development time for the release, then 6 months of free add-ons development. I can however say that this game has gestated in our minds (SpaceTroll and myself) for a long time before the production actually started.

how many copies have been sold

I can say above 200,000 copies and rising

was it a (financial) success in your eyes?

Yes, it was, although the company is not crazy rich. There have been lots of promotions also, and we did not charge any of the 3 first add-ons. Still, quality is essential for us, and improving Endless Space was a worthy investment.

since you used unity3d pro - have you used c#, javascript or boo for scripting?

We use C# in Unity. I am a former programmer, and it seemed like the logical choice, confirmed by our Technical Director. C# is a stricter language, with many tools available, so conversion from C++ felt more natural.



Cheers,

By the way ordoban, you may be interested by this piece from Jeff Spock, Amplitude's narrative director:

Endless Space: When Triple-A Developers Go Indie

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/182470/endless_space_when_triplea_.php

It's a partial answer to your final questions.

Wow, these answers were beyond my expectations - you sirs have won a customer who can not await further addons and even more your next hit.



@SpaceVC - the gamasutra-article is something other people would only have made fee-based public - thank you for that inspiring story.



Right now i think this in not the maximum amplitude (excuse my wordplay) of the way you have decided to go. I am quite sure you are already in deep thoughts of your next product. If this is the case, well, have you ever heard about the game "Planets Edge" published in 1992 by New World Computing? A forgotten jewel in my opinion.



with my best regards

Endless Space is excellent, I already put over 800 hours in MP and this was with sync issues. Took a break the past month only playing a few games here and there. I am delighted with Amplitude as a developer as they are really working hard on sync issues. I hope they do well and I look forward to the next free addon & not free Xpac

ordoban wrote:


- while selecting a technology to research which itself unlocks new tech its nearly impossible to know what these will change - thus the player is not really able to decide which research is most viable without having open the endless space wiki. That situation renders the searchfunction in lower right corner of the research-screen, well, lets say useless. Atleast a list of the new building and their bonus in the description would be very handy.

This sounds like you don't know that you can zoom in on the research screen to see more info. A common problem for people

Exactly what i found out this afternoon - i feel ashamed