Stellaris

was a good game, but incredibly disapointed to see "generative" "ai" content worm into one of my favourite games via the most recent dlc. they're only making justifications for its use to see what they can get away with, testing the waters. if you can't be bothered to create your own art, whats the point of making games?

I own this on another platform. I've put my time into it to evaluate it. It's never going to be finished. The ride never ends. It's nothing like what it started out as. It still has late-game performance problems. It's overpriced at above-free. Stellaris might as well be F2P because the DLCs constitute microtranscations for desperately needed and vital to playability bug-fixes and UX enhancements. I've never been as crestfallen about a video game in all my life. For me this is Paradox's E.T., but stupefyingly, people still keep giving Paradox/Tencent money for this abysmal scheme. No support comes from the company or its forums. You may be abused or ignored if you report issues with the software. I would advise running away personally.

There is little in the way of meaningful interactions between the different species in the universe. Even the addition of a galactic council does little to add additional depth or intrigue. They either happily ignore one another or engage in genocidal campaigns based upon little provocation and nebulous ideals -galactical council be damned. This alone makes the game feel simply mechanical. Exploration is curtailed by the stupidly close proximity of spawns and limited in variety of encounters. A pity, since this was the bit I was naturally drawn to. The last game I will probably ever play was on the largest map possible with only ten AI -and every single one of them was within the same third of the map with my position dead center. I made contact with all of them within the first twenty years. and reached what would be the borders of my fledgling empire within fifty years without expanding through more aggressive tactics. Speaking of combat and tactics, there is no avoiding the one and nothing to the latter. There is some advantage to deploying strategies and a little usefulness in weapon variety varying against ship types and defensive loadouts. . .But one can effectively ignore all of that and simply pursue a high-numbers-always-win mien and find success without much effort. Nor is the AI able, insightful, or effective enough to make for compelling hostilities or memorable battles. In short, combat just isn't good; Good enough, yes, but that isn't the same thing. The music is pleasant, but derivative and offered in a sort of whimsically mindless manner with motiffs lifted almost directly from other, better, efforts such as Interstellar, Mass Effect, and Deus Ex. Whether the notes are exciting or sorrowful, there is no correlation and therefore all of it simply fades into the background much like the humming of an imbecile. A little thoughtfulness here might have gone a long way because the musical accompaniment really is the best thing about the game.

Dumb extra launcher. Online account bullshit. 2 million DLC.

I'm a big fan of 4x games and science fiction themes, but unfortunately can't recommend this game. While it does have a lot going for it in terms of writing, exploration, story events, and more- it also has a fatal flaw in being opaque and sometimes overly complicated. The possible worst offender here is combat, where the power ranking of a fleet or starbase seemingly has no impact on the outcome of a battle. Yes, I've read the forums that describe how different ship configurations are supposed to "counter" superior fleet power, but honestly who can be bothered with the espionage mechanic (another weak point in my opinion) or changing their ship configurations with every battle? It's all very micro-managing intensive and ultimately not fun, which is a shame because it's an impediment to enjoying the many other positive qualities that the game has to offer. Too bad