Master of Orion

This is an enjoyable game that captures the spirit of the original two games, but also changing things up enough that it stands alone on its own merits. Given that it is not at a AAA price point, it is a definite buy for those that like the 4X genre. It has its flaws, hopefully things that will be addressed by the developer in time, but it does not prevent the game from being fun. The addition of star lanes makes ship movement on the galaxy map a strategic decision, and adds a lot to the game. While people do not generally play 4X games for the cinematic sequences and voice overs, they are very well done and make the game feel great to play. They help bring each of the races alive, both when you play as them and play against them. The UI works very smoothly, and managing even a very large empire does not feel like a chore as it does in some 4X games. The AI is competent; if you do not defend your territory well, the AI will take advantage of it. I have mixed feelings on the real-time combat. While I agree that late game it can be highly annoying to wait for a fleet of 50 ships to individually move and fire,, the real-time combat does not feel nearly as tactical. Ship positioning does not feel as important. It also causes multiplayer combat to be auto-resolve only, which takes a lot of the fun out of the multiplayer mode. The biggest negative I have had with the game is that it seems like a lot of the highly powerful game mechanics were removed. Race traits seem very tame compared with MOO2, almost like the developer was trying to keep things conservatively balanced. Powerhouse race traits are either gone (like Democracy, Telepathic, Unification) or poor shadows of their former selves (Tolerant, Subterranean, Lithovore). Leaders, and by extension the super powerful ones, are gone as well. Part of the fun of MOO2 was pitting one set of overpowered mechanics against another.

Ok, so based on my experience playing the game for about 10 hours I can definitely recommend it. I have never played the original before so I can not compare, but this is a very nice 4x game. The game has a nice pace, it is not too complex so that you would need a manual to even try it, but at the same time does have enough depth to keep you interested for quite some time. The visuals are very nice, with nice the battles, especially after you get the bigger classes of ships. As I said the complexity is not as big as with other types of games like this, but for me that is more of a plus. Overall worth the price, look forward to some DLCs with more content....

d

sadly it is not a worthy moo title.

I loved MOO, it was the first PC game I ever played. This is a very nice homage to the best version, MOO2. I play on my 2017 macbook pro. It can be a bit buggy and I've had trouble with it crashing, but I still play it.