So thanks to the magic of Steam's new discovery update, my feed is often inundated with weird strategy games (half of which I already own on another service) and I was reminded that Endless Legend was not only a game that had been in Early Access for a bunch of months but had somehow also come out. I'm a sucker for fantasy 4X games of any kind, and I thought Endless Space was a neatly streamlined, if somewhat dry, 4X game with surprisingly brutal AI.

I assume someone must have played it, either during early access or now as a full release. I'm just interested to know if it's even worth putting on my radar or not.

I've read a few reviews about it, haven't played it myself yet. They say it's an interesting albeit flawed take on 4X; sounds like it's worth checking out, at least.

Everything seems kind of sterile. Endless space style UI doesn't work well with fantasy i think. Ill probably give it a shot down the line but so maaany games atm.

Endless Space was incredibly dry. It just felt like numbers went up and colours changed if one number got too big.

I've played the beta. haven't gotten around to the full release yet.

It's absolutely worth it. It's a much better game then Endless Space imo too, nowhere near as dry. It's basically Civ without so much micromanagement, but with some very neat unique concepts of it's own. I personally love the art style and unlike a lot of it's contemporaries it has not been a resource hog for little bullshit effects that don't matter; clean and snappy. There are some main things going for it, it's a bit of a unique setting, mixing some sci-fi trappings within it's world. It's city expansion and zone usage is also an interesting take, that means you need to make decisions as your city expands, the battles occur using the same terrain that is on the over world map, there are only a few core units for each faction that can be upgraded and customized throughout the tech progression but there are a lot of neutrals that can be recruited and used. It has a hero system similar to ES with modest talent trees, quest chains and a bit of gear. But most importantly it's factions are really really different, it's not just some stats and bonuses like in many other 4X games, their very core mechanics and play styles vary, there is a faction that cannot grow food well and gets it for killing enemies and can sacrifice their own pop for certain benefits; there is a faction that cannot declare war by itself but has access to stronger market manipulation by locking others out of trade and has advanced tech to start of with to make armies out of neutral mercs that show up as factionless; there are dudes who cannot regenerate and have to spend dust (gold) to both heal themselves and to increase their pop in addition to it's common uses of buying buildings and trade; and so on.

From all the recent similar 4X games I've played like Age of Wonders 3, Warlock: MotA or Fallen Enchantress this was by far the most interesting game and the one that actually delivered properly on it's ideas without drowning in mediocrity of execution. Even the beta kept me playing for that one more turn feeling. And because the factions are so different I will probably get at least 9 full map playthroughts from it until I get bored, unlike in most 4X games where it gets samey and boring by like the third or fourth (tops) scenario for me.

The things that were not in the beta (that i've checked on steam forums are indeed in now in the final release) were road and trade route implementation, the last two era research trees, and a proper AI.

@tennmuerti: Alright! I guess I'll have to check it out when it's on sale. I'm still playing a lot of Age of Wonders III (which the devs have been pretty strident about patching and improving) but I wouldn't mind finding a different form of turn-based crack, especially if Beyond Earth doesn't fix some of the issues I had with Civ V.

Well I know Shenryyr was amazing at Endless Space so presumably he'll eventually do the same in this game, at that point I'll have an idea of how good it is. Seems like a fine type of game in general, removes some of the tedium from the 4X formula without making it easy and the AI doesn't straight up cheat like it does in Civ (or did in older Civs, no idea what it does in Civ V, but Firaxis is bad at legitimate difficulty regardless; Gettysburg/Waterloo aside) so there's actually a compelling reason to play it more than once.

I played Early Access and really liked it. When I play Civ6, I'll find Wheat and it'll be like "oh look it's Wheat".... in Endless Fantasy I find Wizard Balls and Glassteel and Fuckeronium and it's like what's all this?!

The way the provinces and the creeps work is also interesting, and I was just getting into that Influence or reputation system or whatever it is. I remember the AI being hard in Early Access, but that might be because all the tools weren't on the table yet.

I didn't much care for Endless Space, but I hear some good things about this one. I'll check it out at some point.

@fredchuckdave: I'm fairly certain that Civ 5 still does the standard Civ cheat of "on the hardest difficulties, we'll just give the AI more starting workers/settlers, and some kind of multiplier on their gold income or some other resource". I forget the specifics, but yeah, definitely cheating instead of AI that is devilishly efficient/AI that is able to properly capitalize on their starting area on the map.

@brodehouse said:

I wish these were real resources.

@arbitrarywater: Been playing about 3 hours of it and enjoying it so far. I played a bunch of Endless Space, but at some point the AI in that game just ruined any fun I had. Also, I never felt like I was making any substantial progress anywhere even if I was. I think what sets Endless Legend apart from Endless Space is the fact that EL is much more eager to tell you about your current status. Or in other words; what things are, what to think about and what to do next. It all feels a lot more clear in EL than ES. I don't feel like I'm trying to figure systems out as much as I was in ES. But as said, I am a mere 3 hours with the game so that could change, I suppose.

I think @tennmuerti covered most of the things worth bringing up though in regards to gameplay specifics.

I almost made the purchase - decided to go with Wasteland instead. For the most part, I don't regret it, but I expect I'll try it out at some point. Probably not until next year.

It definitely improves on what was done in ES (which I love). Most notably the combat system now isn't complete garbage. The setting of the game in itself is worth checking out.

@bisonhero: I swear I had a city that used the Wizard Balls resource..! They gave me like +10 dust or money or something.

Also I just realized I called it Endless Fantasy instead of Endless Legend. Endless Fantasy will be their Warcraft clone.

@brodehouse: Or the name of a Nightwish album.

@brodehouse: Does the whole game revolve around dust/money still? Oil should be a resource like Warcraft 2 methinks, those were the days.

I'd Fuckeronium.

I haven't played in a couple months, but I remember it being a very Civ-inspired system. Towns generate food+production+science+money in different areas. I think they also produce influence/reputation, which is kind of like culture in Civ, except you spend it for temporary boosts across like 15 turns.

Yep, aside from the empire focus (those boosts) you also use influence for all your diplomatic shenanigans. With more major deals requiring more obviously, it also costs culture to trade tech, and if you break or change treaties/deals early you have to pay an extra influence penalty cost. There are also certain influence thresholds for recruiting minor factions that come with their own bonuses and units.

The dust(money)/food/production/science is there. But you are also constantly uncovering new minerals like Fuckeronium to equip your cities with cool new production doodads and your dudes with sweet new Fuckeronium maces the deal a Fuckton of damage. Or you are scrambling to find new wizzard balls so that you can use them to boost your empire happiness and thus combat their creeping depression due to expansion, or you control some gold resources and activate that luxury to just double all your trade route income for several turns, stuff like that.

Oh yeah forgot to mention, the trader dudes can pack up their cities wake up a giant beetle and just move them to a new spot, kind of like a gigantic ass trailer, then unpack the entire city and all it's districts at a new spot.

There is also a concept of a winter season where a lot of your shit gets significant penalties (with certain tech or hero abilities to work around some of the penalites) that gets longer and longer each time eventually becoming an endless winter. The world you are on is dying basically.

I for one adored Endless Space and I'm glad to see there's a good chance I'll probably enjoy this one as well.

I thought Endless Space was gorgeous and picked this and Dungeon of the Endless up when they were on the Daily sale of the recent Steam Sale. Can't wait to play this over Christmas.

I also loved Endless Space and that game alone sold me on this game. So the other day, I picked up Endless Legend and didn't stop playing for 8 hours. It's Civ meets Heroes of Might and Magic.

I really like the look of it and the personality, definitely improved from ES in that regard. My only problem is that the game feels so, so slow. Unless there's something I'm missing, it doesn't seem like you can turn off or skip animations, which sucks. I feel like it takes like ten minutes a turn, of which maybe a minute is spent actually making a decision. The rest is just watching units move.

Turning battles into auto helped speed the game along for me .

@tekzero: Already did that. I'm not talking about the battles, I'm just talking about the units moving around the map. It. Takes. Forever. I just want an option for them to move at about 10x the pace and get to their destination tile, like every other 4X ever has.