Recent reviews by Miesha

Stellaris has become my go-to game to relax and immerse myself in the fantasy of ruling an interstellar empire. I've always been quite big on science fiction, without ever really getting into the "big" franchises so much. My all-time favourite science fiction ANYTHING is Stargate, the whole franchise (except that one game nobody likes to talk about).

Now, Stellaris is nothing like Stargate and that's fine. I'm just explaining where I come from. Recently Stellaris has come under massive scrutiny from people that are upset about the newest expansion and the free patch that came with it. I get that, I really do. Let me break down what the core complaints are about, as best as I understand them:

1) People are upset about the change from being able to pick one of three unique forms of FTL travel throughout the galaxy to a single method only with three alternative variants discoverable throughout the game. Prior to the 2.0 patch, you could choose between
Warp Travel (travel to any system in range of your warp drives, regardless of how many systems were inbetween),
Wormhole Gates (travel to any system in a huge range around the wormhole gate near instantly, but you have to return to a system with a Wormhole Gate in order to travel to a new one, and the gates are fairly fragile) or
Hyperlanes (travel from system to system one after another with fairly fast recharge rate on jumps)
and each empire could have different methods of travel making for a very interesting and dynamic galaxy. On paper. In reality, if you didn't use Warp you'd fall behind everyone else because the ability to jump anywhere with no restriction is quite powerful.
In 2.0 everyone is restricted to Hyperlane travel and to top it off, you now need to travel across the system to reach the next lane in order to continue jumping, you cant just continously hop on and on. But later in the game you discover how to make use of naturally occuring wormholes (basically identical to hyperlanes but connecting two systems that can be anywhere on the galactic map, though you dont know and dont get to choose where the wormhole connects to), as well as getting access to the Hypergate Network if you discover them. Hypergates are very similar in function to Stargates or if you've played Eve Online, the Gate Network. Players can even eventually build up their own Hypergates. Each gate links to all other gates in the network, but you can only travel to neutral or friendly territory gates.

The second thing people are complaining about is the recent "discovery" that the AI gets massive bonuses to everything even at the lowest level of difficulty. This is a discussion I do not like involving myself in, but I'll just say this: No matter what game you play, the AI will never be able to function identical to a human player, because it isn't human.

A game I am a big fan of is called AI War: Fleet Command. In it, you play as the final pockets of human resistance in a galaxy dominated by AI-controlled machines. AI that humans created to fight their wars for them. Interestingly in that game, the AI functions so radically different from the human player that to even think to complain about it "cheating" is a falacy, since that's literally the core of the game.

Similarily, in order for Stellaris to function, the AI needs to be given bonuses to help it function at a level that makes it competitive vs human opponents because humans are, inevitably, going to find ways to exploit or abuse the AI to make it easier on themselves. The players who complain that the AI is getting these major bonuses do so because their easy abuse of the AI no longer works and they are upset about this. Give them a month and you'll see their complaints die away because they found new ways to exploit the AI.

If you're with me so far, you're hopefully interested in playing Stellaris. I can warmly recommend it. In its current state it feels better than ever before. No longer can you win this game by purely building Swiss Army Cruisers, or Plasma Cruisers, or Tachyon Battleships, as you could in past iterations of the game. Currently you need to employ tactics. Fortify your defenses along chokepoints in your small corner of the galaxy. Ally with friends against hostiles, or backstab them while they're busy in other wars. Gang up on the Fanatic Purifier before he cleanses the galaxy of all life. Submit to the Khan or let him stomp all over you, then rise up and take over once he falls from power. There's a lot to do, and a lot that can be done. Discover the lost world of Zanaam, guarded by ancient Destroyers, or find Sanctuary, the ringworld that is home to several civilizations on the cusp of discovering their own place in the galaxy.

tl;dr, for those who do not like to read: Stellaris 2.0 is better than all of previous Stellaris. Haters gonna hate, just let them do so and come join the fun instead.

If you're like me and love RTS games, you should totally try out this game. Brings me back to the days of Supreme Commander LANs which I did like every weekend when I was younger. Great fun times to be had, especially if you've got a friend or two to play with.

Addicting as f*ck! I love it <3

Though there are a good few spelling mistakes and a couple of slightly irritating minor bugs still in it. Nothing gamewrecking that I've encountered yet though. I'll give it 8/10 ^_^