Recent reviews by nirth

I played the first Distant Worlds and really enjoyed it. The game play and the style of game grabbed my attention in a way few games do. I had high hopes for Distant Worlds 2 - that it'd be the Distant Worlds Universe and then some. Unfortunately, it isn't as it stands now. The way the game is now is that it is Distant Worlds Universe and less some.

I'll touch on the crashes briefly since that will, hopefully, be fixed at some point. This is the only game in recent (past six months to a year) that crashed on me. I've played a lot of brand new releases and even betas - this is the one that kept crashing. As noted, this should be fixed, so... whatever.

Back to the game itself - there are an awful lot of restrictions and limitations that were put into the game. Part of the appeal of Distant Worlds Universe to me was the open endedness of everything. You could design your own ships, your own bases, and basically your own empire. The game would play and you had all these fun options with which to tinker. In Distant Worlds 2 - that openness is gone.

As I got further into the game and began learning about the underlying systems from the ship designs, technologies, to the economic system I discovered frustration after frustration. The game doesn't explain what's going on even though, at first blush, it seems like it does. There's this huge "galactopedia" thing that sounds great and then I realized that it's as out of date as most wikis become after a single patch. The information in it is often out of date or completely lacking. The "flavour" text is fine but the actual details, the stuff you need to make decisions on how to design something or how to solve a problem, are lacking.

To me that sums up the game in its present state: lacking.

At the moment this game is not worth picking up. It might be worthwhile after some major patches and / or content releases. Maybe when there are more mods. Something more than what it currently is.

I went into this game looking for a D&D game.

This game does not follow the D&D ruleset. This game has a very distant relationship with D&D mechanics. This is not a D&D based game.

Once you get beyond this not being a D&D game then the game itself is.... messy. All of the bits and pieces of the game (story, modules, multiplayer, game mastering, gameplay, setting, sound, etc) just do not mesh. The game is lacking the element that would make it good and enjoyable. As it is it is more clunky and mired in not knowing what it wants to do.

There is some enjoyment in building overpowered characters if you enjoy that so maybe the game is worth it at 90% off or so.

This is a really fun game with way too much value for its price point (as of this writing $15 USD).

This game easily competes with games that cost over $60 USD.

Give it a try - it is so worth it.

The answer to the most basic question about games of, "is it worth it?" is Yes.

This game is worth it at the full asking price.
The game is even more worth it on sale.

If you enjoy turn-based strategy games then this game is one to get.