In the original disc version, you can extract game files, specifically message text(uzenetek), and inside there are Hungarian comments that reveal more about the story than what is present in the messages!
@@SardonicSays there's no need for Google translate, Hungarians on the internet love flexing their knowledge of the language because it's ridiculously hard
My first 4x was Master of Magic and the space variant Master of Orion 1-2. Also Played with fragile allegiance, pax imperia, Galactic civilization 1-3, Space Empires, Imperium Galactica 1-2 also Reunion which was the precedessor of Imperium Galactica.
Nexus: the Jupiter Incident being a result of a salvaged game does explain the incredibly detailed campaign map (the star system menu). This menu never serves any other purpose than to look pretty.
I can not wait for someone to pick up the mantle of Nexus. It my opinion, it was unique to the point of being in a genre of it's own. Have I played the Homeworld series? Yes. Everspace? Starpoint Gemini? Sins of a Solar Empire? Galactica Deadlock? Starhammer? Gothic 40k? And more? Yes to all. But Nexus was DIFFERENT. It was something special.
@@praesentius Have a go at the sword of the stars. Its not better but does things way different you can designated your own weapons on ships and every race has their own way of carving their path through the galaxy. Some actually drill their way to the next star since they use jump gates and such. As for combat you're kinda limited to a max of 30 ships in a battle but you can reinforce as you lose ships. It was one of those full 3d games before engines could actually handle the full 3d combat. The biggest appeal to it is how very different the races are through their ships, weapons, ways of travel and diplomacy. Its a bit of a shame that most 4x games don't make the aliens alien other then looking weird.
@@praesentius Didn't saw it listed hence i mentioned it. Gratuitous space battles is a fun 2d one but you're kinda left doing the missions before doing a campaign as ship parts are locked behind the missions. Not a recommended game but a fun one if you can unlock the parts you want since even in the campaign the upgrades are only available if you unlocked the prior in the missions. I really don't know why they did that to begin with.
@@sergiwhite9323 could be automated, but you can give main objectives to improve a big planetary invasion. Anything is better than todays ground combat in stellaris.
If it is something that can be automated, I feel like a feature like this would take a lot of work, and people would only play it a few times on release.
Very few people can imagine the level of satisfaction, when for the first time ever my (Solarian - humans) line on the fleetpower graph met the Kra'hen line and then surpassed it. If you know, you know. ;)
I remember my first victory against Krahen. I was ignoring the human special tech - the stun - and I was losing. Badly. Then out of desperation I tried the stuns and oh-boy, did the tide turn... The game suddenly became easy mode.
@@Shinypally I usually used the ship manipulator and stealth tech i stole from the shinari on solarian ships. Combined the fleet with heavy hitters with nukes, mezon guns and antimatter beams(or that electric weapon the krahen had if i had an event to find ships with it to mass produce and they had the top engine) while many have the ship stealth tech, all of my ship in the fleet was basically invisible until the first shot. I made sure the ship manipulator was the first to shoot, literally made the krahen ships to kill each other and i moped up the rest. I was able to defeat 3 times stronger fleets with this method.
When I was younger, I really loved playing a 4X RTS game called Haegemonia: Legions of Iron. I later learned that Digital Reality had also developed IG2. The military bases look quite similar.
@@CalgarGTX Not really. The original IG3 was scrapped and later the ideas were implemented into the game called Nexus: The Jupiter Incident. Although it was more like a tactical game....a very hard and frustrating tactical game.
Yeah, same Moreover, I learned about the whole "global strategy" genre from stellaris And honestly - out of all paradox strategies i played (ck2, ck3, vic2, vic3, eu4 and hoi4) imo stellaris is still the best choice as a first pdx game to play and understand core strat mechanics
Up until three or so years ago it was my personal opinion that Stellaris was the easiest Paradox strategy game to learn. There’s so much stuff you can just sort of ignore.
The late 90's/early 2000's were the best time in gaming. Vision/talent/graphics tech all combined in wonderful new ways. Today, games require so many resources to be a hit that few risks are taken.
I somewhat disagree. Indi games still have all the potential, that those games had and with Steam a means of distribution unheard of in those days. Indi developers take risks, go untrodden paths and deliver unique experiences. Some fail miserably, some hit like a truck. Dave the diver, Rimworld, Project Zomboid, FTL, Manor Lords, Mount&Blade, ... the list goes on and on and on. The biggest differences are, that back in the day, you had only a handful of games and today the sheer amount will mean that most players will never find them. Then there is the technical quality gap between AAA and indi titles, that separates somewhat successful games from possible major hits. Most casual gamers and casual buyers will not buy indi games but rather be persuaded by flashy graphics and marketing. Why else would BS like Diablo iv even make a profit? There are a dozen Diablo games out there, that all are better "Diablos" then Diablo is nowadays. And there are big studio hits and gems like Satisfactory or Baldur's Gate only to name two of the more recent ones. So you are correct only when it comes to major studios and then only partly. In my eyes it is more of a "back in the day everything was better" attitude.
It would seem so, but I think this is a bit oversimplifying. Ideas are independant of technical possibilities. There are good movies and bad movies today. You just notice those, that have an emphasis on CGI and lack substance more. Same with games and I again stress indie games. The low budgets force developers to forgo many things that AAA+ games can afford. Now, when voice acting, cut-scenes, high-res textures, models, mocap, etc. are done at the cost of story and content, then yes, the overall quality suffers. But if the idea was sound from the get-go and the focus is on overall quality not on "what is FOTM and what will sell best" what tech-stack you can use is irrelevant.
@@christoph4977 Exactly. nowadays I pretty much only play indie titles because they're the only ones that actually try to provide innovative gameplay. The oversaturation of the market leads to very little "oxygen" for many, many excellent indie games, especially those that do not have the funds to polish all aspects (mainly graphics)
1996 to 2000 was a golden age for cutscenes in strategy games. Civ II, Alpha Centauri, Starcraft, Red Alert 1&2, and Call To Power 1&2 all did really cool things with them. I don't get why the concept was dropped, it had a huge impact on immersion.
Well pretty much all of these hit the "being bought up" hurdle where their next developer simply produces 3rd rate clones of the primary. Call to Power 1&2 for one is why i dislike Sid Meyer so much. He got bored after making civilazation 2 and when CtP 1&2 out shined his works he took back the IP and made CIV 3 of all things. And because of the way he did that no CIV game ever will have space/aquatic exploration/explotation options due to rights issues. I dunno why SId or his development team never bothered with their space exploration sims instead they just made mobile train sims instead. Starcraft had the same issue where Blizard closed Blizard North just so they could have a share holder bonus. Westwood being bought up by EA killed C&C, Red Alert and Generals in one slow burning process of cheap produced profit margins.
I have a personal favorite cutscene of mine that I really appreciate with a music score I still think about frequently. Watch the opening cutscene of Freespace 2, not a 4X Game, granted, but easily one of the most powerful cut scenes I've ever experienced.
Cutscenes stopped because devs figured out people WILL absolutely buy the lowest effort shit that they can put out, and then rail against anyone that says it was low effort. And then when something does come out that's not low effort, like Baldur's Gate 3 even other devs will shit themselves bashing on it saying not to get used to it, when that used to be the norm.
@@zerogrey3798 Well it is kinda due to the fact back then games couldn't do much on the graphical level so they did FMV's and digital cinematics to make it more immersive then the 2d, 2.5d and polygon images could possibly give. Its still a shame though as the cinematics would make the game look and feel that more awesome to play.
My first 4X game was Space Empires III (1997), which had an almost complete shareware version (as was the fashion of the day). It featured many of the complexities of the Stellaris base game -- colonization, worm holes between systems, economy based on specific planetary buildings, research tracks, detailed ship design, basic diplomacy. As a youth i only grasped it gradually over several games; but as a result, i much later picked up Stellaris relatively quickly. I'm convinced the creators of Stellaris played the hell out of this one. I would recommend SE3 to anyone with a retro PC (as the interface is pure Windows) or to those who don't need strong visuals. It's on Steam for peanuts and still plays well! (though with almost no story or stimulation [except for the tactical battles, which are charmingly retro but direct]) I appreciate your ode to IG2; it seems like a remarkable experience to start off with. It's a delight to see true labors of love! And man those cutscenes look awesome.
I played Imperium Galactica 1, which had Red Alert-style cutscenes with actors playing various characters. The campaign was more linear but focused more on personal progression: you started out as a fleet captain with a few ships, and by the end you commanded the whole human armada against alien threats to rebuild the old galactic empire.
You should check out distant worlds 2. That game is a plausible, realtime space empire simulator with simulated logistics. Ships move in 3D space, rail gun darts are tracked. Its amazing once you understand how it all works.
How could you not mention Sword of the Stars? Released by Kerberos (acquired by paradox) in 2006 it had 6 playable races, each with unique ships and FTL travel methods. You also have research, ship designs and colony management. I spent countless hours playing that game.
My defining memory of playing Sword of the Stars was a Hiver vrs Hiver matchup. The AI randomly got heavy armor tech while I didn't even get medium armor. In the cruiser age, it was possible to use beam weapons and I pushed the AI back to one final bastion. But then the dreadnought age came. The end-game AI dreadnoughts were nearly impervious to my weapons. Whether auto-resolving or manually fighting, my every ship that met an enemy died. But I had a galaxy producing new ones, so the number of my ships was going up- yet I couldn't actually take their last world because I wasn't actually killing anything of note.
Unsure what the difference between "strategy" and "RTS" games are, but my experience with both/either genre was basically playing the main campaign of Age of Mythology when I was 14, and then getting Stellaris when I was 20 because it was recommended by an Extra Credits "games you might not have tried" video. I don't think I have ever finished a game of Stellaris, I don't know how to make a good fleet, I just add ships until my numbers are big enough that my neighbors don't causus belli me cause what I really like is exploring, researching tech, thinking up a story for why my empire has the ethics/government it does, and all the little mini story encounters you can find across your galaxy.
Strategy also encompasses turn based strategy games I'd reckon, as well as other 'wider' scope strategy games like the total war series, which I wouldn't call merely an RTS. Definitely a valid approach to focus on story first and not worry about the grognardy ship meta.
The clue is in the titles of the genres. Strategy is all encompasing. Covering any game requiring a level of strategic thinking using multiple units. Real Time Strategy is any strategy game with real time gameplay. Turn based strategy is any strategy game with turn based gameplay. Fairly simple to understand. Then you have 4X games like this and Stellaris. 4X is a genre onto itself based on the four X's that make up that genre. Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate. Nearly all 4X games are also turn based strategy games. However, this and Stellaris have real time elements. And so aren't turn based. But aren't quite Real Time Strategy games in the same way Age of Mythology or Starcraft are.
You have to remember that strategy games used to be played via EMail. Literally. You would take your turn and send the savefile via EMail to the next player. Individual rounds would go on for weeks, turn by turn. So a Real Time Strategy was an entirely new genre that played very differently! Turn-based was meant for Play-by-EMail, which strangely vanished while the turn-based nature remained. Very strange, because 5-50% of your playtime is waiting.
@@SardonicSays I personally call games like total war, which combine turn-based strategy with real-time tactics, "hybrid strategy games". I'm not sure if anyone else does something similar.
To be fair, Empire at War does ground combat relatively well during Galactic Conquest, with the only caveat being that- oh, wait, you already had that covered. I have no further complaints. Excellent video!
I've only played the first Imperium Galactica so far. The way how that game really makes you feel like you are a person in a spaceship, who rises through the ranks from someone responsible for just a few planets to the supreme commander is incredible. It manages to achive that by making the the space ship you cammand the menu while throwing events and cutscenes at you frequently until the early late game. I have not played a game that managed to replicate this since.
This really reminds me of Star Wars: Empire at War, which was not only my first space 4k but it was also the first pc game I have any memory of playing.
To this day I remember emperor of the fading suns. A 4x space game that also came with a ground combat map layer that is randomly generated for every planet. I have yet to see any game do something in quite the same way, i'd love to see something as deep as stellaris combined with actual planet exploration with random gen maps. It gives you a different layer to play and explore stuff, you'd go around and invade cities, find ancient structures, maybe even unlock some ancient terrors locked in some long forgotten bunker. You had to develop your ground units and maintain them along side your space ships. All turn based, of course. The layers interacted, too. You could just bomb everything from orbit, you'd have to watch out for anti spaceship batteries, and some ground units were even capable of going to space to manhandle your spacecraft.
Never thought listening to someone explaining how impressive old 4X game was compared to what's available now, could be this entertaining, I personally love 4X game and its certainly enjoyable to hear someone brag about their experience. Thanks 😄
I had around 6000 hours in total in the greater Paradox library when I started on Stellaris just last month and most of the systems seemed like slightly simpler versions of stuff found in all the other games, like ship design from HoI4, the resource management of the Victoria series, etc. so it was pretty easy for me to just pick up and understand the basics in a couple hours, although I still scoured UA-cam a bit afterwards to find some videos detailing the deeper complexities, another skill I learned from when I got into EU4 and needed to do the same there. As a result, it seemed like a pretty simple, but super fun entry into the genre that I could totally use to introduce grand strategy to my friend during a free weekend. What an experience that was, almost like there was a language barrier between us. So many things I take as second nature had to be explained to him in detail and I'm more than a little ashamed of how exasperated I got a couple times. To me, it makes perfect sense if there's a system that buffs one specific industry on a planet, you want to specialize it and abuse that buff as much as possible, but to someone who hasn't played a billion hours of modifier stackers, it seemed stupid and illogical you wouldn't want to make a planet self-sufficient. Really gave me a lot of insight into just how hostile this genre really is to beginners.
i was going to comment something about loving video essays that introduce me to weird little video games and then I looked at your sub count. Subscribed for small creator Solidarity, Keep up the good work man
Pretty sure Stellaris was my first 4X, on my third run I already had learned how to do most things, considering that first thing I did was turn VIR into 5 minerals. the learning curve isn't bad unless the player has never touched a game or lived under a rock their entire live
I bought the game at launch, but only really played it for real years later. I kept losing, so I had to really put in effort to watch guides and learn how to play in a way that actually made you win. It really does take a lot of time investment, but it's also got a massive payoff for the effort. Probably my favorite game.
Though it's an absolute nightmare to get running well these days I still love Space Empires V. The ability to design every unit from ground tanks to super carriers combined with the end game technology of reshaping the stars and planets themselves is everything I want from a 4x.
Another good space games to mention: - Star Trek Armada 1-2 - Distant Worlds 1 (not played the second game yet) - Starsector - Pax Imperia - Sins of Solar Empire - Space Empires - Star Ruler - Master of Orion 1-2 - Fragile Allegiance - Homeworld (if you count it as 4x) - Stars in Shadow - Empire of the Black Star - Galactic Civilization series - Haegemonia - Nexus : Jupiter incident
@@Eledore Basically these can be counted because the main task is Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate so perfectly fitting to the 4x. :) I think I did not played with the Conquest so a good mention.
Such a neat video, about a game I'd never heard of but which looks like it would have blown my mind as a nine-year-old. I was not expecting the planetside development mechanics to actually be interesting, and all the little 3D buildings are adorable!
Stellaris was my first strategy game! It was a wild ride. My best friend wanted to play it so we did several co-op lobbies of just the two of us against the AI. Even with him answering all questions I had about the game, the systems didn't really make sense to me. I couldn't understand why his Empire was always more powerful than mine and why I was always struggling in space battles, even if my stack had a higher fighting power. It wasn't until a year later when I started watching UA-cam tier lists and guides that the game's mechanics made any sense! I started understanding what resources were a priority, how to best acquire them, and how to actually build ships that would work in space battles. Thanks, Stefan Anon! xD
... The music used here is a total nostalgia trip for me. That ending card with the MechCommander victory tune made me stop what I was doing for a second.
Stellaris was my first entry into Space 4X. Although I had some earlier 4X as well as other strategy game experience, I personally never found it a very challenging entry point. I definitely never felt the need to watch any tutorials or reference any forums or what have you to learn it Frankly, in my opinion, Stellaris is a very locked down experience, especially in later version, as Paradox has discarded so much of its depth to appeal to newcomers. But to it's credit a near none of the more advanced features appear in the early game. The ones that do, given that you have some strategy game experience, are very basic. I think a lot of people overestimate the complexity of Paradox games from the reputation they have developed with their Hearts of Iron and Europa Universalis series, and a lot of that has more so been from bad menu design and onboarding than game depth.
The original Master of Orion is where I cut my teeth on a space opera 4x. Though I played much more of its sequel than the original. Imperium Galactica 2 was like my white whale for over a decade before I managed to track a copy down.
My first space civ game was VGA planets. But Imperium Galatica I and II are the ones i remeber the having most of the fun playing back in the day. Glad that 2 is on steam.
To be fair this video has by far the best clickthrough rate I've had in quite some time, so apparently there was a hunger for this, and the algorithm found it
@@SardonicSays It's a 30 minute video which makes it on the longer side. Now usually this would be a bad thing since most of the clicks get channeled to fast-paced content like MrBeast... I say usually, because if you're going to make a video on 4X or strategy, you can just directly assume that the audience has more patience than the usual viewer and thus can watch a 30 mins video and will watch it to completion (which is what the algorithm likes, that's why it recommends short term content so much, because most people finish it from beginning to end) In other words, in your case, longer term videos which can be put on the background as a podcast and have low calm editing is really pushing the algorithm's buttons. Of course, this could be untrue as the sample size for this is 1 video, but you could try to experiment further. If not just watch the Spiffing's Brit 's latest video about the algorithm and his findings on how it works, it's an interesting watch and makes you think about the platform more. Here's the part of the link you can append after the home youtube page if you can't find it: /watch?v=8iOjeb5DTZI&t=914s
I played IG2 - it was really damn good. The ability to build your own colonies, and set up fortresses and stuff for defensive planning was really damn neat
As a Stellaris player since day one who only had Anno as "strategy game" experience under my belt going into it, watching the dev streams back in 2016 helped a whole lot with the onboarding. And speaking of Anno, the decline of RTS elements in 4X and related genres you mentioned is very noticable in that franchise as well.
@@1kvolt1978 Yep, unfortunately it's not on GOG. I did find it on an abandonware site, but I'm a bit scared to download it from there for fear of installing some hacker's rootkit on my PC or something.
I remember watching my dad play this when I was a kid. I couldn't remember the name of the game for years. Only the end of the intro cinematic. So thank you for finally putting that goddamn ear worm to rest.
Hungary's game dev industry is pretty much dead ever since Crytek Budapest was closed. Many great Hungarian games came out in the 90's and early 2000's, but at this point it's dead aside from some crappy mobile games.
@@anteep4900 Neocore made WH40k Inquisitor Martyr and it was so aggressively mediocre I only just now remembered it. ...anyway, that came out in 2018 and as far as I know, that was the last one. Compare that to the 2000s when 5-6 Hungarian games came out every year.
Stellaris actually was my first Space 4X, but what I found is that it's incredibly similar to Sid Meier's Civilization 5 to the point where I was able to essentially pick up and play. Rather than pops working tiles, they work jobs in the planets, traditions are almost exactly the same system, ideology becomes ascension paths, and just like in Stellaris, Civ has advanced resources to make the most out of your cities and military. Just like you need horses for a stable, you need exotic gases for a research complex. Puppeting cities, that's like having a vassal. Et cetera, so on and so forth. The main differences I found are the obvious ones: That Civ is turn-based as opposed to Stellaris' real-time, the lack of a tile system, and a few mechanics that aren't in Civ5. Leaders were pretty simple to figure out, but I still don't know how to make the most of espionage, for example. I suppose it helped that I got the game back in late 2019, they've added a lot of features since then. It was literally easier for me to jump from Civ5 to Stellaris than from Civ5 to Civ6.
I started playing stellaris in 2016 when a friend introduced it to me at summer camp when I was 11. The game was much simpler back then, but still complex, and I learned it with a bit of my friend teaching me the very basics and me teaching myself more in-depth stuff. I got my dad into it during the pandemic and it was much more difficult for him since the game has become much more complex.
This is one of the quintessential games of my childhood, looking back it encapsulates what game development from those time felt like, don't put the eggs in one basket, if a system feels to hard to give depth to, just make it basic and fun, and move on to the next system and also make that fun, I feel this game managed to do that, didn't double down on having one extraordinary feature, but rather just end up with something friendly and fun (And hard as hell towards the end of the campaign). Great video, cheers!
@@EvGamerBETA every version required a learning period, even if it used to be much simpler. I've honestly been very satisfied with how it's evolved over the years.
there was a game called "Space Empire V" by Malfolder Machination, a tiny game studio in california. It had EVERYTHING, the tech tree was ridiculous. You could design and customize and level up everything, it featured space and ground combat. You started with mondane technologies like a nuclear railgun and in the end you had ridiculous stuff like a kamikaze drone carrier stealth battleships with temporal distorition weapons and self healing bio armor. Oh and the drones were all individual sub-units you could all customize and control as well. And my most favourite part was that you really could micromanage your entire empire, but you could also activate "ministers" to automate things like espionage, construction, fleet resupply, planetary construction, unit refitting and upgrading, politics, exploration and so on. Essentially you could play the game completely afk if you wanted and only do ship designs, or battle or whatever you like.
It reminds me of Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. Although I haven't played it myself, even many years after its release, it left a deep impression on me with its atmosphere. Researching technologies and building wonders there were accompanied by quotes about the world from one of the faction leaders, or voiced videos. Each leader represented a certain philosophy about the world and man's place in it. There was a sense of self-discovery among people in the distant future. When the developers tried to make a new space game, it was seriously lacking this atmosphere.
FINALLY, SOMEONE MADE A VIDEO ON THIS GAME.....i havent had the time to actually play this game but every time i look at this game i just go ''how has no one made a proper video on it yet'' To this day it still boggles my mind that it had not only planetary invasion but also city building on top of things also 43 fuckin cutscenes in 4x is astounding to me, and i say this with a lot of love as i ADORE 90s cgi cutscenes in strategy games, its very specific i know (holy shit at the 300 message animations )
Most of the points you made about the game's simplicity, especially with the only resource being money, reminds me of Empire at War where people have praised it for much of the same reasons (granted, even if it can't be classified as a 4X game)
That was a good video bringing back memories from one of my favorite games. Especially interesting that some of of the later games I liked a lot had a connection to IC2, namely Nexus and Hegemony.
I have played 700 hours of stellaris and regularly still learn something new that has a huge impact on the game. The learning curve is never ending, which I think is why its so captivating.
Stellaris was almost my first 4x, but not only did I play Civ4 when I was like 9, albeit, not knowing what I did at all, and actually is more just looking at what my dad did. I also played Red Alert 2, an RTS game was also a major part of my childhood, I was also horrendous at it ofc. Even then, when I first touched Stellaris in like 2019, I was so overwhelmed that I literally could not put anything together at all, leading me to kinda not play it unless it was with friends. Until Stellaris released the very interesting mode of letting more than one person manage a singular empire, did I finally start to learn how to properly manage my systems, how to build my ships, and so on, only because I only needed to worry about a small part of the whole system. Finally I was able to enjoy the game. I was like 60hrs in without properly being able to enjoy the game.
By pure happenstance, my ~9 year old self borrowed IG2 from a local library some 24 years ago, and I was hooked from the get go. While I wasn't good at English, it was rudimentary enough that I could somewhat understand what was happening, and it was basically my first real introduction to sci fi as a genre instead of as an adventure (Star Wars, namely). When Stellaris released, I played that too, and much like you probably did, I kept comparing everything to how IG2 handled things. Like Deus Ex and many other games from just around the turn of the millennium, IG2 was way ahead of its time in so many aspects, and it's a damm shame that there aren't more games out there that has attempted to continue in its footsteps, or even evolve the space 4X genre at all. If nothing else, we can hope that Stellaris has inspired a new generation of game developers to expand on its ideas and concepts, so that we one day might see the genre flourish. Wishful thinking, I admit!
Nexus is a title I haven't heard for a while. Was so pretty and a triumph of complex and engaging tactical combat. Only drawback was if you didn't happen to spec your fleet a particular way several missions ago, it's possible to find yourself totally unable to get through a subsequent mission and would have to save scum back one or more missions earlier. I ended up never figuring out how to beat the final mission and couldn't even work out how far back I'd have to save scum in anticipation of what I'd need for that mission.
Finally, this game is getting some love. I remember finding a demo of this back in 2001/02 on a CD that used to be bundled with a computer magazine. I was always someone fascinated by space, and so I spent like an average of 12 hours a day on weekends playing this. One of my favourite games that very few people know about.
I still remember IG2 too, loved it. And yes, Ground invasions were very cool there. I even loved Moo2 Invasions way more than Stellaris. I think that is the one key area, where Stellaris lacks the most and always hoped, it would get revamped/completely redone at some point.
I'd also mention Empire of the Fading Suns - it was staggeringly beautiful. And the idea of stagnant feudal star-faring society was very well implemented there. Of course, an idea of full hexagonal maps, unique and specific for every planet was a true find. Decent economy model was a cherry on the top.
It actually makes me happy when someone finds/remembers one of the few thinkgs that makes me proud of my nationality. Kudos to the dev team, I've seen very few games in the past 25 years that got even close to being as good as IG2, no matter the genre.
Imperium Galactica was my first. IG2 was okay as it gave some but also took some of the charm. Played many 4X since but none of them came close to the joys the IGs gave me. I wish I could create a spiritual successor to IGs one day.
And this was released in 1999....breathtaking. Then they continued by developing Haegemonia.....My countrymen seem to excel at this thing because soon after in 2004 Mithis Entertainment released Nexus: The Jupiter Incident. I never played it but enthusiasts claim it is on par with Homeworld. Then all of the Hungarian dev companies were decapitated by big corps. Such a nice idea to make this video. Great upload, thank you!
Master of Orion 2 was my first 4x. idk if anyone remembers this, but i really loved ship designing in space empire. It also have tactical space combat when you could give command to individual ship an fleet. Plus your ship could run out of the supplies in the middle of the fight xD. I really wish stellaris give us ability to build and customize fighters.
pure ear candy: HERE ARE TWO UNSKIPPABLE ADS! I always find that kind of timing funny. If a youtuber wants to show you something and exactly then an ad plays.
Stellaris was the first strategy game that I actually ‘learned.’ I’d played through many games but never ‘got’ them by any means, aka Distant Worlds but just existing while it played in the background. I think it helped that I started Stellaris in the old, pre-DLC days, before everything was hyper-complicated. I remember even reading in 2016 or so that if you wanted a ‘deeper’ game to get Distant Worlds but if you wanted accessible and pretty, to get Stellaris, which is crazy looking at it now.
Stellaris was my first space 4x. I was already familiar with previous Paradox games and I played Stellaris from launch forwards, but it was my first Space 4x.
21:48 Vinesauce jump scare. Stellaris is what got me into the 4X genre and I've been playing on and off since day 1. If PDX can keep up the quality with things like Utopia and Machine Age in the future, I'm sure it will make Stellaris even better.
First 4x space game I played was indeed Stellaris. First time I played it, I had no idea what was happening and I fell off a few minutes after. Some time later I came back and it all just kinda clicked. I just started learning more and more as I played. I've done a lot of other playthroughs since the first but I still remember that one more than any other. First playthrough ended with me being destroyed by a spiritualist fallen empire. I tried to salvage it by running to the edge of the galaxy and start again on a small ice planet I'd found there. I was quickly followed by the FE and finished off. What a ride.
Wow I had absolutely no idea that IG2 and The Jupiter Incident were linked in that way, consider my mind blown. Alas I was too young at the time to truly comprehend IG2 but it has always lurked at the back of my mind as something pretty special. My last memory of the game is of having my end game ships instantly destroyed by the enemy and not understanding why. I guess that would've been the whole crisis thing huh? Thanks for this little delve into the past.
Stellaris was my first and currently only space 4x. Played a ton of Paradox 4x though prior and honestly I feel the learning curve is fairly simple atleast for playing casually. As it has a ton of auto upgrade chance and not to many extra unknown resources.
Stellaris was my first 4x and paradox game, I really liked it because of the sandbox like feel of the game and you can choose your own paths which is really neat
Stellaris was my first strategy game, i played it for about 50 hours before i understood the game well enought to win for the first time. It was the steepest learning curve i have seen in any game i have played up until now.
my first strategy game was Civ V, which I played for an amount of hours I shudder to contemplate. I got into Stellaris when it came out because scifi is my life, and I learnt everything I know about how to play it through trial, error, and experimenting with the systems. That worked for me because I enjoy it, but yeah I've tried talking friends into playing it (so I have someone to play multiplayer with) and so far no one has taken to it. I 100% understand why they get put off when they see the UI and all the damn resources and convoluted systems. I'd never considered playing another scifi 4X, since Stellaris still satisfies my craving, but watching this video make me want to try out the rest of the genre. Particularly older games like this one.
In the original disc version, you can extract game files, specifically message text(uzenetek), and inside there are Hungarian comments that reveal more about the story than what is present in the messages!
Oh snap, I might have to try and run that through google translate and check them out, great find!
@@SardonicSaysIf you haven't done that already. I might be able to help translate
@@aronmarkovits5396 If it's too much to do alone, I can help out.
@@SardonicSays If you are so into Google Translate, there is a game called 1848 and it is about the Hungarian Revolution. Quite old but still fun.
@@SardonicSays there's no need for Google translate, Hungarians on the internet love flexing their knowledge of the language because it's ridiculously hard
My first space 4x was Galactic Civilizations 2, and nearly 20 years later I find myself going back to it every now and then.
A solid choice for sure!
My first was Master of Orion 1. Great game.
My first 4x was Master of Magic and the space variant Master of Orion 1-2. Also Played with fragile allegiance, pax imperia, Galactic civilization 1-3, Space Empires, Imperium Galactica 1-2 also Reunion which was the precedessor of Imperium Galactica.
@@sziklamester1244 Fragile Allegiance as another childhood favorite of mine! The menu music sticks with me all these years later
@@SardonicSays My first was Stellaris - But i had experience with games such as HOI-4 which means i was quite familiar with the UI hell of Paradox.
Nexus: the Jupiter Incident being a result of a salvaged game does explain the incredibly detailed campaign map (the star system menu). This menu never serves any other purpose than to look pretty.
I can not wait for someone to pick up the mantle of Nexus. It my opinion, it was unique to the point of being in a genre of it's own.
Have I played the Homeworld series? Yes. Everspace? Starpoint Gemini? Sins of a Solar Empire? Galactica Deadlock? Starhammer? Gothic 40k? And more? Yes to all. But Nexus was DIFFERENT. It was something special.
We will never see its like again.
@@praesentius Have a go at the sword of the stars.
Its not better but does things way different you can designated your own weapons on ships and every race has their own way of carving their path through the galaxy.
Some actually drill their way to the next star since they use jump gates and such.
As for combat you're kinda limited to a max of 30 ships in a battle but you can reinforce as you lose ships.
It was one of those full 3d games before engines could actually handle the full 3d combat.
The biggest appeal to it is how very different the races are through their ships, weapons, ways of travel and diplomacy.
Its a bit of a shame that most 4x games don't make the aliens alien other then looking weird.
@@vonshroom2068 I like where your head is at! But, I'm no stranger to the Sword of the Stars series. :)
@@praesentius Didn't saw it listed hence i mentioned it.
Gratuitous space battles is a fun 2d one but you're kinda left doing the missions before doing a campaign as ship parts are locked behind the missions. Not a recommended game but a fun one if you can unlock the parts you want since even in the campaign the upgrades are only available if you unlocked the prior in the missions. I really don't know why they did that to begin with.
I'm just gonna say it. Full-fledged RTS planetary invasions single-handedly would make Stellaris like 50% better.
Hard agree
Even a planetary grid and you moving armies and conquering cities/sectors on a planet would be better than what it is now...
Maybe in lower difficulties. If I had to go through 50+ planets for a single Grand Admiral Ai war I'd kill myself.
@@sergiwhite9323 could be automated, but you can give main objectives to improve a big planetary invasion. Anything is better than todays ground combat in stellaris.
If it is something that can be automated, I feel like a feature like this would take a lot of work, and people would only play it a few times on release.
My fist 4x was Master of Orion, on a 1.44 floppy, running on a 486.
Same.
Well, maybe. If it wasn't Master of Orion, then it was Master of Magic.
@@Rainer-qc2ol Both for me, loved both, replayed them a lot over the years.
Master of Orion II here :)
Master of Orion 2, released in 1996, is still the best 4X game out there. Despite all its shortcomings.
still play it, from time to time
Very few people can imagine the level of satisfaction, when for the first time ever my (Solarian - humans) line on the fleetpower graph met the Kra'hen line and then surpassed it. If you know, you know. ;)
I remember my first victory against Krahen. I was ignoring the human special tech - the stun - and I was losing. Badly. Then out of desperation I tried the stuns and oh-boy, did the tide turn... The game suddenly became easy mode.
@@Shinypally I usually used the ship manipulator and stealth tech i stole from the shinari on solarian ships. Combined the fleet with heavy hitters with nukes, mezon guns and antimatter beams(or that electric weapon the krahen had if i had an event to find ships with it to mass produce and they had the top engine) while many have the ship stealth tech, all of my ship in the fleet was basically invisible until the first shot. I made sure the ship manipulator was the first to shoot, literally made the krahen ships to kill each other and i moped up the rest. I was able to defeat 3 times stronger fleets with this method.
When I was younger, I really loved playing a 4X RTS game called Haegemonia: Legions of Iron. I later learned that Digital Reality had also developed IG2. The military bases look quite similar.
It's basically IG3 as far as I'm concerned.
@@CalgarGTX it basically is. When the dev team split in two, DR reworked IG3 into Haegemonia. It was amazing, even if it could've been even greater.
I thought that it looked similar to Haegemonia.😊 Haegemonia still has the best explosions in a space strategy game.
@@Peregrin3exactly
@@CalgarGTX Not really. The original IG3 was scrapped and later the ideas were implemented into the game called Nexus: The Jupiter Incident. Although it was more like a tactical game....a very hard and frustrating tactical game.
I started with stellaris. Just kinda dealt with it. Had a ton of online school during the pandemic to learn how it worked.
Same. I liked the setting and just kind of started playing.. hahaha
Yeah, same
Moreover, I learned about the whole "global strategy" genre from stellaris
And honestly - out of all paradox strategies i played (ck2, ck3, vic2, vic3, eu4 and hoi4) imo stellaris is still the best choice as a first pdx game to play and understand core strat mechanics
That was like me and eu4. Stellaris is far more complicated tho tbh
I begun with stellaris, although it was after watching multiple full playthroughs, particularly with the Gigastructural Engineering mod.
Up until three or so years ago it was my personal opinion that Stellaris was the easiest Paradox strategy game to learn. There’s so much stuff you can just sort of ignore.
The late 90's/early 2000's were the best time in gaming. Vision/talent/graphics tech all combined in wonderful new ways. Today, games require so many resources to be a hit that few risks are taken.
Totaly agree, imperium galactica, earth 2150, free space, impirium galactica, sid meyers alpha centuary, evil genius, call to pwer 2, fronter wars, universe at war earth assault,
I somewhat disagree.
Indi games still have all the potential, that those games had and with Steam a means of distribution unheard of in those days. Indi developers take risks, go untrodden paths and deliver unique experiences. Some fail miserably, some hit like a truck.
Dave the diver, Rimworld, Project Zomboid, FTL, Manor Lords, Mount&Blade, ... the list goes on and on and on.
The biggest differences are, that back in the day, you had only a handful of games and today the sheer amount will mean that most players will never find them. Then there is the technical quality gap between AAA and indi titles, that separates somewhat successful games from possible major hits. Most casual gamers and casual buyers will not buy indi games but rather be persuaded by flashy graphics and marketing. Why else would BS like Diablo iv even make a profit? There are a dozen Diablo games out there, that all are better "Diablos" then Diablo is nowadays.
And there are big studio hits and gems like Satisfactory or Baldur's Gate only to name two of the more recent ones.
So you are correct only when it comes to major studios and then only partly.
In my eyes it is more of a "back in the day everything was better" attitude.
The computing limitations forced innovation.
It would seem so, but I think this is a bit oversimplifying. Ideas are independant of technical possibilities. There are good movies and bad movies today. You just notice those, that have an emphasis on CGI and lack substance more.
Same with games and I again stress indie games. The low budgets force developers to forgo many things that AAA+ games can afford. Now, when voice acting, cut-scenes, high-res textures, models, mocap, etc. are done at the cost of story and content, then yes, the overall quality suffers. But if the idea was sound from the get-go and the focus is on overall quality not on "what is FOTM and what will sell best" what tech-stack you can use is irrelevant.
@@christoph4977 Exactly. nowadays I pretty much only play indie titles because they're the only ones that actually try to provide innovative gameplay. The oversaturation of the market leads to very little "oxygen" for many, many excellent indie games, especially those that do not have the funds to polish all aspects (mainly graphics)
As a hungarian myself I played every race at every difficulty at least twice
I even tried it in multiplayer at a LAN party but it didn’t work out. Too long 😂
1996 to 2000 was a golden age for cutscenes in strategy games. Civ II, Alpha Centauri, Starcraft, Red Alert 1&2, and Call To Power 1&2 all did really cool things with them. I don't get why the concept was dropped, it had a huge impact on immersion.
Well pretty much all of these hit the "being bought up" hurdle where their next developer simply produces 3rd rate clones of the primary.
Call to Power 1&2 for one is why i dislike Sid Meyer so much.
He got bored after making civilazation 2 and when CtP 1&2 out shined his works he took back the IP and made CIV 3 of all things.
And because of the way he did that no CIV game ever will have space/aquatic exploration/explotation options due to rights issues.
I dunno why SId or his development team never bothered with their space exploration sims instead they just made mobile train sims instead.
Starcraft had the same issue where Blizard closed Blizard North just so they could have a share holder bonus.
Westwood being bought up by EA killed C&C, Red Alert and Generals in one slow burning process of cheap produced profit margins.
Yep add to the list Mech Commander.
I have a personal favorite cutscene of mine that I really appreciate with a music score I still think about frequently. Watch the opening cutscene of Freespace 2, not a 4X Game, granted, but easily one of the most powerful cut scenes I've ever experienced.
Cutscenes stopped because devs figured out people WILL absolutely buy the lowest effort shit that they can put out, and then rail against anyone that says it was low effort. And then when something does come out that's not low effort, like Baldur's Gate 3 even other devs will shit themselves bashing on it saying not to get used to it, when that used to be the norm.
@@zerogrey3798 Well it is kinda due to the fact back then games couldn't do much on the graphical level so they did FMV's and digital cinematics to make it more immersive then the 2d, 2.5d and polygon images could possibly give.
Its still a shame though as the cinematics would make the game look and feel that more awesome to play.
My first 4X game was Space Empires III (1997), which had an almost complete shareware version (as was the fashion of the day). It featured many of the complexities of the Stellaris base game -- colonization, worm holes between systems, economy based on specific planetary buildings, research tracks, detailed ship design, basic diplomacy. As a youth i only grasped it gradually over several games; but as a result, i much later picked up Stellaris relatively quickly. I'm convinced the creators of Stellaris played the hell out of this one.
I would recommend SE3 to anyone with a retro PC (as the interface is pure Windows) or to those who don't need strong visuals. It's on Steam for peanuts and still plays well! (though with almost no story or stimulation [except for the tactical battles, which are charmingly retro but direct])
I appreciate your ode to IG2; it seems like a remarkable experience to start off with. It's a delight to see true labors of love! And man those cutscenes look awesome.
there is space empires V. it had potential to be more complex and better than games like stellaris.
Stellaris actually was my first 4x game. The console edition specifically as I had never owned a PC prior to that
I played Imperium Galactica 1, which had Red Alert-style cutscenes with actors playing various characters. The campaign was more linear but focused more on personal progression: you started out as a fleet captain with a few ships, and by the end you commanded the whole human armada against alien threats to rebuild the old galactic empire.
I played that one. I thought it was a pretty good game for the time, but gettting to the end really was a grind.
You should check out distant worlds 2. That game is a plausible, realtime space empire simulator with simulated logistics. Ships move in 3D space, rail gun darts are tracked. Its amazing once you understand how it all works.
How could you not mention Sword of the Stars? Released by Kerberos (acquired by paradox) in 2006 it had 6 playable races, each with unique ships and FTL travel methods. You also have research, ship designs and colony management. I spent countless hours playing that game.
It's in the video, just not directly mentioned.
The sequel was heartbreaking for me.
@@l0rf Yeah, I was terribly disappointed as well. It could have been such a good game.
You can tell Stellaris has taken a lot of things from it, like the techs/weapons n wot not.
My defining memory of playing Sword of the Stars was a Hiver vrs Hiver matchup. The AI randomly got heavy armor tech while I didn't even get medium armor. In the cruiser age, it was possible to use beam weapons and I pushed the AI back to one final bastion. But then the dreadnought age came.
The end-game AI dreadnoughts were nearly impervious to my weapons. Whether auto-resolving or manually fighting, my every ship that met an enemy died. But I had a galaxy producing new ones, so the number of my ships was going up- yet I couldn't actually take their last world because I wasn't actually killing anything of note.
Sword of the Stars represent
Loved that one.
Unsure what the difference between "strategy" and "RTS" games are, but my experience with both/either genre was basically playing the main campaign of Age of Mythology when I was 14, and then getting Stellaris when I was 20 because it was recommended by an Extra Credits "games you might not have tried" video.
I don't think I have ever finished a game of Stellaris, I don't know how to make a good fleet, I just add ships until my numbers are big enough that my neighbors don't causus belli me cause what I really like is exploring, researching tech, thinking up a story for why my empire has the ethics/government it does, and all the little mini story encounters you can find across your galaxy.
Strategy also encompasses turn based strategy games I'd reckon, as well as other 'wider' scope strategy games like the total war series, which I wouldn't call merely an RTS.
Definitely a valid approach to focus on story first and not worry about the grognardy ship meta.
The clue is in the titles of the genres. Strategy is all encompasing. Covering any game requiring a level of strategic thinking using multiple units. Real Time Strategy is any strategy game with real time gameplay. Turn based strategy is any strategy game with turn based gameplay. Fairly simple to understand. Then you have 4X games like this and Stellaris. 4X is a genre onto itself based on the four X's that make up that genre. Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate. Nearly all 4X games are also turn based strategy games. However, this and Stellaris have real time elements. And so aren't turn based. But aren't quite Real Time Strategy games in the same way Age of Mythology or Starcraft are.
You have to remember that strategy games used to be played via EMail. Literally. You would take your turn and send the savefile via EMail to the next player. Individual rounds would go on for weeks, turn by turn. So a Real Time Strategy was an entirely new genre that played very differently! Turn-based was meant for Play-by-EMail, which strangely vanished while the turn-based nature remained. Very strange, because 5-50% of your playtime is waiting.
@@SardonicSays I personally call games like total war, which combine turn-based strategy with real-time tactics, "hybrid strategy games". I'm not sure if anyone else does something similar.
@@nathangamble125 Definitely a valid approach!
Wow thanks algorithm - what a great watch.
To be fair, Empire at War does ground combat relatively well during Galactic Conquest, with the only caveat being that- oh, wait, you already had that covered. I have no further complaints. Excellent video!
Anyone remember “Stars!”? It is one of the original 4x game that outdoes Stellaris in space colonization.
I still play Stars! using otvdm.. great game.
I've only played the first Imperium Galactica so far. The way how that game really makes you feel like you are a person in a spaceship, who rises through the ranks from someone responsible for just a few planets to the supreme commander is incredible. It manages to achive that by making the the space ship you cammand the menu while throwing events and cutscenes at you frequently until the early late game.
I have not played a game that managed to replicate this since.
I'll be honest, to me, non other games ever captured the feeling of this old space strategy games.
This really reminds me of Star Wars: Empire at War, which was not only my first space 4k but it was also the first pc game I have any memory of playing.
To this day I remember emperor of the fading suns. A 4x space game that also came with a ground combat map layer that is randomly generated for every planet. I have yet to see any game do something in quite the same way, i'd love to see something as deep as stellaris combined with actual planet exploration with random gen maps. It gives you a different layer to play and explore stuff, you'd go around and invade cities, find ancient structures, maybe even unlock some ancient terrors locked in some long forgotten bunker. You had to develop your ground units and maintain them along side your space ships.
All turn based, of course.
The layers interacted, too. You could just bomb everything from orbit, you'd have to watch out for anti spaceship batteries, and some ground units were even capable of going to space to manhandle your spacecraft.
Never thought listening to someone explaining how impressive old 4X game was compared to what's available now, could be this entertaining, I personally love 4X game and its certainly enjoyable to hear someone brag about their experience.
Thanks 😄
I agree. Imperium Galactica II was very well done. I like that it has ground combat too.
Haegemonia was excellent as well. :)
I had around 6000 hours in total in the greater Paradox library when I started on Stellaris just last month and most of the systems seemed like slightly simpler versions of stuff found in all the other games, like ship design from HoI4, the resource management of the Victoria series, etc. so it was pretty easy for me to just pick up and understand the basics in a couple hours, although I still scoured UA-cam a bit afterwards to find some videos detailing the deeper complexities, another skill I learned from when I got into EU4 and needed to do the same there. As a result, it seemed like a pretty simple, but super fun entry into the genre that I could totally use to introduce grand strategy to my friend during a free weekend. What an experience that was, almost like there was a language barrier between us. So many things I take as second nature had to be explained to him in detail and I'm more than a little ashamed of how exasperated I got a couple times. To me, it makes perfect sense if there's a system that buffs one specific industry on a planet, you want to specialize it and abuse that buff as much as possible, but to someone who hasn't played a billion hours of modifier stackers, it seemed stupid and illogical you wouldn't want to make a planet self-sufficient. Really gave me a lot of insight into just how hostile this genre really is to beginners.
10:10 Incredible. It has become such a cultural force now, you don't even need to hint at where it's from and it still lands. You love to see it!
i was going to comment something about loving video essays that introduce me to weird little video games and then I looked at your sub count.
Subscribed for small creator Solidarity, Keep up the good work man
Pretty sure Stellaris was my first 4X, on my third run I already had learned how to do most things, considering that first thing I did was turn VIR into 5 minerals. the learning curve isn't bad unless the player has never touched a game or lived under a rock their entire live
Yeah, I played supreme commander and that's the only thing strategy that I played before stellaris (now I have 800 hours in stellaris)
I bought the game at launch, but only really played it for real years later. I kept losing, so I had to really put in effort to watch guides and learn how to play in a way that actually made you win. It really does take a lot of time investment, but it's also got a massive payoff for the effort. Probably my favorite game.
Though it's an absolute nightmare to get running well these days I still love Space Empires V. The ability to design every unit from ground tanks to super carriers combined with the end game technology of reshaping the stars and planets themselves is everything I want from a 4x.
Another good space games to mention:
- Star Trek Armada 1-2
- Distant Worlds 1 (not played the second game yet)
- Starsector
- Pax Imperia
- Sins of Solar Empire
- Space Empires
- Star Ruler
- Master of Orion 1-2
- Fragile Allegiance
- Homeworld (if you count it as 4x)
- Stars in Shadow
- Empire of the Black Star
- Galactic Civilization series
- Haegemonia
- Nexus : Jupiter incident
If you are counting Homeworld as 4x
- Conquest: Frontier wars
- Star Trek: Armada 1-2
@@Eledore Basically these can be counted because the main task is Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate so perfectly fitting to the 4x. :)
I think I did not played with the Conquest so a good mention.
That zoom-in to combat is a masterwork, especially for the age of the game.
Such a neat video, about a game I'd never heard of but which looks like it would have blown my mind as a nine-year-old. I was not expecting the planetside development mechanics to actually be interesting, and all the little 3D buildings are adorable!
Stellaris was my first strategy game! It was a wild ride. My best friend wanted to play it so we did several co-op lobbies of just the two of us against the AI. Even with him answering all questions I had about the game, the systems didn't really make sense to me. I couldn't understand why his Empire was always more powerful than mine and why I was always struggling in space battles, even if my stack had a higher fighting power. It wasn't until a year later when I started watching UA-cam tier lists and guides that the game's mechanics made any sense! I started understanding what resources were a priority, how to best acquire them, and how to actually build ships that would work in space battles. Thanks, Stefan Anon! xD
... The music used here is a total nostalgia trip for me.
That ending card with the MechCommander victory tune made me stop what I was doing for a second.
It's a bop isn't it? The mechlab theme too from that game, quite iconic!
Stellaris was my first entry into Space 4X.
Although I had some earlier 4X as well as other strategy game experience, I personally never found it a very challenging entry point.
I definitely never felt the need to watch any tutorials or reference any forums or what have you to learn it
Frankly, in my opinion, Stellaris is a very locked down experience, especially in later version, as Paradox has discarded so much of its depth to appeal to newcomers.
But to it's credit a near none of the more advanced features appear in the early game. The ones that do, given that you have some strategy game experience, are very basic.
I think a lot of people overestimate the complexity of Paradox games from the reputation they have developed with their Hearts of Iron and Europa Universalis series, and a lot of that has more so been from bad menu design and onboarding than game depth.
The original Master of Orion is where I cut my teeth on a space opera 4x. Though I played much more of its sequel than the original. Imperium Galactica 2 was like my white whale for over a decade before I managed to track a copy down.
This is a gem of a video, instantly subbed!
Thank you!!
My first space civ game was VGA planets. But Imperium Galatica I and II are the ones i remeber the having most of the fun playing back in the day. Glad that 2 is on steam.
Wow that's a title I haven't heard in a great number of years. Damn I'm old.
This has the vibe of Star Wars: Empire at War, with the simple resources, ground and space combat etc
Every other full moon a random youtuber gets gifted with youtubes attention
To be fair this video has by far the best clickthrough rate I've had in quite some time, so apparently there was a hunger for this, and the algorithm found it
@@SardonicSays It's a 30 minute video which makes it on the longer side. Now usually this would be a bad thing since most of the clicks get channeled to fast-paced content like MrBeast...
I say usually, because if you're going to make a video on 4X or strategy, you can just directly assume that the audience has more patience than the usual viewer and thus can watch a 30 mins video and will watch it to completion (which is what the algorithm likes, that's why it recommends short term content so much, because most people finish it from beginning to end)
In other words, in your case, longer term videos which can be put on the background as a podcast and have low calm editing is really pushing the algorithm's buttons. Of course, this could be untrue as the sample size for this is 1 video, but you could try to experiment further.
If not just watch the Spiffing's Brit 's latest video about the algorithm and his findings on how it works, it's an interesting watch and makes you think about the platform more. Here's the part of the link you can append after the home youtube page if you can't find it: /watch?v=8iOjeb5DTZI&t=914s
I played IG2 - it was really damn good. The ability to build your own colonies, and set up fortresses and stuff for defensive planning was really damn neat
As a Stellaris player since day one who only had Anno as "strategy game" experience under my belt going into it, watching the dev streams back in 2016 helped a whole lot with the onboarding. And speaking of Anno, the decline of RTS elements in 4X and related genres you mentioned is very noticable in that franchise as well.
IG2 is such an amazing game, i loved it as a kid, plus that hungarian into cutscene.. simply 10/10
My favorite space 4x from the 90's is Ascendancy. I wish it was still purchasable, I'd snap it up in a heartbeat
I think you have to pick that one up from an abandonware site. I'm surprised it's not on GoG.
Have you checked Gog?
@@1kvolt1978 Yep, unfortunately it's not on GOG. I did find it on an abandonware site, but I'm a bit scared to download it from there for fear of installing some hacker's rootkit on my PC or something.
Theres like one torrent of it lol
1 seeder xD
I remember watching my dad play this when I was a kid. I couldn't remember the name of the game for years. Only the end of the intro cinematic. So thank you for finally putting that goddamn ear worm to rest.
Hungarian games is my favourite genre.
Isn't it weird that not a one has been developed for over 14 years...wonder why.
Hungary's game dev industry is pretty much dead ever since Crytek Budapest was closed. Many great Hungarian games came out in the 90's and early 2000's, but at this point it's dead aside from some crappy mobile games.
@@evanharrison4054 they too Hungary to do game dev nowadays
@@anteep4900 Neocore made WH40k Inquisitor Martyr and it was so aggressively mediocre I only just now remembered it.
...anyway, that came out in 2018 and as far as I know, that was the last one.
Compare that to the 2000s when 5-6 Hungarian games came out every year.
Stellaris actually was my first Space 4X, but what I found is that it's incredibly similar to Sid Meier's Civilization 5 to the point where I was able to essentially pick up and play. Rather than pops working tiles, they work jobs in the planets, traditions are almost exactly the same system, ideology becomes ascension paths, and just like in Stellaris, Civ has advanced resources to make the most out of your cities and military. Just like you need horses for a stable, you need exotic gases for a research complex. Puppeting cities, that's like having a vassal. Et cetera, so on and so forth.
The main differences I found are the obvious ones: That Civ is turn-based as opposed to Stellaris' real-time, the lack of a tile system, and a few mechanics that aren't in Civ5. Leaders were pretty simple to figure out, but I still don't know how to make the most of espionage, for example. I suppose it helped that I got the game back in late 2019, they've added a lot of features since then.
It was literally easier for me to jump from Civ5 to Stellaris than from Civ5 to Civ6.
Stellaris was indeed my first real 4x game
Yo, congrats on finding your way into my algorithm! Loved this video and I've subbed!
Woo, thanks!!
I started playing stellaris in 2016 when a friend introduced it to me at summer camp when I was 11. The game was much simpler back then, but still complex, and I learned it with a bit of my friend teaching me the very basics and me teaching myself more in-depth stuff. I got my dad into it during the pandemic and it was much more difficult for him since the game has become much more complex.
This is one of the quintessential games of my childhood, looking back it encapsulates what game development from those time felt like, don't put the eggs in one basket, if a system feels to hard to give depth to, just make it basic and fun, and move on to the next system and also make that fun, I feel this game managed to do that, didn't double down on having one extraordinary feature, but rather just end up with something friendly and fun (And hard as hell towards the end of the campaign). Great video, cheers!
My first 4x was Stellaris and it definitely came with a learning curve but as you mentioned youtube guides helped.
Stellaris of which year's sample?
@@EvGamerBETA every version required a learning period, even if it used to be much simpler. I've honestly been very satisfied with how it's evolved over the years.
there was a game called "Space Empire V" by Malfolder Machination, a tiny game studio in california. It had EVERYTHING, the tech tree was ridiculous. You could design and customize and level up everything, it featured space and ground combat. You started with mondane technologies like a nuclear railgun and in the end you had ridiculous stuff like a kamikaze drone carrier stealth battleships with temporal distorition weapons and self healing bio armor. Oh and the drones were all individual sub-units you could all customize and control as well. And my most favourite part was that you really could micromanage your entire empire, but you could also activate "ministers" to automate things like espionage, construction, fleet resupply, planetary construction, unit refitting and upgrading, politics, exploration and so on. Essentially you could play the game completely afk if you wanted and only do ship designs, or battle or whatever you like.
Bro forgot about Distant Worlds
Distant worlds controlled like garbage and it wasn't nearly as good as the introduction to Imperium galactica 2.
@@TheGoreforce bro couldn't figure out the automation
@@Zekyb0y automatin made the game feel bad... like what's the point of playing the game, if it played for me?
@@Zekyb0y I mean if you like a "city" builder 4x game, sure.
I never played IG2, but I did have a copy of Imperium Galactica.
As to first 4X I played, as people share? Supremacy/Overlord
In 11:22 is that because of the Red Cross usage ? Because Stardew Valley had to change it because it violates the Geneva Convention.
You got it!
It reminds me of Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. Although I haven't played it myself, even many years after its release, it left a deep impression on me with its atmosphere. Researching technologies and building wonders there were accompanied by quotes about the world from one of the faction leaders, or voiced videos. Each leader represented a certain philosophy about the world and man's place in it. There was a sense of self-discovery among people in the distant future.
When the developers tried to make a new space game, it was seriously lacking this atmosphere.
FINALLY, SOMEONE MADE A VIDEO ON THIS GAME.....i havent had the time to actually play this game but every time i look at this game i just go ''how has no one made a proper video on it yet''
To this day it still boggles my mind that it had not only planetary invasion but also city building on top of things
also 43 fuckin cutscenes in 4x is astounding to me, and i say this with a lot of love as i ADORE 90s cgi cutscenes in strategy games, its very specific i know
(holy shit at the 300 message animations )
Stellaris was my first space 4x, and that was a hell of a time to learn
My favorite is Imperium Galactica 1 it was my first space strategy game
Most of the points you made about the game's simplicity, especially with the only resource being money, reminds me of Empire at War where people have praised it for much of the same reasons (granted, even if it can't be classified as a 4X game)
I love the city building and ground battle aspect it just makes everything feel that much more tangible
That was a good video bringing back memories from one of my favorite games. Especially interesting that some of of the later games I liked a lot had a connection to IC2, namely Nexus and Hegemony.
I have played 700 hours of stellaris and regularly still learn something new that has a huge impact on the game. The learning curve is never ending, which I think is why its so captivating.
My first 4X was Sword of the Stars by Kerberos Games. Still my favorite to this day
Stellaris was almost my first 4x, but not only did I play Civ4 when I was like 9, albeit, not knowing what I did at all, and actually is more just looking at what my dad did. I also played Red Alert 2, an RTS game was also a major part of my childhood, I was also horrendous at it ofc.
Even then, when I first touched Stellaris in like 2019, I was so overwhelmed that I literally could not put anything together at all, leading me to kinda not play it unless it was with friends.
Until Stellaris released the very interesting mode of letting more than one person manage a singular empire, did I finally start to learn how to properly manage my systems, how to build my ships, and so on, only because I only needed to worry about a small part of the whole system. Finally I was able to enjoy the game. I was like 60hrs in without properly being able to enjoy the game.
By pure happenstance, my ~9 year old self borrowed IG2 from a local library some 24 years ago, and I was hooked from the get go. While I wasn't good at English, it was rudimentary enough that I could somewhat understand what was happening, and it was basically my first real introduction to sci fi as a genre instead of as an adventure (Star Wars, namely). When Stellaris released, I played that too, and much like you probably did, I kept comparing everything to how IG2 handled things. Like Deus Ex and many other games from just around the turn of the millennium, IG2 was way ahead of its time in so many aspects, and it's a damm shame that there aren't more games out there that has attempted to continue in its footsteps, or even evolve the space 4X genre at all. If nothing else, we can hope that Stellaris has inspired a new generation of game developers to expand on its ideas and concepts, so that we one day might see the genre flourish. Wishful thinking, I admit!
Nexus is a title I haven't heard for a while. Was so pretty and a triumph of complex and engaging tactical combat. Only drawback was if you didn't happen to spec your fleet a particular way several missions ago, it's possible to find yourself totally unable to get through a subsequent mission and would have to save scum back one or more missions earlier. I ended up never figuring out how to beat the final mission and couldn't even work out how far back I'd have to save scum in anticipation of what I'd need for that mission.
Finally, this game is getting some love. I remember finding a demo of this back in 2001/02 on a CD that used to be bundled with a computer magazine. I was always someone fascinated by space, and so I spent like an average of 12 hours a day on weekends playing this. One of my favourite games that very few people know about.
I still remember IG2 too, loved it. And yes, Ground invasions were very cool there. I even loved Moo2 Invasions way more than Stellaris. I think that is the one key area, where Stellaris lacks the most and always hoped, it would get revamped/completely redone at some point.
Bought this when it first came out and boy was it glorious, looked fantastic too. This really deserved a sequel.
FINALLY someone talks about this !!! Their combat was great for the time !
I'd also mention Empire of the Fading Suns - it was staggeringly beautiful. And the idea of stagnant feudal star-faring society was very well implemented there. Of course, an idea of full hexagonal maps, unique and specific for every planet was a true find. Decent economy model was a cherry on the top.
It actually makes me happy when someone finds/remembers one of the few thinkgs that makes me proud of my nationality. Kudos to the dev team, I've seen very few games in the past 25 years that got even close to being as good as IG2, no matter the genre.
My first 4X is indeed Stellaris :D
Played 1800 hours on xbox and started it on PC to play with mods like giga structures.
Imperium Galactica was my first. IG2 was okay as it gave some but also took some of the charm. Played many 4X since but none of them came close to the joys the IGs gave me. I wish I could create a spiritual successor to IGs one day.
And this was released in 1999....breathtaking. Then they continued by developing Haegemonia.....My countrymen seem to excel at this thing because soon after in 2004 Mithis Entertainment released Nexus: The Jupiter Incident. I never played it but enthusiasts claim it is on par with Homeworld. Then all of the Hungarian dev companies were decapitated by big corps. Such a nice idea to make this video. Great upload, thank you!
IG2 : smashing game, still play it to this day
Thank you for making this video.
This game was so great, I enjoyed just listening to it's music and watching ships gently waltzing through space.
You and I must've had shockingly similar childhood gaming experiences. This game and Deadlock II were my obsessions for a while.
I cry whenever Homeworld 3 is mentioned, i was so hyped for it 🫠
Good video btw
I loved being able to build Planetary Guns on the ground and also see them fire at the enemy in a space battle.
Master of Orion 2 was my first 4x. idk if anyone remembers this, but i really loved ship designing in space empire. It also have tactical space combat when you could give command to individual ship an fleet. Plus your ship could run out of the supplies in the middle of the fight xD. I really wish stellaris give us ability to build and customize fighters.
pure ear candy: HERE ARE TWO UNSKIPPABLE ADS!
I always find that kind of timing funny. If a youtuber wants to show you something and exactly then an ad plays.
Stellaris was my first 4X game .
Thanks to the graphics and approachable layout I learned the basics .
"hold the match, Kyle is doing the ground invasion, we must now watch"
Stellaris was the first strategy game that I actually ‘learned.’ I’d played through many games but never ‘got’ them by any means, aka Distant Worlds but just existing while it played in the background. I think it helped that I started Stellaris in the old, pre-DLC days, before everything was hyper-complicated. I remember even reading in 2016 or so that if you wanted a ‘deeper’ game to get Distant Worlds but if you wanted accessible and pretty, to get Stellaris, which is crazy looking at it now.
Stellaris was my first space 4x. I was already familiar with previous Paradox games and I played Stellaris from launch forwards, but it was my first Space 4x.
21:48 Vinesauce jump scare.
Stellaris is what got me into the 4X genre and I've been playing on and off since day 1. If PDX can keep up the quality with things like Utopia and Machine Age in the future, I'm sure it will make Stellaris even better.
Oh man upon seeing those spinny ships I got hit by massive nostalgia. A forgotten lifetime flashed before my eyes. Thank you!
First 4x space game I played was indeed Stellaris. First time I played it, I had no idea what was happening and I fell off a few minutes after. Some time later I came back and it all just kinda clicked. I just started learning more and more as I played. I've done a lot of other playthroughs since the first but I still remember that one more than any other. First playthrough ended with me being destroyed by a spiritualist fallen empire. I tried to salvage it by running to the edge of the galaxy and start again on a small ice planet I'd found there. I was quickly followed by the FE and finished off. What a ride.
Wow I had absolutely no idea that IG2 and The Jupiter Incident were linked in that way, consider my mind blown. Alas I was too young at the time to truly comprehend IG2 but it has always lurked at the back of my mind as something pretty special. My last memory of the game is of having my end game ships instantly destroyed by the enemy and not understanding why. I guess that would've been the whole crisis thing huh? Thanks for this little delve into the past.
Stellaris was my first and currently only space 4x.
Played a ton of Paradox 4x though prior and honestly I feel the learning curve is fairly simple atleast for playing casually.
As it has a ton of auto upgrade chance and not to many extra unknown resources.
Stellaris was my first 4x and paradox game, I really liked it because of the sandbox like feel of the game and you can choose your own paths which is really neat
Stellaris was my first strategy game, i played it for about 50 hours before i understood the game well enought to win for the first time.
It was the steepest learning curve i have seen in any game i have played up until now.
my first strategy game was Civ V, which I played for an amount of hours I shudder to contemplate. I got into Stellaris when it came out because scifi is my life, and I learnt everything I know about how to play it through trial, error, and experimenting with the systems. That worked for me because I enjoy it, but yeah I've tried talking friends into playing it (so I have someone to play multiplayer with) and so far no one has taken to it. I 100% understand why they get put off when they see the UI and all the damn resources and convoluted systems. I'd never considered playing another scifi 4X, since Stellaris still satisfies my craving, but watching this video make me want to try out the rest of the genre. Particularly older games like this one.