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  Expansion release date announced! Launches April 22nd on Steam and GOG. More information here: http://starruler2.com/2016/04/11/heralds.htmlhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OFhVtqfDBQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIwA8Xw_NA4 Nab it on Steam: http://store.steampowered.com/app/282590 Swipe it on GOG: http://www.gog.com/game/star_ruler_2 Star Ruler 2 is a pausable 4X/RTS Hybrid developed by Blind Mind Studios (I'm one of the 2 BMS developers!). It's set in an original sci-fi setting at near-future tech levels - though it ends with the construction of entirely theoretical constructs such as Ringworlds. You play as one of seven unique races [or a product of your own terrifying goon intellect] each with their own morph on the base gameplay (minus the 'vanilla' Terrakin). The first four non-terrakin races are minor morphs to the gameplay and the last two alter or even entirely subvert core concepts of the game. That's before we get into what FTL method your race uses (there are four, each have their perks and work entirely different from the others) and what Government your race adheres to. Your job is to survive, expand, and ultimately persist in the galaxy. Whether you wind up conquering the stars with thousands of ships hurled into the void with potent, star-crushing, weaponry - or diplomatically annexing and subjugating those who could or would stand against you - is up to you as their leader. Star Ruler 2 runs on the Starflare Engine, a from-scratch in-house engine we built specifically for Star Ruler 2, and is releasing on PC and Linux. It has really minimal hardware requirements, which you can check out here on the Steam store page if you like but - brass tacks - if you've got a rig that's post-2009 you should be just fine.       Our goal was to create a 4X which tries to actually solve a lot of the problems we've had while playing other 4Xes, such as nobody having figured out a good way to do a diplomacy system that isn't Civilization's. Meanwhile, we wanted to revisit and improve all the ideas of Star Ruler 1 like making your planets something you care about and making the economy not mind-numbing. As a result, between the innovations and the improvements, we believe SR2 is a far superior title to the first one - despite offering a different gameplay experience.  Blind Mind Studios: James Woodall (Firgof) - Too many responsibilities to list shortly. Andrew Ackermann (ThyReaper) - Programmer [Doesn't have a SA forum account] Glacicle: Lucas de Vries (GGLucas) - Programmer Firgof fucked around with this message at 22:59 on Apr 16, 2016 |
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Mar 27, 2015 18:14
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 (Sorted by difficulty/subversion versus normal gameplay) Beginner/Default (Recommended for those who are new to Star Ruler 2)  Advanced (Recommended for advanced players who understand the basics of the game and are ready to absorb new strategies)     Expert (Recommended for players who have mastered the core mechanics of the game and wish to learn new ones)    Reviews "[...] a clear go-to for those who've been looking for a breath of fresh air in the strategy genre" - Twinfinite "It will break a strategy gamer out of their long-held beliefs about the genre, and maybe just have enough mysteries to make a neophyte interested in doing something new [...] Space strategy fans would be doing themselves a disservice by not playing this unique diamond in the rough." -The Escapist "Star Ruler 2 brings a number of fresh and enjoyable mechanics to the RTS/4X genre [...] (can't) wait to sink many more hours into this game. [...] Just buy it." - Explorminate Firgof fucked around with this message at 23:04 on Apr 16, 2016 |
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Mar 27, 2015 18:15
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Hey a game actually came out of early access instead of languishing for years before being quietly abandoned. Congrats.
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Mar 27, 2015 18:16
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Congratulations Firgof!
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Mar 27, 2015 18:18
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I like space, and ships, and ships that travel through space. However I have played so many EPIC SPACE 4X at this point that I induce vomiting as a defensive measure when I hear the term. Seriously that poo poo is like tower defense now. Firgof tell me what makes your game different from the legion of "spiritual successor to MOO2" titles that clutter gamer's Steam libraries like E.T. in a New Mexico landfill. This is the kind of info we discerning gamers want and need tia I look forward to your response.
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Mar 27, 2015 18:29
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Thanks, y'all. Sorry for the second post being skeletal at the moment. I'm filling it out as quick as I can while trying to keep up with all the stuff going around on the 'net about the game. Also, newcomers: Feel free to ask questions, make comments/suggestions, and whatnot. I'm not here just for show - I'm here to be at your disposal. quote:Firgof tell me what makes your game different from the legion of "spiritual successor to MOO2" titles that clutter gamer's Steam libraries like E.T. in a New Mexico landfill. This is the kind of info we discerning gamers want and need tia I look forward to your response. Well, without going into long-winded details I guess what makes us most different is - we're not a spiritual successor to MoO 2. I'm not sure you could say we're a spiritual successor to anything really - except maybe Star Ruler 1. From the economy to diplomacy, it's a very different game than the Civ/MoO model that's been reproduced and refined over the years. We've got Ceaser 2 as inspiration for our economy, board games as inspiration for our diplomacy, FFX/PoE as inspiration for our Research, and Space Empires IV as inspiration for our ship design. Going in expecting Star Ruler 2 to behave much at all like MoO 2 I think would be setting your expectations up to be dashed. I dislike marketing junk like 'a new breed of 4X' but that's kind of what this game represents. We really did build it wholecloth from scratch and ignored a lot of the conventions the genre so far has stated are 'mandatory' - going with our gut into unventured territory instead. So if you're looking for something new then Star Ruler 2 is where it's at. Firgof fucked around with this message at 08:00 on Mar 29, 2015 |
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Mar 27, 2015 18:30
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Firgof posted:Thanks, y'all. Sorry for the second post being skeletal at the moment. I'm filling it out as quick as I can while trying to keep up with all the stuff going around on the 'net about the game. It'd be nice to see a rundown of how the game differs from SR1. Though just from looking at the store page, this seems like quite an evolutionary leap from SR1 rather than just an incremental iteration, so perhaps that wouldn't be super useful.
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Mar 27, 2015 18:33
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Here is a long and extremely thorough review of the game..
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Mar 27, 2015 18:42
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bonds0097 posted:It'd be nice to see a rundown of how the game differs from SR1. Though just from looking at the store page, this seems like quite an evolutionary leap from SR1 rather than just an incremental iteration, so perhaps that wouldn't be super useful. A lot. It'd probably in fact be faster to run down all the ways its similar than all the ways its different. We held nothing sacred when we started up the development of SR2 - but kept in mind all the failures and problems SR1 had. It's the same idea/thrust as Star Ruler 1 but executed in an entirely different fashion. And it's built to be much more balanced than its predecessor. There's no guarantee you'll like SR2 if you liked SR1 - but if you liked how we innovated with ship design in SR1 there's even more innovation in SR2. It's definitely not as mechanically complex in ship design - your ships won't be blowing up because they ran out of fuel 0.2 seconds after they left the dock, causing the power generators to fail, causing the bridges to go offline, causing the ship to go offline, causing space to damage the ship, and thus causing the ship to explode. This time it's more about strategy than tinkering around (though of course there's still tinkering around). Your ships won't be able to store ships that store ships that are missiles which shoot other ships - but you will be able to understand what the hell is going on when combat breaks out. Firgof fucked around with this message at 18:48 on Mar 27, 2015 |
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Mar 27, 2015 18:44
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To get in on the ground floor and offer  :Star Ruler 2 is a fun, interesting game which takes new spins on various concepts in the 4x genre. While it doesn't much resemble its predecessor other then in name, one thing that is consistent is the ever exuberant dev team. Firgof might not post much outside of his own thread, but he interacts with the community lots. If anyone's on the fence about this one, I recommend getting it. Its not that hard to pick up, and it has the required depth to keep you amused for quite some time! On a less reviewy note, when are we gonna get some multiplayer goon games going? Do we have a Star Ruler 2 SA steam group going yet?
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Mar 27, 2015 20:02
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Star Ruler 2 is an awesome game that everyone should buy because it's fun and good and polished. However - come on Firgof, is Energy Clash still the same icon as Negotiate and Ancient Knowledge? I was sort of hoping there'd be an art overhaul for the diplomacy cards, like there was for subsystems and race art.
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Mar 27, 2015 20:06
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DatonKallandor posted:Star Ruler 2 is an awesome game that everyone should buy because it's fun and good and polished. It is, yeah. I'm intending on overhauling the diplomacy cards post-launch. Just didn't have enough time to get that done pre-launch. There's a bunch of things that I think could benefit from a little more elbow grease art-wise and I intend to layer it on.
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Mar 27, 2015 20:11
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So I'm sucking bad! Any ideas? http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=414910627 Also some questions: What's the easiest/simplest way to get energy going in the beginning of the game? At the start of the game, I can't find any victory conditions. How do you win? When I click on a planet in the Planets box, it doesn't tell me what level the resource is, am I missing something? It's very frustrating. When I discover new capabilities in research, are my ships automatically upgraded to use the new research or do I need to design new ships? What does it mean if my first Influence number is in red? That'll do to start  .
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Mar 27, 2015 20:38
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quote:What's the easiest/simplest way to get energy going in the beginning of the game? Also if the Zeitgeist: Power occurs, voting that in and being the biggest supporter will get you a lot of energy generation. quote:At the start of the game, I can't find any victory conditions. How do you win? How you accomplish this is left entirely to the player but by default there are a few things which can majorly shift the balance of power - these are listed presently as 'Victory options', such as assembling the Revenant - which is an incredibly powerful ship; but it is only a ship and must be wielded properly for it to win you the game. quote:When I click on a planet in the Planets box, it doesn't tell me what level the resource is, am I missing something? It's very frustrating. quote:When I discover new capabilities in research, are my ships automatically upgraded to use the new research or do I need to design new ships? quote:What does it mean if my first Influence number is in red?
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Mar 27, 2015 20:48
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Just played through the tutorial and really enjoyed it, a few things that stuck out me that were outside the 4X norm: - The resource management system is really cool. I like the fact that not every planet can do everything and that you have to carefully balance which planets you upgrade by allocating resources to them and the like. - On the same note, I really like how easy it is to set up import/export routes (since this is integral to the whole resource management situation) and colonize planets. - I like the macro-ness of it all. - The budget system is cool, I like that you only have a certain period of time to spend your budget and that you don't get to hoard infinite money. - In general the economy is neat, the 'pressure' system is pretty novel (essentially, resources can create pressure on a planet which motivates civilians to build buildings that generate a certain kind of resource like research, money, etc.). - Ship design is less overwhelming than I thought it would be, so that's cool. I also really like that I can easily download designs from the community tab since that's not really the main thing I want to spend time doing. Looking forward to playing more!
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Mar 27, 2015 20:50
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Thanks Firgof! You forgot to tell me how to suck less however 
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Mar 27, 2015 21:15
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Lorini posted:Thanks Firgof! You forgot to tell me how to suck less however Ah, well that part's easy: Practice and experimentation. Also, if you can't beat them - join them.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:19
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Oh, this out now? The original was great, looking forward to trying this over the weekend.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:38
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Kris xK posted:Oh, this out now? Yep. Launched at about 12:30 PM CST today!
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Mar 27, 2015 21:40
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A Good Game. Also, as mentioned earlier, the dev's are heavily involved with the community. There's an integrated irc client in the game, and they're usually chilling in there willing to shoot the poo poo with anyone (at least, I assume this is the case, haven't had a ton of opportunity to play recently).
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Mar 27, 2015 21:45
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Will buy, loved the first one for ship design alone.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:46
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Still the case! In the last week we've discussed: * how FTL in SR2 should be a time machine, but isn't because the FTL crystals enforce causality or something (we dunno how! It just does!) * the damage capacity of a 130g antimatter detonation in space * how pressure capacitance actually works (it's about as mathy/logicy as the stuff above) * the specific formulae for income via population and level And everyone's favorite: How to defeat Alarcarr/Jurasic Park's beam sniper ships. Firgof fucked around with this message at 08:05 on Mar 29, 2015 |
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Mar 27, 2015 21:47
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I know how to beat beam snipers. I will beat them. Soon. Ish. Soonish.
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Mar 27, 2015 22:19
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More questions! Why would I want to rally to an asteroid? What makes the "colonize and auto-import to Level X" message come up instead of just "colonize?" What do I need to do to get Influence storage? How can I easily find unused mining ships. I find asteroids I want to mine but I can't figure out how to find unused ships. I can find all mining ships, but I only want idle ones.
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Mar 27, 2015 22:37
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I have a question about your poo poo designer. When you setup the layout of your ship, is it defined by the ship model you're using? Will the ship's model reflect what you have in your design (Or is the model just static). I always find making ships to be kind of boring when they don't really look like what you've designed. I realize that poo poo is hard to do, I'm just wondering.
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Mar 27, 2015 22:40
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Lorini posted:Why would I want to rally to an asteroid? Lorini posted:What makes the "colonize and auto-import to Level X" message come up instead of just "colonize?" Lorini posted:What do I need to do to get Influence storage? Lorini posted:How can I easily find unused mining ships. I find asteroids I want to mine but I can't figure out how to find unused ships. I can find all mining ships, but I only want idle ones. quote:I have a question about your poo poo designer.  (Sorry, I'm one of those people that has to do that sort of thing.)It's actually the inverse - the ship model tries to approximate itself to the shape of the design you've made. You can also manually select which model you'd like it to use by clicking the model selector button in the little sub-topbar in the design editor (I think it's the one that has the icon for a flagship). We don't have an enormous amount of models, of course, and some of the shipsets have 'preferred shapes' just due to how the models were made but nonetheless it does try.
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Mar 27, 2015 22:59
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Firgof posted:In case the ship you were buying was a Miner. So how does that work? I'd love to rally a miner that I'm building to an asteroid. Do I click on the building planet and then click on the asteroid? Thanks much Firgof. I wanted to wait til it was released to really dig in. Edit, ok I queued up two miners and used two different rallys, but only the first one worked. Mayveena fucked around with this message at 23:29 on Mar 27, 2015 |
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Mar 27, 2015 23:07
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The game is crashing as soon as I begin it, it appears to happen as soon as the steam overlay notification pops up in the lower right.
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Mar 28, 2015 00:06
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If you're on an ATI card then you'll want to update your drivers. If not, are you on an intel card?
Firgof fucked around with this message at 00:09 on Mar 28, 2015 |
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Mar 28, 2015 00:07
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To chuck my into the mix, Star Ruler 2 is an extremely solid and surprisngly innovative 4x/RTS, even the mechanics it cribs from other games are implemented rather uniquely, and stuff like the diplomacy system is almost entirely novel, or at least I don't know of any other game with anything like it. It's basically Space Opera Bullshit: The Game because it does a great job of letting you build the stupidest and most insane spaceships and empires right out of The Culture novels or whatever else. Building a ringworld is extremely hard but it's also realistically an absolutely insane concentration of power and production. This game gets scale in a way very few other space games do. If I have any criticisms, it's that the game would be much improved (though it's already good) with more content, more systems, more difference between some of the races, and more map types and stuff to find in space. SR1 had the Galactic Armory mod which really made the game a lot better while relying on the existing mechanics, just by putting more content in. And also the AI is a little bit easy, or possibly the Mono are a bit overpowered given that I've yet to face much challenge playing as them. But it's definitely a good game and offers stuff you won't find elsewhere in the 4X genre.
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Mar 28, 2015 00:09
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DarkAvenger211 posted:I have a question about your poo poo designer. 
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Mar 28, 2015 00:10
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Firgof posted:If you're on an ATI card then you'll want to update your drivers. If not, are you on an intel card? AMD Radeon, but I'm updating my drivers anyway to see if that resolves the issue. edit: yeah it's fixed, thanks Emmideer fucked around with this message at 00:24 on Mar 28, 2015 |
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Mar 28, 2015 00:13
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No problem. Hope you enjoy it!
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Mar 28, 2015 00:24
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Why isn't the system with the red line connected? http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=415042364 In other words, what would I have to do to make it connected? I don't understand how the planets connect up. thanks.
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Mar 28, 2015 00:32
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Lorini posted:Why isn't the system with the red line connected? Mouse over a star, it will show the trade lane connections between it and nearby stars, you have to link systems following those lanes. Alternatively, build a commerce station in each system, which links systems too.
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Mar 28, 2015 00:35
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Edit: Ninja'd. ^
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Mar 28, 2015 00:37
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I had no idea this was out so soon!  Gonna have to pick it up because I enjoyed the original a great deal and I am especially eager to see A) Someone who has explicitly said "We're not trying to succeed MoO2" and B) Diplomacy that is different from the Civ model.e; Plus Firgof is good people who actually communicates with players and stuff, and didn't run off before finishing the first game. Ms Adequate fucked around with this message at 01:06 on Mar 28, 2015 |
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Mar 28, 2015 01:01
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Mister Adequate posted:I had no idea this was out so soon! I quite enjoy the diplomacy system in Star Ruler 2, although I tend to dabble in it rather then focus in it. It really is diplomacy that can kick your rear end if someone goes all out on it, ranging from giving you intel to sabotaging their fleets to annexing planets and stealing artifacts. I'm hoping to see a Galactic Armory style mod in the near future which diversifies in to a bunch of (probably superfluos) weapon types, because I love pointless poo poo like that.
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Mar 28, 2015 01:04
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Diplomacy is actually really powerful but I admit, I don't focus on it either. I feel like I would focus on it more if I could set up rules and have it run itself. Like, if I could set the game up to autobuy enhance and cultivation cards if they cost a certain percentage of my influence, or if I could filter what messages cause popups. Also if I could set up things to spend influence freely if I'm running up against my cap, stuff like that. The system is good but you have to keep an eye on it all the time to really play it well, and I find that doesn't mesh too well with the main job of setting up your empire.
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Mar 28, 2015 02:37
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Question, how micro/detail focused is this? I haven't had a lot of love for the Space 4X Genre, as it were, for a while because it tends to boil down to an extreme level of possible customization. I know a lot of people like this! That's cool! But I'm not a fan, especially when it feels like 'build the mining things on the mining planet. hard decision' as it often does. To give some comparison, I really liked Sword of the Stars (1, of course) because it abstracted a lot of that and made for focus on more interesting elements, rather than the individual structures on each of 20 planets; basically, the game flowed really well. Is this game more about the aforementioned kind of hard-core micro or does it try to keep turns flowing? EDIT: to clarify, it doesn't have to be AS abstracted as SotS; I also liked Endless Space, at least until it became clear it was a mess in other ways. BlondRobin fucked around with this message at 03:08 on Mar 28, 2015 |
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Mar 28, 2015 03:03
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