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The Chad Jihad posted:Perhaps the reason no 4x is good is the 4x fanbase is all idiosyncratic unpleasable cranks chasing after the nostalgic highs of their childhood, laced with the mad possibility of what that child thought the games of the now-present would be like. I will not be turning on my monitor I'm intending to make this OP a relatively comprehensive resource for 4X games (and 4x-alikes) and where to get them (Steam, GOG etc). If anything's missing, post in the thread or PM me. I haven't played all of these, so I'm not certain quite how 4X they are (but 4X-alikes are welcome anyway) THREAD AGENDA: * talk about 4X games, old and new, mainstream and niche * argue about which one is the best * stories of games you played * stupid in-jokes and alpha centauri quotes (don't over-do it!!  )* letting posters know when a 4X has a really good discount somewhere * interesting mechanics, how they compare between games * if there's a specific thread for it, go there to post about strategies and minutae * It is every citizen's final duty to go into the tanks and become one with all the people. Here's an exhaustive list of 4X on wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_4X_video_games And below, a selection. Feel free to recommend additions, especially niche ones. UPCOMING GAMES
HISTORICAL 4X
        4X IN SPAAAAAACE
         SCI-FI 4X BUT STILL ON A PLANET
     FANTASY 4X
   
Microplastics fucked around with this message at 13:38 on Apr 6, 2023 |
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Jun 23, 2020 08:36
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Nice, I'll add those in shortlypedro0930 posted:Space 4X really need to think up a more interesting combat system than laser counter shield and kinetic counter armor. It doesn't help that Space 4X can't spice things up with terrain. It's far more engaging when you can move units behind a hill or cross a river or get higher ground, but in space all you can do is... drift through the featureless void 
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Jun 23, 2020 12:01
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Pharnakes posted:Also Distant Worlds should be in here. I could have sworn this was something else. What's the name of that game which is basically all just microsoft windows and barely any graphics to speak of? The really complex one when you can control battles down to the second but also build ships over the course of years. Basically "4X: The Spreadsheet"
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Jun 28, 2020 10:15
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The Bramble posted:One game I go back to every year or so is Civilization 4: Colonization. I got into it last year and it was so god drat addictive. I really liked it, especially the balancing interests of dealing with native civs, other colonising civs, and the homeland.
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Aug 19, 2020 23:01
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I'm definitely intrigued by it but at £45 it's gonna take one hell of a sale before I dip my toe in that. I'll add it to the OP though for sure. e: ok, turns out I already had it there but hosed it up with a typo. Also got a bit confused between Distant Worlds (2010) and Distant Worlds: Universe (2014) (turns out the latter is just the steam version, and includes all expacs) Microplastics fucked around with this message at 21:20 on Aug 20, 2020 |
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Aug 20, 2020 21:17
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I'm ashamed to say that a good-looking UI is a bit of a must for me, and while i like the concept of Shadow Empire, the interface looks like horrible garbage. I don't mind grognardy option spam as long as the UI is pretty enough to compensate (stellaris for example). It's still on my wishlist though and I'll be keeping it on my radar for when I've run out of other games to play.
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Aug 23, 2020 10:47
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Node posted:I'd say it qualifies as a 4X, or at least, an honorary member. That's been mentioned a couple times now and it has got me excited. It sounds a bit like simcity, in that private enterprise will come along if you just foster the right conditions for it, and then you reap the rewards of tax intake. I kinda wish Civ was a bit more like that. Instead you build every building like you're in the city planning department of the USSR (which is fine if you picked that ideology  ). Even trade routes are completely state-directed.
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Aug 23, 2020 11:16
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I've not played planetfall but I kinda like that sort of unit progression. My favourite promotions for units in Civ are the ones that give special abilities, or bonuses in certain circumstances. It gets you thinking more about positioning in a battle. Sadly the "shoots better in all situations" promotion is the one you pick every time because it's just projects way more force. The balancing of promotions, in Civ5 at least, is pretty terrible.
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Nov 15, 2020 11:50
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Can't say I wasn't tempted but it looks a little too deep for me (so many numbers) and the dated graphics kinda put me off even more. Would be keen to hear more about how it plays though from goons who've got it.
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Dec 8, 2020 12:11
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Truga posted:hi, i just noticed this thread after having another ES2 stint last month and I figured I'd say ES2 is still very very good, but then I saw this: Nice, thanks for linking! civ 5 was my first civ and I enjoyed civ 4. I've had a weird desire to go back and try the civs that started it all.
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Dec 9, 2020 21:56
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I'd certainly like to give it a go.
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Dec 12, 2020 17:02
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Mayveena posted:Star Ruler is goon made. Who made the wiki?
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Mar 6, 2021 18:34
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orangelex44 posted:Deadlock: Planetary Conquest is a older game but my teenaged past self is highly confident that it's fantastic (while my embittered current self says that I have enough games I already don't play on Steam that I shouldn't spent $7 to find out if past me is right). The reviews on steam suggest it doesn't work on Steam and recommends gog. I'll add it to the OP in a bit along with other games mentioned recently
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Mar 12, 2021 14:18
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I don't actually have that much experience with many 4Xs (something I'm trying to correct!) but I am familiar with the AI in the Civ series and I'll say this much: the most fun I've had with the AI is in Civ 5, specifically with the Vox Populi mod. The AI was known to be somewhat psychotic in Civ 5, especially the base game (it improved with both expansions), and even worse in Civ 6. And it's difficult to enjoy an AI that just goes balls-to-the-wall insane on you. But with the VP mod, I find the AI to be actually enjoyable to engage with. It won't do psychotic things like backstabbing you for literally no reason, or going to war when it has no chance of victory, things like that. It generally behaves in its own interest. And the modders added tonnes more flavour text / dialog too, which helps buy into their decisions. I'm actually playing a game right now where even in the classical era, the various civs I've encountered are taking up sides based on what they think of my warmongering. Actually it's kinda funny - they were all friendly with each other but then I started a war with someone, and they all have opinions on it, and their differences of opinion is splitting them up. My war might actually cause another war over there, on the other side of the continent. A few of them are already on edge due to territorial disputes, this might just tip them over 
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Mar 16, 2021 18:22
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threelemmings posted:Reminded me of something I wondered for a while, why hasn't anyone taken some of the good stuff from Reach for the Stars 2000 remake. The biggest one was the different races, there were like 16(?) they all had different requirements for temperature, atmosphere, and gravity. I don't think the AI was designed to make use of it but you could imagine a similar game mechanic leading to certain species naturally getting along, since they're never competing for each other's resources. Doesn't Stellaris do this? One race's "20% habitable planet" might be another race's "80% habitable planet". Terraforming tech does kinda make this distinction pointless though eventually. You're gonna want those 20% planets anyway because of their potential
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Mar 16, 2021 18:27
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I have a love-hate relationship with Stellaris. I haven't played it much, but I really really like the theme; it's the only game where I feel you can make a Star Trek-like universe come to life, without any of the pre-scripted Star Trek IP. But, I also find it rather boring. The early game is great, when you're exploring and establishing new colonies and meeting other empires and such, but when your borders butt up against other empires and your expansion grinds to a halt, it gets intensely boring for me. Interaction with the AIs seems to be almost non-existent. Nothing seems to happen, unless you end up in a war. Some things happen on the galactic council but it all seems mostly irrelevant, with proposals just being +X bonus to something or other and my diplomatic weight is too insignificant to make a difference to what happens with them anyway. That said, I have the base game and none of the DLC. I have the DLCs on my wishlist but I haven't felt confident enough to pull the trigger on any of them. They're like £7 a pop even on discount, and I just can't be sure they actually solve the problems I have with the game.
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Mar 16, 2021 23:58
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Bug Squash posted:I think the best way to do things would be to have a finite number of "human" actions you can take a turn and everything after that gets ai controlled. Not only would this stop games slowing to a crawl in the late stages, but it gives a natural malus to large empires, and opens up a new dimension of decision making to players in choosing ai behaviours, and creates novel strategies for underdog players to attack a much larger player. I like this. I'm imagining how this might work in Civ - something like 'the player can directly control X cities and must rely on governors in the others'? Doesn't stellaris kinda do this with sectors? I recall there a limit to how many systems you can have in your core, directly controlled sector. Been a while since I've played it though. For unit control, Old World makes use of an Orders resource (though AI doesn't get to move units when you run out, as I understand it) grate deceiver posted:Maybe make communication delay a gameplay element - so that the game tracks everything in 'absolute time', but knowledge of events propagates radially at lightspeed. I long for an RTS with a lightspeed delay  I don't think it would necessarily make a good game but I'd love to see it made as a proof of concept.
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May 14, 2021 07:29
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doctorfrog posted:Gimme a 1X. *finger curls on monkey's paw* Welcome to balloon simulator,
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Jul 4, 2021 22:47
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Saros posted:In case anyone isinterested i'm starting up a Stellar Monarch Lets Play! I should add let's play threads to the OP. If there are any others currently active please do post them here and I'll add them.
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Jul 28, 2021 15:40
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You idiot, seeing the victory screen is the irl blowjob
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Jul 28, 2021 20:07
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Jack Trades posted:Here's a question. Is there a 4X out there with an AI that can pose a challenge without cheating? I suspect the answer is "every 4x until you've learned the mechanics"
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Aug 10, 2021 14:41
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Complex doesn't have to mean complicated! Complex is good, it means there's lots to discover, lots to master. It does, however, tend to provide plenty of banana skins for the AI to slip on.
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Aug 23, 2021 14:11
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I don't see how they're gonna put machine learning in situ without killing processors but colour me intrigued anyway.
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Aug 27, 2021 18:32
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In my experience it's when there are no unclaimed systems in reach. The very moment when all my borders butt up against other borders is the moment when there's nothing exciting left to do It's a drat shame because it feels to me like the best star trek empire management game that doesn't use any star trek IP (instead just the high concepts). So I think the game really just needs a whole lot more events (meaningful events) that revolve around diplomacy. There needs to be more to interaction with your neighbours than making your army number bigger than theirs and shuffling different numbers over at the UN (where your vote barely matters anyway) Microplastics fucked around with this message at 22:40 on Dec 5, 2021 |
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Dec 5, 2021 22:35
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NoNotTheMindProbe posted:Shadows of Forbidden Gods is in a pretty good state for Early Access. It's an anti-4X game where you play as a dark god and send out agents to ruin the AI's kingdoms. Pretty sure it's goon made as well. Sadly I can never get into the fantasy setting, but I'm super intrigued about this description. What makes it an anti-4X? Is it the case that you play as someone sabotaging the AI's empire, like barbarians on Civilization? That does sound a lot of fun... BTW, if someone would like to provide a pretty screenshot of DW2 I'll add it to the OP. I might even update the OP if I stop being lazy (ok I'll do it tomorrow). And one of you DW2 nerds make a thread already!
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Mar 15, 2022 23:54
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I'd be keen on a goony PBEM of something. I'd love to do a PBEM civ 5 Vox Populi but I gather it's not terribly popular on this forum
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Apr 17, 2022 18:29
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https://webdiplomacy.net/ is actually really really good
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Apr 18, 2022 12:11
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That Terra Invicta demo seems to have disappeared from steam. Don't suppose anyone has a link to anywhere else it can be found?
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Jun 28, 2022 23:16
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PerniciousKnid posted:Maybe we should just ask the AI what it wants to play. Thermonuclear War
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Mar 25, 2023 22:50
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Veryslightlymad posted:Tl;dr: I enjoyed this post a lot. I have idly thought, a long time ago, about some mechanic that involves 'prospecting' for oil etc, though I haven't put any detailed thought into a wider surveying mechanic like you have. But I like it. I've been thinking about resources recently too. I dunno why, but every time i go on vacation, I end up thinking about Civilization and redesigning some mechanic or another in my head. Lately it's been resources (and trade but I'm not going to do a braindump on that because I've gone a bit overboard with it). Here's what I, a crazy person, would do:
I like to think that this would help to model some fun historical things:
LordSloth posted:Edit or [Cell]ivization hahahaha this is incredible. I've actually been thinking about using excel (the only thing I know how to program) to model some of my ideas and see if they would work. But I've never seen anything like this Veryslightlymad posted:Oh, don't get me started on the problems I have with hard borders everyone agrees to, or the lack of intricacy in diplomatic agreements. oh man, don't get me started. Disputed territory is another thing i've dwelled on a lot
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Apr 6, 2023 13:30
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I've finally managed to get that ridiculously detailed Star Trek mod working in Stellaris, and have now embarked on what is probably a big mistake. I'm enjoying it so far though, especially the alternate endings to episodes I've watched. Already I've rolled a big fat zero on the vulcan monastery episodes and lost my Enterprise with all its crew. Not a great start for star fleet!
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Apr 14, 2023 17:29
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You could play a Civ with no opponents. Civ 4 lets you do that, not sure about the others. Just you, beating back the barbarians and civilising the world
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Jun 7, 2023 08:18
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Do you like "grow and expand but hit resource limits and end up in a gigantic panic" games cause there's a few to scratch that itch nowadays too
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Jun 7, 2023 12:34
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At the risk of opening up the ai/lore can of worms again... The Simcity 2000 newspapers would be a ripe playground for ChatGPT functionality
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Jun 24, 2023 16:10
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Oh wow, Knights of Honor has a sequel! (after 19 years!) And it's on a pretty hefty discount. It came out last year but it's only because of the Sale that I noticed. For some reason the original always stuck with me, I'd go back to it from time to time. Honestly though, judging from the screenshots, it doesn't look like the empire management gameplay has changed at all, rather there's been a focus on the tactical combat (the bit that appeals least to me). I think I'l line up a let's play on youtube but I ain't committing to giving this one a go just yet. Graphics look awesome though.
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Jul 8, 2023 08:53
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For some reason I can never get into space 4Xs. I like Stellaris a lot but still couldn't get into it. I think it's the lack of terrain. I enjoy terrain too much and there's just not much scope for anything equivalent in space 4Xs. For me, terrain is a huge part of what makes a game interesting. Anyway, despite never getting into 4Xs I still have a weird interest in them, in how various mechanics have been designed and implemented, and how they play. With that in mind I'm wondering if anyone can recommend a good youtube series for MOO1 and MOO2 - games which I'll probably never play but could still enjoy watching someone else play. For reference I've been really, really enjoying Many A True Nerd's playthrough of Total War: Rome, because he knows that game inside out and can explain all the different mechanics very well (and how to cheese them). And he exudes such a passion for the game. (incidentally, that's another game I know I'll never play because I'm not a fan of that kind of tactical combat - I'm much more at home on the strategic level managing the empire)
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Oct 21, 2023 10:17
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Joe Chill posted:Checkout youTuber Sullla and his plays of MOO1. Thank you for this recommendation btw. I watched his intro video and he explains the game really well. It was a nice accompaniment to this review of Remnants of the Precursors on explorminate, which i haven't read in full yet but which also covers the basic themes of MOO1: https://explorminate.co/remnants-of-the-precursors-review/ I don't think I could possibly get into MOO1 with its dated AI and graphics but I'm now having a bit of fun in RotP.
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Oct 26, 2023 22:38
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Btw, I recently discovered explorminate has a rather comprehensive database of 4x games, thorough enough to include 4x-alikes and games that really stretch the 4x definition. I'm working my way through the links to pick out any gems i might want to try (or watch on youtube) - worth a look if you're in the mood to try something new.
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Oct 26, 2023 22:44
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Jabor posted:(Similar to the players that always choose the largest allowed map size and number of opponents, 
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Oct 28, 2023 20:50
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SlyFrog posted:when I realized the AI just had random units wandering around doing nothing I like to think of this as an accurate portrayal of the US military during peacetime
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Dec 4, 2023 18:07
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