ningabblah

I do appreciate the detailed supply chain and I liked the effort that has gone into making it play more like a wargame from the 80s. The game's core, a city simulator of production chains where outputs become the inputs for a greater range of products over time is interesting. It's not innovative and even though it's the central core of the game's design - it wasn't applied to all the improvements that you build. The purported living world is a satisfying string of visual animations but the 'world' is not dynamic or responsive to the actions taken by the player. Almost all of the gameplay except military conquest is passive micro-management. Trading between players isn't a barter system it's a 'free' production over time of items one player has in their inventory for another - this is the antithesis of the game's core design. Resources are unlimited and the endless bounty of the colonizer extraction approach isn't challenged at any point. Minor factions and AI players do trigger events that are based in actual historical events but lack 'personality' in that once you've experienced the small pool of events the game launched with you realize the summation of these in-game entities effects are popup events ... these popup events allow you the player to set the tone for the relationship. In a multiplayer games you don't have these and you can if you have voice over applications roleplay or negotiate things and that could provide satisfaction but unfortunately the in-game diplomatic actions are simplistic and unoriginal. As for aesthetic the music does eventually take on a solid presence in the game but visually aside from the 'living world' experience the games visuals seem almost archaic and to my view are mostly static considering the hype around the living world and other triumphs shown off. The map and the UI are quite busy with several components potentially disguising others - other units and their icons for example can be hidden behind your building or units icons. The details of my disappointment could include a longer list and in some places maybe a bullet point of potential gaffs and errors. Near launch they changed one small Quality of Life name from "Aesthetics" to Security - but this creates some odd bonuses in the game where they kind of make sense once you realize that the developers are still working on the game. In a very real sense they may still be working on the entire game. The publishers worked with the developers to plan out a year of continued funding. So they do plan to work on the game for at least a year after launch but this creates a premise for a different question. The question of when, or even if, the game will be finished and ready for launch. Honestly this game feels like a huge success for their marketing team. Because I was typing that up to joke about the game still being 'in the works' but it's not a joke, not really. It's not a finished project. It seems like it's got more unfinished elements than finished ones.