“I’m not planning to go back until the Early Access period is done,” our Adam said after playing the initial release of Endless Space 2 [official site]. It’s not that Amplitude’s 4X space strategy sequel was bad, more he’d much rather wait then get to know the full, complete game. Sounds sensible! Adam, and all y’all who held back, get out your pens, glue, glitter, and sticky stars and decorate Friday, May 19th something cosmic on your calendar. That’s when Sega have announced Endless Space 2 will launch, see. You can also decorate other days, if you’d like. … [visit site to read more]

In its early access mission to seek out new features and new civilizations, Endless Space 2 [official site] today encountered some corkers. Multiplayer is now in, supporting up to eight players, and a new faction has entered the 4X scrap too. The Riftborn are a lifeform from another dimension forced into ours, packing mighty time-manipulation powers and some natty threads. Here, meet ’em in this video: … [visit site to read more]

Look, I trust you’re a sensible sort who’d sooner pluck out thine eye than read video game loreblasts but… check out this backstory for the latest faction added to strategy ’em Endless Space 2 [official site] on its journey through early access.

“Incredibly wealthy and only slightly less deranged, Horatio was a trillionaire who left to discover his own star cluster. Finding a planet sprinkled with labs of ancient cloning technology left by the Endless, the boredom soon drove Horatio to create a race of allies, servants, and slaves who were every bit as gorgeous as the most beautiful person in the universe–Horatio. Once the planet was repopulated, Horatio the First had only to look up, regard the stars, and realise how much beautiful they, too, would be if they were filled with… Horatios. The rest, as they say, is history.”

Amazing. And with an egg head like that! Let’s crack on with the rest of the update. … [visit site to read more]

Heavens to Murgatroyd, it’s only the weekly Steam charts! That is to say, the ten games which sold best on Steam last week.

After a string of backwards-looking weeks, it’s beginning to look a lot like 2017 at last.

… [visit site to read more]

“I’m not planning to go back until the Early Access period is done,” our Adam said after playing the still-in-development Endless Space 2 [official site], preferring to wait to enjoy the finished game. Fair enough! But if you’ve been playing Amplitude’s space strategy game or simply want to know how development is coming along, here’s word of the first big update. It’s expanding and extending the game, adding another major faction, the United Empire, along with three more minor factions, while extending the turn limit to 200 and adding the fourth tier of technologies. … [visit site to read more]

Every Monday we jettison Brendan into the uncharted quadrants of early access and demand constant progress reports. This week, Brendan is away so Adam did the only thing he knows how to do: he spent a few hours playing a strategy game. It’s Endless Space 2 [official site].>

I’ve been looking forward to Endless Space 2 since around the time I played Endless Legend and fell for it hard. Actually, I’ve been looking forward to Endless Space 2 since I played the first Endless Space and a wonderful feeling washed over me here, in Amplitude, was an exciting new studio making strategy games that were forward-thinking and unafraid to muck around with genre conventions.

Now that Endless Space 2 is available in Early Access, I should be soaking it up, exploring every corner of what already exists and speculating about the shape of things to come. Instead, I’ve been playing another 4X game and didn’t find a spare minute to look at Amplitude’s latest until this weekend just gone. And now, I’m not planning to go back until the Early Access period is done.

… [visit site to read more]

Endless Space 2 [official site] is not out. If you want the full and fancy 4X space strategy experience, you might need to wait another six or so months. However! If you want to play something of it, any of it, and you want to be a teacher’s pet and maybe help shape the game, you can now have a crack at a chunk on Steam Early Access. We’ve played a bit ourselves and it’s… clearly not finished, but you knew that because it’s not finished yet, yeah?

… [visit site to read more]

Endless Space 2 is warping into Steam Early Access next week, but since I m not a particularly patient intergalactic conqueror, I got my hands on it a wee bit early. Already, I ve gobbled up countless star systems and found myself in plenty of scraps with space-faring ne’er-do-wells. Last night, I gave my entire empire pets. This morning, I harvested the life-force of a planet full of peaceful aliens.

In the 100 turns on offer, there are already a lot of diversions and meaty choices to chew your lip over, and it makes for a compelling glimpse of the bigger picture.

… [visit site to read more]

Interstellar 4X strategy game Endless Space 2 [official site] will launch onto Steam Early Access on Thursday next week, October 6th, developers Amplitude Studios announced today – narrowly missing its planned September launch. The initial release will only come with half of its factions, but that’s early access for you – it’s not finished, yeah? Fraser Brown dug a preview version he played, so it sounds like it’ll have a good heart. Spacefingers crossed, anyway.

… [visit site to read more]