Distant Worlds : Universe - released (+ Steam availability)

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wanderer27

Platinum Member
Aug 6, 2005
2,173
15
81
What automation settings does everyone like to have a more classic 4x experience but not be grossly overwhelmed by micromanagement? I didn't ever actually play this game more than a few times (which was still a lot of hours actually) so I can't quite remember what I did.

Some of it depends on what type of game you're playing.

For instance, on the new Ancient Galaxy scenario the only thing I manually control is Colonization, Ship Design, and Fleet Formation (Options Menu) - things get busy pretty quick in this one.
I'll also control Constructors and Fleets for the early part of the game, but eventually end up assigning duties to Fleets and just controlling two or three.

Normal game, I'll control Taxes and Troop Recruitment in addition to the above from the Options Menu.
I'll control Explorers early on in a normal game as well for awhile, before eventually turning them over to auto.
I control more Fleets in this one also unless it gets too hairy.


In both cases, the remaining Advisors I have on Suggest and usually determine my own Spy Missions.

Don't forget to set up your Policy early on as well.


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Baptismbyfire

Senior member
Oct 7, 2010
330
0
0
Hmm, very pleasantly surprised by this game. I love 4X games to death, and this one is surprisingly deep and unique. I highly recommend fans of the genre to try this game.

Thanks wanderer27 for the recommendation.
 

wanderer27

Platinum Member
Aug 6, 2005
2,173
15
81
Hmm, very pleasantly surprised by this game. I love 4X games to death, and this one is surprisingly deep and unique. I highly recommend fans of the genre to try this game.

Thanks wanderer27 for the recommendation.

:thumbsup:


Next Patch is out 1.9.5.3 :

Distant Worlds 1.9.5.3 Beta Update is now available for testing. You may download it from Here.




This build has the following changes from 1.9.5.2:


CRASH FIXES
- fixed crash when drawing long range scanners in galaxy view
- fixed crash when drawing planet in hover panel
- fixed crash when auto-saving game
- fixed crash when loading game with custom theme from main menu
- fixed crash when drawing Empire Navigation Tool
- fixed crash with advisor message when invading independent colonies
- fixed crash when investigating ruins
- fixed crash when calculating troop strength
- fixed crash when editing ship design
- fixed crash when edit very large stars in game editor
- fixed crash when AI assigns new mining mission

BUG FIXES
- altered Windows API used for checking mouse location to fix screen scrolling to top-left (thus avoiding bug in Windows Vista 64-bit)
- fixed bases detaching from their parent planet/moon/asteroid when initiate retrofit before they are finished their previous retrofit
- sound volume now properly remembered when load games
- Unload Troops missions are now cancelled when target colony changes ownership (thus avoid unloading troops at enemy colony)
- fixed misleading message when your special forces troops destroy hidden pirate base facility at one of your own colonies
- main view now properly regains focus for mouse scroll-wheel when close Build Order screen
- fixed rare bug with pirate colonies over-ordering construction resources
- fixed display problems with main menu screen in Windows XP

USER INTERFACE
- enabled scaling of Empire Navigation Tool at screen left - use new size button next to close button in each panel to cycle 3 sizes: normal, large, extra large

OTHER
- improved how Action buttons (under Selection Panel) determine which mining station design to show (gas vs mineral) when building mining stations at planets/moons/asteroids (better support for custom themes with unusual resource distributions)



One other item.

It seems there's some kind of issue with having the sale on Steam for an extended period - you can still get the sale price and free Steam Key when ordering at the Matrix site.





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GoodRevrnd

Diamond Member
Dec 27, 2001
6,803
581
126
I don't remember pirates being this much of a bitch, but I guess I didn't used to play a lot of pre-warp starts either. :x

- sound volume now properly remembered when load games
Thank god.
 

wanderer27

Platinum Member
Aug 6, 2005
2,173
15
81
I don't remember pirates being this much of a bitch, but I guess I didn't used to play a lot of pre-warp starts either. :x


Thank god.

Yeah, Pirates have always been a major PITA for me as well :biggrin:

Fortunately, now at least you can tame them a bit in a Custom set up.




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wanderer27

Platinum Member
Aug 6, 2005
2,173
15
81
Patch 1.9.5.4 coming up :

This build will be available as a public beta today, hopefully as an official update tomorrow.

This build has the following changes from 1.9.5.3:

CRASH FIXES
- fixed rare crash when determining object visibility for an empire

BUG FIXES
- fixed bug where loading a previously saved game was sometimes auto-switching to default theme, even when default theme was already loaded
- building pirate bases, fortresses and Criminal Network using the Facility dropdown list in the Colonies screen now properly assigns facility ownership to player pirate faction
- now ensure that cost for building pirate Criminal Network is always properly deducted
- now ensure that custom ship names (shipNames.txt) are used for new pirate ships built using the Build Order screen
- fixed bug where ship design images were being rotated when received a popup message about new ship type research breakthrough (e.g. Carriers)
- fixed bug where Robotic Troops (BattleBots from Robotic Troop Foundry) were not getting maintenance reduction bonuses when recruited from action button under Selection Panel

RESEARCH AND SHIP DESIGN
- AI ship designer now always adds sufficient reactors to ship designs (possibly more than one) to enable hyperdrive to operate at full speed
- AI ship designer now more willing to shrink new designs to fit within current construction size limits, especially when first obtain hyperdrive technology
- altered size of starting Colonization Module component (now 300 instead of 360, updated components.txt)
- NEW MODDING FEATURE: allow restricting any research project to specific races using the new ALLOWED RACES line in the research.txt file (updated header comments of research.txt explains)
- improved AI research pathing to better emphasize tech focuses from empire policy (ResearchDesignTechFocus1-6), while still researching other important techs
- increased research output for lab components by approximately 50% (components.txt and research.txt)

GAME BALANCE
- Shakturi now have faster construction and lower ship maintenance (updated Shakturi.txt race file)
- Shakturi ship design templates now use more weapons and other components (military ships, medium & large spaceports, defensive bases)
- Shakturi empire policy now builds more large military ships and less small military ships
- reputation gain from attacking pirates is now reduced by 50%
- Robotic Troops are now cheaper to maintain (25% of normal instead of 33%), and now twice as fast to recruit
- empires are now more willing to use excess cash on hand as factor when deciding whether to build new ships (e.g. low or negative cashflow, but large cash reserves on hand), especially when at war
- now much harder to perform intelligence missions against Ancient Guardians (steal maps, tech, etc)

OTHER
- no longer scrap and rebuild fighters after loading a saved game
- all sound effects (button clicks, etc) are now disabled when effect volume is set to zero in options screen
- savegame and settings folder location is now standardized to "My Documents\My Games\Distant Worlds Universe" (this remains the same across version updates)
- now send a message to an empire when one of their colonies is lost to a pirate faction that builds a Criminal Network there
- immediately update empire list in Diplomacy screen when trade Empire contact (can now immediately see new empire in list)
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3640204



Also, DW : Universe finally has a Metacritic score - 87/100 :

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/distant-worlds-universe



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wanderer27

Platinum Member
Aug 6, 2005
2,173
15
81
New Patch is out for those that picked this up (sale is now over) :

Hello Everyone,

The Distant Worlds 1.9.5.5 Beta Update is now available for testing. You may download it from Here.

This build will hopefully be available an official update next Tuesday.

This build has the following changes from 1.9.5.4:

CRASH FIXES
- added extra safeguards to help prevent crashes when using faulty themes

BUG FIXES
- now cancel intelligence missions when target colony or base conquered, destroyed, etc
- fixed bug where sometimes getting tech bonuses from disassembling ships without advanced tech
- Ion Defense and Tractor Beams no longer counted as weapons when checking civilian designs in Ship Design editor
- ensure never load pirate raider troops when loading troops onto transports (e.g. loading troops from own colony while attacking pirate base)
- ensure custom planetmaps getting loaded ('other' folder)
- ensure mouse scroll wheel retains focus when Character and Empire Policy screens are closed
- ensure colonies only appear once in Top Colonies screen, even when controlled by pirates

MODDING
- NEW MODDING FEATURE: defined Research path. Optionally allow specifying project order for a race for each tech tree (see new entries in race files: WeaponsResearchProjectOrder, EnergyResearchProjectOrder, HighTechResearchProjectOrder)
- reverted file loading for certain files to be encoding neutral, i.e. does not matter whether ANSI or UTF-8 (resources.txt, components.txt, research.txt)
- increased maximum government amount to 60 (governments.txt)
- increased maximum planetary facility amount to 100 (facilities.txt)
- increased maximum fighter amount to 50 (fighters.txt)

USER INTERFACE
- increased font sizes for main menu items when screen resolution is greater than 1920x1080
- increased font size for Galactopedia topic index
- increased font size of hover panel at bottom-middle of screen
- increased font size in Game Options screens
- slightly increased font size in main view for system names, nebula names, etc
- increased font size of tradeable items in Diplomacy trade screen
- increased font size in hover tech descriptions in Diplomacy trade screen
- increased font size in Component Guide screen (Design Detail screen and Research screen)
- ensure correct empire remains selected in Diplomacy screen when conclude trade deal

GAME BALANCE AND AI
- further improved AI ship design: no longer add too many extra reactors, nor remove too many shield components, when attempting to shrink a new design to fit within construction size limits
- increased chance of counterintelligence missions successfully intercepting enemy intelligence missions, especially for agents with high counterintelligence skill levels
- random government selection more balanced (no longer frequently choosing Military Dictatorship)
- initial home system ruins (Age of Shadows) now never contain system map bonuses
- reduced number of spaceports empire builds when has low population
- increased maximum fleet count. Now relates to overall number of ships and bases, up to maximum of 100 fleets
- AI empires now check whether colony is safe to build at prior to initiating research station construction (e.g. check for nearby pirates)

PIRATES
- ensure pirate smuggling freighters repair at pirate base when damaged
- ensure pirate smuggling freighters retrofit when necessary and able
- empire will not detect and attack pirate smugglers when they are smuggling resources for that empire
- ensure that pirate-owned colonies are included when checking for wonder completion
- pirate factions now get research bonuses from scientists at their bases
- pirate factions can now change their home base to any space port in their empire by selecting new option in right-click pop-up menu

OTHER
- ensure that new settings and savegame folder locations are properly created (My Documents\My Games\Distant Worlds Universe)

_____________________________

Erik Rutins
Director of Product Development

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3645837



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wanderer27

Platinum Member
Aug 6, 2005
2,173
15
81
Rock, Paper, Shotgun award :

The Bestest Best Strategy 2014 – Distant Worlds: Universe

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/12/14/the-bestest-best-strategy-2014-distant-worlds-universe/

Moving from the earliest steps toward the stars to space operas and sci-fi dreams that could be responsible for an expanded universe of spin-off novels, Distant Worlds has never seen a horizon that it doesn’t want to touch. It copes with the enormous scale by allowing players to pick and choose their responsibilities. Yes, the game was first released four years ago and, yes, it’s an expensive and acquired taste. But this is the most complete version of one of the most unique, enormous and engrossing strategy games ever made.


While I'm hear, the current version is at 1.9.5.10


Also, beyond the normal huge scope of the game here are few notable Mods (thread links) :


Star Trek The Picard Era Mod - http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3668367

Distant Worlds Extended (with 40 more Races) - http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3141149

ExtendedRaceBannerSmall_zpsf3a6c468.jpg


Beyond Extended Universe (WIP extension to above) - http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3657646

Research Reloaded (huge new Research Tree) - http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3658567

AI Improvement Mod - http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3647528


A few other Mods also at : http://www.moddb.com/games/distant-worlds/mods



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brandonb

Diamond Member
Oct 17, 2006
3,731
2
0
Not sure why this was rated best strategy.

The game is completely broken AT BEST.

Take that ancient galaxy scenario. It reminds me much of WW2. Where you have allies vs axis. You have a partners and recruit other factions to join your alliance against the bad guys. So here I am. Playing, and my partner starts attacking my colonies and starts taking them over. I go into diplomacy and he's still in my alliance and is pleased with me. Every time I go in there and say "lets end the war" he says no... The game is causing this dude to attack me, and I can't fix the problem because he already likes me and is part of my alliance.

Ok. That has to be a bug. I'll forgive it.

But there is absolutely no way to automate your fleets in a defensive stance. Sure you can override them and make them defensive. But you have to turn automation off in order to do so. But that also means they won't retrofit, refuel, or do anything unless you manually do it yourself. Anytime you turn automation on, they go into offensive mode, and that leaves your distant worlds completely unprotected for the AI to come in and face roll your empire.

There is absolutely no strategy in the game. There is no such thing as a front line, a flank, taking out a supply route, nothing...

Not to mention I try to play the pirate factions. And your AI will never attack any other pirate faction unless you manually control them. But you have objectives such as controlling the most pirate bases, etc. So again, you have to turn automation OFF and control everything manually, you won't ever win.

There is absolutely no mode or anything in this game that even works. Not unless you feel like pausing the game every second to give orders to your fleets, etc. Honestly. That's not going to be even remotely fun micro managing an empire which claims to be the BIGGEST 4x game in the universe!
 

local

Golden Member
Jun 28, 2011
1,850
511
136
I don't fully automate fleets. Just leave it on suggest attacks or something like that. That way if I want to stay defensive I just decline all attacks. Also I always keep a personal fleet under manual control.
 

zinfamous

No Lifer
Jul 12, 2006
110,511
29,096
146
I bought this way back at release when it was ridiculously expensive...played it for a bit, enjoyed it, but...eh. don't know.

I wonder if I dig up my key, I can activate it on steam? :hmm:
 

you2

Diamond Member
Apr 2, 2002
5,678
917
126
You can. I might need to email matrix (I forget) but the matrix version can be activated on steam.

I bought this way back at release when it was ridiculously expensive...played it for a bit, enjoyed it, but...eh. don't know.

I wonder if I dig up my key, I can activate it on steam? :hmm:
 

zinfamous

No Lifer
Jul 12, 2006
110,511
29,096
146
You can. I might need to email matrix (I forget) but the matrix version can be activated on steam.

yes, I would have to mail them. I found my key buried in the game folder on an old backup hardrive, where I placed random junk from years ago just ahead of a re-format.

That key doesn't work on steam (plus, I had installed and played that game)--but it isn't a key format that steam would recognize, anyway. Not sure if I want to bother, aside from the fact that if I get it activated in steam, at least I will always know where it is.
 

wanderer27

Platinum Member
Aug 6, 2005
2,173
15
81
yes, I would have to mail them. I found my key buried in the game folder on an old backup hardrive, where I placed random junk from years ago just ahead of a re-format.

That key doesn't work on steam (plus, I had installed and played that game)--but it isn't a key format that steam would recognize, anyway. Not sure if I want to bother, aside from the fact that if I get it activated in steam, at least I will always know where it is.

Assuming you have the DW: Universe edition and aren't talking about the previous expansions/versions this is what you need to do to get the Steam Key :

Hi guys

we've had a lot of questions about how the system works so we're trying to put all the info in one place.

If you have bought Distant Worlds from our stores you will have a serial. This serial is all you need to get your Steam key. The way the system works is you register your serial and then we issue you a Steam key.

Depending on your location, Distant Worlds: Universe will be online on Steam later today or tomorrow morning. You will be able to find it here

The Steam version is exactly the same as the version we sell.

To register your serials & redeem your steam keys please go here

Once you have registered a serial a button will appear to generate a Steam key. Click the button and the page will update to show your key. This page will track all the Steam keys you have redeemed.

We've tried to make it as universal as possible so it works for everyone no matter where they bought and will work for future releases. We've tested it thoroughly but as always when new software hits the wild there can be issues so if something goes wrong let us know and we'll get to fixing it ASAP.

Thanks again for your support!

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=3615511



Main reason I bumped this was so that those still thinking about this game or someone looking for a good 4x Space game might want to take a look at it.


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local

Golden Member
Jun 28, 2011
1,850
511
136
This is a good game and considering the publisher it is about as cheap as you can expect it to go.