A glimpse of things to come

“Victory gentlemen does not belong to the strong alone, helm prepare to come about, all hands action stations”

And so it begins, in a few days you will all have the opportunity to see what has been cooking all these years and what the devs have been up to.

I admit that until the last pre-alpha there were a few areas of concern for me or rather cause for caution.

And then the AI came along. In a way it is still an adolescent that is still growing so when I first tested it I was sure of victory.

But while my focus was on how quickly I could dismantle the AI a funny thing happened, I was playing that one more turn again and again and again. The whole game had started to come together in a way that it had not before. Exploration which was already a blast took on new meaning and urgency. Research choices all of a sudden became something I was seriously giving thought to. And all the while I noticed that micromanagement just wasn’t an issue.

“Sir we have multiple contacts on an intercept course”

The AI! Contact was made and I was drooling, to war at once!

Do you know what happened? The AI fought back like a cornered lion. It retreated rather than sacrifice, raided my bases so I was forced to detach forces for garrison duty and counter-attacked every single chance it got. It made not a single bad choice.

I beat it in the end, but we are talking of a war that lasted close to 70 turns and featured dozens of battles, some were just skirmishes and others were desperate actions that determined the fate of worlds.

By the way, I had the advantage of studying the game for months and a lifetime of tactical experience.

This is a pre-alpha my friends but it is already ahead of MoO2 in many areas and certainly has the feeling of that title while being a breath of fresh air at the same time.

Obviously there is still a lot of work and refinements ahead but I can’t emphasize enough how wonderful it felt to have that “one more turn” feeling again

 

I share that feeling. I have tried many 4x games over the years and none filled the void left by MoO2 when it came to TBS.
ISG is freaking me out right now, I'm playing a pre-alpha mind you that has the feel and atmosphere of MoO2 but is also so different and unique. Even at this stage the Devs have managed to improve on that tittle.
Remember doom stacks? doesn't seem to happen here and it comes off natural.
Small ships staying relevant? you bet. there is still an advantage to the bigger hulls of course but you need the frigates and destroyers.
I could go on Mark but I don't want to spoil it.
It's Pre-Alpha with a lot of work ahead but I'm already loving so many aspects of it. A lot of the common mistakes and failings of current games are just simply non-existent here.