Humankind, the latest and most ambitious 4X strategy game from Endless Legend creators Amplitude Studios, looks to revitalise the historical 4X genre and nab the crown from the titanic and venerable Civilization series. And look damn pretty while it does so, too.
But it's not just looks that Amplitude are hoping to win out on with Humankind. We'll go over everything we know about Humankind below, from release date information to our first glimpses of gameplay in trailers and screenshots, and what we can glean about how everything will work when it's released.
]]>I've always liked how Amplitude set their games in the same universe. From Endless Space to Endless Legend, whether their games are flavoured sci-fi or fantasy, each one forms an act in a space opera that spans millennia.
Surprise! The latest act came out yesterday. It's a free visual novel where you play as a fresh clone in the Horatio empire, a people born from an eccentric trillionaire determined to reforge the galaxy in His image. You fancy Him, obviously.
]]>Spectral space-spies and mushroom people have arrived today in Endless Space 2 and Endless Legend. The two expansions - Penumbra and Symbiosis, respectively - each add a new playable faction to the already-massive 4X strategy games, plus a major game-changing new feature that can impact everyone. Below, a developer stream taking an hours-long dive into both expansions.
Those new to the Endless universe (a sprawling sci-fi setting shared by all of Amplitude's games, including Endless Space 1 & 2, Dungeon Of The Endless and Endless Legend), all the games in the series are free to try on Steam for the weekend, along with discounts to keep. Endless Space 1 is forever if you sign up and link your Steam account over on their Games2Gether site here.
]]>I was really good at Endless Space. Me and my internet buds (found through the RPS community, in fact) used to while away our weekends in Amplitude's first stab at 4X strategy, embroiled in bickering over juicy planets and strategically-important hyperspace lanes. My empire would nearly always shine the brightest and the best - at least until the other galactic players would team up to take me down. Nobody knew quite why I did so well, other than it might have something to do with me taking twice as long to end my turn.
I had a secret.
]]>Xcess, xplain, xcacerbate, xpire. Those are my 4 Xs. What are yours? Oh, it’s the boring ones. The kind you’d find in grand strategy sci-fi game Endless Space 2. Well, it might xcite you to learn that the space race between space races is getting an xpansion featuring the Vaulters, a crowd of godly ne’er-do-wells who’ve feature in previous Endless games, such as Endless Legend. This is the first proper expansion and it’s coming out on January 25. Here’s a cinematic about a sad robot.
]]>Big, slow, sweeping strategy games expose their rules in a way no other game does. Call of Duty doesn’t have floating numbers above enemy heads, telling you their movement speed, for example. But in most 4X and grand strategy games, there is no attempt to hide exactly how everything works: the stats, their interactions, are all laid out and plain to see. Yet these games are utterly dependent on their ability to evoke a sense of place, scale, and history – they have to be much more than just a fancy chessboard, they have to feel alive, or they’re just not much fun. How can these games survive and thrive under such conflicting pressures? I spoke to three of the world’s top strategy game designers, from Firaxis, Paradox and Amplitude, to find out.
]]>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.
]]>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.
]]>Amplitude Studios has grown significantly since the Parisian developer, as a small team that you could count on one hand, first conceived Endless Space. Now they work out of two floors in a high-rise near the centre of the metropolis and are busy working on their fourth game, Endless Space 2. Recently, they announced a partnership with publisher Sega.
It’s an evolution and escalation that’s echoed in their games. Endless Space 2, then, is an opportunity to show everyone just how much they’ve grown, combining the ideas that birthed their first game with the lessons they’ve learned through the much lauded Endless Legend. I spoke to the company's two founders to discuss why they're making the game now, what the partnership with Sega means for the studio, and more.
]]>Endless Space 2 is the sequel to French studio Amplitude’s cosmic 4X game, though it feels just as much a follow-up to their exceptional fantasy strategy affair, Endless Legend. Comfortably sitting next to all the numbers, resources and planetary management are lively stories, epic quests, and fascinating space-faring species, each with distinct hooks – the ingredients that made the company’s last game something special.
I traveled to Amplitude’s offices to get my hands on the game, and thus far my goal is to try and get rich – the noblest of pursuits.
]]>Sega have acquired Amplitude, creators of the Endless series of strategy games. Endless Legend was our game of the year in 2014 and its predecessor Endless Space is set to receive a direct sequel that will enter Early Access later this year. Sega will now publish that game, as well as assuming responsibility for the back catalogue of Endless games, which includes Dungeon of the Endless, a fantastic tower-defense/roguelike hybrid.
Amplitude are one of the smartest young strategy studios around and they join Creative Assembly, Relic and Sports Interactive (Football Manager is a strategy game) in Sega's stable of PC developers. That's a mighty strong line-up for a company that old men like me still associate with ancient consoles and platform games rather than PC publishing.
]]>Perhaps Amplitude's award-winning strategy game really is endless. A large free update for Endless Legend [official site] is due to land sometime today and there will be two cash-money chunks of DLC arriving alongside. The free stuff comes under the heading Forges of Creation and brings AI improvements, new modding tools, including compatibility with free map editor Tiled and the ability to reskin 3D units. There will also be Steam Workshop integration. The two purchasable packs contain new music, items and minor faction quests. More details below.
]]>Endless Space was a fine 4X strategy game with interesting, distinct races and a best-in-class interface. Then Amplitude Studios' follow-up was Endless Legend, a fantasy 4X game set within the same universe which was best-in-class in general. In fact, we named it the best game of 2014.
So pardon my excitement for the news that Amplitude are now making Endless Space 2 [official site] and have released the first CG trailer.
]]>One of the year's Bestest Best Games is currently discounted by 50% on Steam. The game is Endless Legend, Amplitude's superb 4X fantasy game, and it's currently £13.49, but only until 6pm GMT. The discounts extend to all three of the studio's releases, so you can also grab debut title Endless Space and this year's brilliantly inventive roguelike door defense thing Dungeon of the Endless for £4.99 each. There's also a bundle with all three plus DLC for £30.49. If you need to know more, our reviews of Dungeon and Legend are here to help, and Jim and I wrote about Endless Legend as part of our December festivities.
]]>Adam reported on Endless Legend's free add-on Visions of the Unseen last week, but now it's out, we know the details of what it contains, and it comes alongside a smaller but similarly free add-on for Amplitudes previous 4X strategy game, Endless Space. Visions of the Unseen? More like posts of the seen, right?
Right.
]]>Amplitude are having a very good year. The studio's debut release, Endless Space, was a good 4X game but the follow-up, Endless Legend, is a great 4X game. I'm fairly sure there hasn't been a better release in the genre this year. Along with that, there's Dungeon of the Endless, a smart cocktail that contains a dash of roguelike, a splash of tower defence and several fingers of cunning twists.
Endless Legend, as you might expect given the name, isn't quite done yet. A second free add-on has just been announced. It's called Visions of the Unseen and the first details are below.
]]>The three-game Endless universe and its interconnecting lore is one of my favourite games-related tidbits right now. Amplitude Studios' two in-development games, Endless Legend--a fantastical grand strategy--and Dungeon of the Endless--a roguelike dungeon crawling/tower defense--are both prequels to Endless Space. It all ties together wonderfully, with monsters from Dungeon being minor races in Legend, some of whom have become playable factions by Space. While Dungeon is still wandering the halls of Early Access, Legend is launching onto Steam proper on September 18th.
]]>The endless endlessness, it never ends! In the beginning, there was Endless Space, and it was endlessly space-y. Recently, we also told you of Endless Legend, which is another 4X strategy set in the same universe, only all fantasy-fied. But let's not forget about Dungeon of the Endless, which Amplitude teased shortly before getting sucked into the time-distorting, endlessly cacophonous Gamescom hypehole. At that point, all we had to go on was a rather painfully un-endless trailer, which cut off right before we found out what was HASHTAG BEHIND THE DOOR WOOOOOOO. But now... oh, now we know. And I can guarantee that you will be shocked and surprised probably.
]]>Welcome. Welcome to the beginning of endless endlessness. Well, OK, I suppose the endless nature of this endlessness technically started with Endless Space, Amplitude's rock-solid, ox-strong 4X space strategy. Now, however, the developer with Xs for eyes (they're not unconscious; their eyes are literally the letter X) is headed in a markedly different direction with Endless Legend, a 4X fantasy about magic, discovery, and an impending, inexplicable apocalypse. It takes place in the "Endless universe," so I guess that makes it a prequel? Or maybe a bunch of space ships will crash into your bustling metropolis at the last possible second, revealing that the two games were coexisting the entire time.
]]>Space is ever-expanding. It is, for all intents and purposes, endless. Thus, when Amplitude asserted as much with much-loved 4x strategy Endless Space, I was totally on board. "Space? Endlessness?" I said. "Yep, all checks out. Looks like I won't have to get the Title Police involved after all. You folks behave yourselves now, ya hear?" And then I strolled off into the hungry hills, ever vigilant for a new entry in the Kingdom Hearts franchise. But dungeons? Those can't just go on forever. I mean, it'd defeat the purpose. Why lock some doer of grievous wrongs up in a never-ending expanse? "You are hereby confined to infinity. There are no limits on what you can accomplish. Good luck, sucker." I might just have to let Dungeon of the Endless off the hook, though, because of reasons. Mainly, it looks pretty great - even if we don't know a whole lot about it yet.
]]>Step one to making a nice space game: make space. Step 2.: make things that fight in space. Step 3: decide on the genre. Step 4: DLC! Lovely 4X Space strategy series Endless Space has already gone through the first three steps of that plan, but as everyone knows nowadays games aren't complete without a scab of DLC forming on their flawless skin, and Endless Space is particularly pretty so it'd be highly noticeable. It's characterful to have scars, and today is the day that Amplitude Studios launch the Disharmony DLC to scrape up its good looks. A trailer explaining what and why is below.
]]>Lovely 4X space-fancying game Endless Space has an expansion pack in the (space) oven. It's going to introduce a new faction and new AI. Amplitude explain: "A new faction with a unique play style, “The Harmony”, will make its appearance. Battles will be even more intense with the addition of fighters and bombers, battle formations, a new targeting system, a redesigned weapon system and enhanced invasion mechanics. The AI opponents will be significantly more unpredictable with the implementation of the new ‘Adaptive Multi-Agent Artificial Intelligence System’." Sounds intelligent. And adaptive.
Trailer in the depths.
]]>Amplitude have consistently done things the right way, as far as I'm aware. They began well by making a superb space strategy game, Endless Space, which is a fundamental part of the development process. When they finished the game, they allowed the people who bought it to play, although those people did have to register the game on Steam which caused some grumbling. You're probably thinking they slipped up by charging outrageous amounts for inconsequential DLC but you'd be wrong. The fourth expansion has just landed and it's as free as the last three. This one adds new random events, anomalies and heroes, and allows further tinkering with gas giants. The game will be discounted by 50% until March 18th.
]]>Endless Space is free to download and play on Steam until 9pm GMT this Sunday and its strategic turn-based space-conquering is fantastic, so you're going to have to cancel your plans to do some Christmas shopping, hunt sharks or play with your new Nintendo-Box. There are so many space games in the crowd-funding mixer at present but it would be very foolish to forget that this year has already seen such a stellar release. To sonically celebrate the free weekend, the ace soundtrack is also available on a 'name your price' basis.
]]>I thoroughly enjoyed my time with Endless Space pre-release and I've been dabbling and preparing to tell you wot I think of the launch version. In the meantime, I fired up my interstellar communicator and beamed some messages to the development team, specifically Mathieu Girard CEO of Amplitude Studios. Across the infinite void I fired these queries and across the infinite void, answers came. Peruse them below.
]]>Endless Space, the 4X spacy strategy is now out on Steam, and has a launch trailer with lots of pretty explosions. It also explains that in the end, it's a game about dust. I am bemused by the role that dust appears to play in fiction. From Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, to CCP's EVE spin-off, it's hard to think of a more innocuous object to take such an important role. Where are the stories about fluff? And lint? Where are my games about loose bits of thread? I have been sidetracked. You can see the launch trailer below.
]]>My plan is to release a 7X game. eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, eXterminate, eXasperation, eXboyfriend, eXit ab urso actus. But until my great day reaches us, you'll have to put up with just the four Xs, and as soon as the 4th July. That's the date that's just been put on Endless Space, Amplitude's scifi strategy that's looking rather good.
]]>Maybe the joy isn’t quite infinite and maybe the space isn’t endless in the sense that might be imagined on first exposure to the title, but turn-based space conquest game Endless Space is already the second great entry in my 2012 feast of strategy gaming. If Crusader Kings II was a roasted hog with a side order of roasted hog, washed down with a keg of mead containing roasted hogs as booze-croutons, Endless Space is a vacuum-packed futurepill of a meal: nutritious, filled with flavour, perfectly formed. And it’s only just reached beta.
]]>The amount of developers that seem happy to revive our favourite things from times gone by is something recently discussed in the breezy parapets of Castle Shotgun. A few days later a game appeared on Steam, taking preorders that gave access to its alpha. That game is Endless Space and if it were a farmyard animal it would be plodding around a field saying 'MOO' quite a lot. It's a space-based 4X game and although I need to spend more time with it before I say too many more words, it's already caused me to miss one night's sleep and that just doesn't happen enough anymore. Trailer and brief excited key-tapping below.
]]>
