Have you finished a game of Beyond Earth?

[Lucius_]

I've played 10 games to completion with 132 hours played. I'm finding I'll abandon a game in the first 100 turns if I get a bugged affinity quest. I'm finding getting that first affinity level for free from an early quest makes for an entirely different experience. Without it, getting affinity to a decent level is a real slog.

 

[Sidor1982]

I've played a couple of games (and finished) and am extremely startled how dull and boring BE is comparing to CiV series. After turn 100ish it's just clicking of next turn until the end (with brakes for clicking on trade routes - just send that damn trade route back where it was going in the first place!). There is basically no difference which tech path you take as they all lead to victory (sooner or later), where the later is still way before the AI. I've had games where the AI declared war on me and I was without any units at this point, yet they ended in my domination victory...

 

[Ari Rahikkala]

I've played 10 games to completion with 132 hours played. I'm finding I'll abandon a game in the first 100 turns if I get a bugged affinity quest. I'm finding getting that first affinity level for free from an early quest makes for an entirely different experience. Without it, getting affinity to a decent level is a real slog.

Ryoga made a mod to fix those, it does make the game noticeably more fun: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=338912889

 

[omniclast]

The few MP games I've played to finish have been excellent. The combat is really superior to Civ5 - so many paths to take, so many different ways to screw your opponent. End-game rushing is way more difficult because you know your opponent will DoW you, and you better have a bigass army before you finish that wonder.

 

[Cymsdale]

I didn't finish a game. I didn't want to bother going through the motions once I figured out how unbalanced it was. I'll try again after the first balance patch.

 

[parts]

I still haven't. The end game is just so boring...

Quoting you because technically I have, but because I won almost by accident, via espionage/domination, am one of the few who voted that I hadn't finished a game. When I try to play "properly", it's just such a drawn out and tedious process that I can't bring myself to jump through hoop after hoop.

I don't have any suggestions on how to make it better - I can't quite put my finger on it why, but CivBE just isn't doing it for me. Gone back to CiV.

 

[Japper007]

Yes I have, several in fact.

I've worked my way through most of the difficulties and victories already. Though I've yet to finish an Apollo game, been getting some really bad starts lately.

 

[Roxlimn]

My philosophy is, you haven't mastered a difficulty setting until you can make a VC out of the worst possible start location with the worst possible start options. We're talking Algae and nothing else on an otherwise inland start.

 

[Numdydar]

I've played about 4 completed games and 2 more multiplayer ones

 

[kingofsealand]

Just finished my first last night. Won a harmony victory on standard speed small terran map as the asian cooperative.

My first impression is that this game is about where Civ V was when it was first released. There is a ton of potential here but so much needs to be fleshed out further with more content. Diplomacy is the most glaring issue. And of course the AI leaves something to be desired but so did Civ V's, and at least the barbarian "aliens" are somewhat more of a challenge than Civs. They could do more with the aliens as well though, possibly alien factions the player can choose in the future?

That said the game is enough fun that I spend the first 100 turns or so enamored with exploring my surroundings, collecting stuff, and hunting down critters. It might not be a bad idea for them to increase the variety of said collectable stuff though they did an alright job with the diff. ruin types.

My first game was on like the second or third difficulty so it was hardly a challenge but gave me plenty of time to explore the tech web and play with all the high level goodies. Now that I have my footing im starting a gemini game epic pace on standard size because the first was just far too short. The patch might mess with it but who cares ill have fun playing anyway

 

[Darkflight]

I've started 200-300 maps or something like that, and finished one. The game finds a way to annoy me enough to restart sooner or later.

 

[Gaian Jen]

All three games I finished were set on Standard speed and Massive map size.

1st: Harmony path, Contact victory on Mercury.
2nd: Supremacy path, Emancipation victory on Vostok.
3rd: Purity path, The Promised Land on Vostok.

Played perhaps two dozen other games and lost interest for various reasons.

I must admit that I have very little interest in attempting the other victory conditions. One of the main reasons is that I was left feeling extremely disappointed that my "reward" upon completion of a victory was a static picture screen.

Maybe I'm jaded due to the fact that I was (and still am) a huge SMAC fan where you got actual animated videos not only for winning, but upon completion of Secret Projects, also. All in all, I personally feel SMAC was far more fun to play with greater replay appeal than BE in it's present state.

 

[rastak]

Of course.

 

[KingCraig]

After winning my 2nd or 3rd game as Pan-Asian this evening, I checked my Hall of Fame and noticed I've only finished games as PAC, KP, or Polystralia (a couple games each). I quit an ARC game close to the end because it was getting tedious. I don't recall starting games as any other leader.

People are always talking about playing as the Slavs, but it seems under-powered to me. Basically it has one advantage - one free tech - and the orbital thing does not appeal to me (I want my miasmic repulsors to finish up asap).

Sorry if that's off-topic - just saying that the factions seem imbalanced to me, so I tend to avoid playing half of them. (Africa is even worse, since the ability only applies when healthy, and that's only about 1/4 of the game. But then again, it wouldn't be realistic if Africa weren't getting screwed somehow.)

 

[m15a]

You're in luck. The devs said they are modifying the 4 civs you haven't played in the patch.

 

[KingCraig]

You're in luck. The devs said they are modifying the 4 civs you haven't played in the patch.

Thanks for the heads-up! Looking forward to a bit more variety.

 

[Pietato]

A few. Now I am waiting.

 

[ehroifcf]

played and finished 15ish games 6 of which were on apollo each with a different leader. never won a game as africa and have never even chosen to play as the slavs since i find their bonus to be meaningless (just like africas) ive just started a few games using the SMAC sponsors but never finished because it just seems too easy and the ai doesnt know how to really deal with the university of planet (which was my favorite and still is). basically waiting until the patch to even start a new game because ive finally lost patience with the bugs and such. on a side note, whenever i get the bugged familiar exotics quest (the one where you need algae or oil) i find that i always just go get the satellites that make those resources to finish it which gives you a whole level in either purity or supremacy that will be worth more when im already at level 12 or 13

 

[Halbbruder]

I've finished about 80% of my games. I could probably continue them maybe, but I'm currently doing a marathon game to determine whether it's more difficult than quick (doesn't look like it so far 400 turns in, which is still mid-game) and when the AI secure their victories. On quick, the AI gets their victory wonder at around the halfway mark of around T170. On standard it's around T260-280. On epic, it's around T350.

Of all games, the most common strategy is to take out the harmony players first because of their easy victory condition. Game becomes difficult when there is a harmony runaway faction, which gets worse as they spam solar collectors all over their empire. The only exception is if some faction, harmony or not, is aiming for contact victory. Once those factions are down, you can win at any time, although I'd probably target the supremacy factions next. I'm yet to see whether AI knows how to send troops into emancipation gate, let alone build it.

You're in luck. The devs said they are modifying the 4 civs you haven't played in the patch.

Which ones? I reckon the following need some additional bonuses or changes:
- African Union -- change 10% to 25% food when healthy.
- Slavs -- maybe instead of free tech from first satellite it could be a tech boost for each different type of satellite you send into orbit.
- ARC -- +1 spy along with more effective spies.
- Brazilia -- +50% XP and all units gain an additional maximum level, the 10% combat bonus could be changed to all units start with +10XP.

Remember the time we thought Firaxis was going to put upsides and downsides to sponsors? They could revive that idea, make the existing UA's more effective and add downsides.

 

[sprang]

Which ones? I reckon the following need some additional bonuses or changes:
- African Union -- change 10% to 25% food when healthy.
- Slavs -- maybe instead of free tech from first satellite it could be a tech boost for each different type of satellite you send into orbit.
- ARC -- +1 spy along with more effective spies.
- Brazilia -- +50% XP and all units gain an additional maximum level, the 10% combat bonus could be changed to all units start with +10XP.

PAU - the bonus is too small, self-defeating, and still doesn't work as advertised. It says "+10% food" or "+10% growth" but it actually means "+10% surplus base food". If you ever get more than +1 food from ANY city under size 12 for it, you've probably done something horribly wrong.

Slavs - the orbital units bonus is half-broke - some sats you want faster, some slower. The free tech is totally OP. Maybe, free tech can only be Leaf Tech? That way it can't trigger the slingshot on its own.

Brasilia is weak.

ARC - I thought ARC was, if anything, already too strong. You can actually flip capitals with ARC, you get 25% more science from spies, and you can reliably get the Free Covert Agent from "Perform Op of +4 or higher" quest. Very nice.

I think the other faction they are changing is FI, as part of addressing Free Tech slingshots.