So I played my first game last night, started a medium galaxy as the United Empire on newbie (just to get my feet wet and see how things work). So, after about six hours and over 100 turns in, I'm kind of getting my ass kicked. I'm third in score out of four races. My ships are finally tough enough to beat back pirates, but the red empire (human looking?) are at war with me and their ships are much more advanced than mine, I am at the point now that I just retreat from battle or I lose all of my fleet. I have peace treaties and open borders with the other two races (Pilgrims and Horatio) and am friendly with them both. The Horatio (yellow empire) have about twice as many systems as I do and are in second place, with huge borders (culture?). The orange empire, the Pilgrims, are in last place.
I thought I was doing well, but I'm losing. On newbie!!!
However, my first game has been a learning experience and I see where I made a few mistakes. I realize now that I let my fleet get outdated and ignored the warfare tree for too long. Now I'm playing catch up. I also spent quite a bit of time fighting happiness and working on the exploration tree. I may have over expanded a bit. I'm also getting the hang of the planetary exploitation stuff and which planet improvements are best for certain planets, how they work. I built quite a few improvements that were mistakes and did me no good at all. I've also learned to look at the happiness modifiers of planets and choose which ones to colonize appropriately, especially early on.
Interesting game. It's been fun so far. I love the presentation and interface, VERY slick and well done. I wish Galactic Civ II had an interface like Endless Space!
That said, so far I still prefer GC2 over ES overall. That might change quite a bit as I play more ES and get a few games to completion under my belt. But,. GC2 has a few things over ES that I feel are key things. One, the AI in GC2 is awesome, they feel and act like real opponents. Two, the ship building in GC2 is half of the game! Much better than ship building in ES. Three, the unique tech trees and playstyles for every race in GC2 really adds incredible depth and replayability to the game.
I'm not saying that GC2 is far superior to ES, in fact I'm pleasantly surprised just how much I like ES in comparison. I'm just saying that GC2 is still the better game IMHO. But I'm glad I bought Endless Space and I plan on playing it quite a bit in the next few weeks. Very fun and addicting game. Certainly the best space 4X since Gal Civ 2, no question. This is what Master of Orion III should have been!