Skip to content
CGMagazine
  • News
  • ArticlesExpand
    • Buyers Guides
    • Features
    • Interviews
    • Previews
    • Spotlight
    • The Vault
  • ReviewsExpand
    • Game Reviews
    • Comic Reviews
    • Anime Reviews
    • Book Reviews
    • Tabletop Reviews
    • Hardware Reviews
    • Music Reviews
    • Movie Reviews
    • TV Reviews
  • Guides
  • Magazine
  • MediaExpand
    • Podcasts
    • Video
    • Sound Off
    • First Fifteen
    • Weekly Goods
    • Video Interviews
    • Video Reviews
  • Store
  • Newswire
Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube
CGMagazine
Endless Space 2 Preview - Creating Endless Stories
Share on facebook
Share on twitter
Share on linkedin
Share on reddit

Endless Space 2 Preview – Creating Endless Stories

  • Robert B. Marks Robert B. Marks
  • May 12, 2017
  • 3 Minute Read

If there is one concept that keeps coming up throughout the preview presentation of Endless Space 2, it is letting players create their own stories.

It’s around 3:30 p.m. EDT, and I’m on Skype with Romain de Waubert, Creative Director of Amplitude Studios, based in Paris, France. Their 4X science fiction strategy game, Endless Space 2, comes out of Early Access on May 19, 2017. As he walks me through some of the mechanics and gameplay, it becomes very clear that he has put great thought and care into the many decisions that players will need to make as they play through his game.

“When you make a choice, it should be a new choice, [and] you need to create oppositions with new choices,” he says as I interview him after the presentation. “With all of these choices, you will create your own story that nobody else will have. We want to make sure that [when] you take a choice [it] is really yours, and not somebody else’s.”

Endless Space 2 Preview - Creating Endless Stories 1

There is a lot to keep each decision meaningful, beginning with the choice of which faction to play. As he tells me during the presentation, each race is an archetype that has had additional development added on, with the player’s selection having a massive impact on what happens in their game. This even extends to the game’s sense of humour, sprinkled throughout to keep the experience from getting too serious. Play the inquisitive Sophons (the first to do everything, including accidentally blow up their own moon), and you’re in for a lighter experience with plenty to laugh about as they bumble their way through. Choose the Riftborn, and you’re in a desperate struggle for survival – there’s not much to laugh about, but you do get to reverse time and redo battles. These differing motivations, along with the character development they bring, is a key to Endless Space 2‘s design.

“I don’t want to play a game where I just gather food,” says de Waubert. “You want to play a game where you unify the universe in your image. It goes well beyond the gameplay, and that’s what we wanted – [those are] the games that get remembered ten, twenty years later.”

This effort to create a more memorable experience for the player appears in sometimes surprising places. Whereas many 4X strategy games have a civics mechanics, Endless Space 2 has you actually passing laws, dealing with political parties, and even having elections – a game mechanic that replicates political capital, and puts the player into a situation where public opinion matters. You can attempt to ride it or run roughshod over it, but you must always take it into consideration.

Endless Space 2 Preview - Creating Endless Stories 2
Endless Space 2 Preview - Creating Endless Stories 3

“It should be about the population and how they feel,” says de Waubert. “That allows you to create stories between and your population – between this guy who wants to recreate the universe in his image and this population who just want to eat. It’s more organic, it makes the game more believable, and it hooks you even more.”

If the Civilization series is about great power politics throughout history, then Endless Space 2 seems to be an attempt to take it to the stars, putting the player in the shoes of a galactic head of state. This even extends to the combat, where the player can set general strategy, but the battles themselves are automated – carrying out the tactics is up to the fleet commanders. What the player does with this position and power, in the end, is up to them.

“It’s about conquering the galaxy, saving the galaxy, beautifying the galaxy, believing what you see and what you are,” de Waubert tells me. “It’s all about the richness you experience pleasing your ears, pleasing your eyes, not giving you any reasons to get out of the game. It should suck you in and leave you with a little smile along the way.”

Robert B. Marks

Robert B. Marks

Robert B. Marks wears many hats, only two of which are a Stetson or Tilly - he is an author, editor, publisher, military historian, and university instructor. He lives in the area of Kingston, Ontario, with his wife and daughter.
All Posts

Must Read

Samsung Note 20 Ultra Review 18

Gaming on the Go: Talking Note 20 as Gaming Alternative

Samsung Reveals Galaxy S21 Lineup at Unpacked 2021 5

Samsung Reveals Galaxy S21 Lineup at Unpacked 2021

ASUS ROG Line Expands With RTX 30 Series and 11th Gen Intel CPUs 12

ASUS ROG Line Expands With RTX 30 Series and 11th Gen Intel CPUs

MORE FROM Robert B. Marks

Command & Conquer Remastered Review

Command & Conquer Remastered Collection Review

HBO’s Watchmen: What It All Meant 4

HBO’s Watchmen: What It All Meant

Why the Best James Bond will never Appear on the Screen

Why the Best James Bond will Never Appear on the Screen

What the Critical Backlash Against Midway Means for Cinema 2

What the Critical Backlash Against Midway Means for Cinema

CGMagazine Logo

Advertise with us
Jobs @ CGMagazine
© 2020 CGMagazine Publishing Group

Facebook
Twitter
Youtube
Linkedin
Instagram
  • Advertise
  • Contact
  • About Us
  • Policies
  • Jobs
  • Contests
  • CNW News
Menu
  • Advertise
  • Contact
  • About Us
  • Policies
  • Jobs
  • Contests
  • CNW News
  • News
  • Articles
    • Buyers Guides
    • Features
    • Interviews
    • Previews
    • Spotlight
    • The Vault
  • Reviews
    • Game Reviews
    • Comic Reviews
    • Anime Reviews
    • Book Reviews
    • Tabletop Reviews
    • Hardware Reviews
    • Music Reviews
    • Movie Reviews
    • TV Reviews
  • Guides
  • Magazine
  • Media
    • Podcasts
    • Video
    • Sound Off
    • First Fifteen
    • Weekly Goods
    • Video Interviews
    • Video Reviews
  • Store
  • Newswire
Search