First Thoughts

[Kaeryndir]

Installation

Without issue, the game installed and updated fine, didn't hang or leave me wondering what it was doing.

Loading

The loading screen with the little % counter in the bottom left could do with something to give it more interest.
A background image and perhaps some sound would make it feel a bit less like staring at a blank wall

New Game

The menu seemed straight forward and easy to navigate, I particularly liked the faction bonuses showing on mouse-over in the advanced setup screen.
The interface itself, whilst trim and tidy is perhaps a bit too minimalist, I don't think it would need to be animated, just a few tech-themed decorative bits round the edges might work.

Playing the Game

Seems stable enough while playing, and runs nice and smoothly. The visual style is nice, and while obviously reminiscent of Civ, is still unique and interesting.
Initial combat was perhaps a little on the vicious side given my rates of attrition of units, and the unit workshop needs a confirmation button on changes to stop you accidentally changing something important without meaning to.

The technology tree is functional, though some of the dependencies appear odd, unless its random each time (why do I need to research guided missiles in order to then learn to build better houses? )

Overall

Good first impressions overall, I like what I've seen so far, great job guys, and thanks for letting me share my thoughts on progress so far

[butcher5012]

My First impressions:

Installation went without flaw, I do love the auto update at the beginning - this is a HUGE factor for someone idiotic like me who tends to never check for updates - a big PLUS in my book thank you.

Background- As all Sci Fi games, I feel many simply ignore this first step - the background is absolutely outstanding and beautiful - it gives me a real feel that I am playing a Sci Fi game, something I honestly don't do - I prefer War/Turned based games - 10% of the time I play Sci Fi (sorry im a Trekkie)

New Game: I always tend to be a little slow when it comes to new games, I wasn't sure what race to choose so I chose the bottom one - they seem to be broken down into Tech Tree, one was Miltiary the other non-military and a few traders. I wish there was a pop up to give me some idea of what I am doing or what race I should be interested in choosing.

After I started my first game, it gives me indepth information on my character, I went with Professor schreiber.

Side note: on 2600x1600 graphics, the game looks very beautiful/

[butcher5012]

Well after my first hour of playing, I am very impressed - I still don't have a clue what do - I seem to engage some of the Xenos and kill them, but when I attack the hive I get killed every time.

As for the graphics, they are quite stellar, I am however at a loss what to do - the help really doesn't give me much information as to what I am suppose to be doing, I do get a city up and such, but after that I am at a loss.

[Soheil]

Thanx for the feedback! The objective of the game is to win by one of three victory conditions, economic victory, military victory, or scientific victory with each having their own conditions. I guess we could explain that a bit more but you can find the options under the "advanced" button in the new game window. The hives not being destructible seems to be a bug that has recently popped up and we will fix it asap. Keep letting us know what you think as you play on

[butcher5012]

I absolutely love this game! I started a new game - spent a while building my cities and troops. With Research you can upgrade your troops (in fact I was attacking the Hives with NO armor or weapons) - I gave them Titanium armor and better weapons - and they kicked the hives butt.

I also massed enough troops to attack a neighbor of mine (a military faction) - and beat him taking over his cities - while my ally was mutually giving me support (sent one set of troops over to help out). Interestingly I noticed when I first started out - he acted as a tough guy, demanding coins and such, when my cities grew and army, he backed away and gave me coins and avoided all conflicts (as he was a much smaller nation)
The Military faction I had, I made contact with, even gave them coins to be allies - however it wanted nothing to do with me and one if its units bumped into my ATV unit and attacked it, so I retaliated then War started.

Only thing I couldnt figure out was the Planet bombardment? I could see under operation I had two of them but could not use them.

The only thing I don't like is the limited number of combat troops - Foot Soldier, ATV and Tank - I think this can however be easily expanded upon with the research enabling more vehicles/troops, the ideas are endless with the research tree - from planes, helicopters different tanks/weapons/troops.

[Kaeryndir]

Could I perhaps hijack my own thread back again and get some feedback on my feedback?

As much as its nice seeing what other players think, I'd like to know if the devs have any thoughts on the points I made, pretty please?

[Soheil]

Well sure, its always better to hear someone write down what actually happened in the game they played in their own words instead of just giving us a list of good things and bad things because then we get a glimpse into how players experience the game and how they run into the problems or the positive features of the game and we learn a lot from that. Your feedback has been great so far because you have reported a problem with understanding how the operations work (orbital bombardment) which basically everyone else has complained about, when more than one person complains it usually means the problem is not due to personal preference and needs to be fixed asap. Regarding there being too few units, i think you will be positively surprised as you keep advancing in the tech tree. So keep playing and keep posting what happens.