Distant Worlds 2

[ojsdad]

I get to use mine with the yearly holiday sale. 

[Martok]

Rub some salt in with that lemon juice while you're at it...   

[Bison]

I though Matrix always exempted new release from discounts.

[Martok]

Generally, that is indeed the case.  The anniversary coupon is an exception, however. 

[bbmike]

All of this anniversary coupon talk made me go and dig through my spam box. Sure enough, there was a Matrix anniversary coupon in there just about to expire! So I snagged a copy of Gary Grigsby's War in the East 2.
Thanks guys! 

[ojsdad]

Glad we could be of help Mike

[Martok]

All of this anniversary coupon talk made me go and dig through my spam box. Sure enough, there was a Matrix anniversary coupon in there just about to expire! So I snagged a copy of Gary Grigsby's War in the East 2.
Thanks guys! 

You're welcome.   

I've been seriously contemplating using my coupon for WITE2 as well (once I get it later this month), especially if/since I won't be able to use it for DW2 anyway.  It would still be *stupid*, but when has that ever stopped me?   

[Martok]

(From the Victoria 3 thread -- I didn't want to derail it any further...) 

I think we may be lucky to see DW2 in Dec.

What makes you say that?  Anything in particular? 

If DW2 does get delayed -- yet again -- until December, then Slitherine might as well hold off on releasing the game until next year after all.  Not much point in dropping the game right at the end of the holiday season when everyone else has just released their big games as well -- DW2 will be completely buried and/or forgotten. 

[ojsdad]

Just their lack of hype. 

[Bison]

I tend to agree with OJ assessment but I think next year. 

[Martok]

Dev Diary #3 talks about how the game uses procedural rendering to generate the planets, nebula, etc. in each game.  This contrasts with the hand-drawn artwork that was used in Distant Worlds: Universe, and the dev diary looks at the advantages of the former versus the latter. 


https://www.matrixgames.com/news/distant-worlds-2-dev-diary-3



A bit of a dry topic, perhaps, but I still appreciated Elliot sharing a sliver of his thoughts.  He so rarely posted even during development of DW1, and barely at all while he's been working on DW2, so it's interesting to to get even just a glimpse of his thought processes. 



Also: screenshots.   

[bob48]

That looks impressive,

[Martok]

Yeah, they're light-years beyond the planets in the first game, or even most other 4x games in general, for that matter. 


More than anything, though, I'm still just blown away by the sheer *scale* of things in DW2:  Ships are dwarfed by stations, stations are in turn dwarfed by planets, planets & moons are actually a decent distance away from from both their parent star and each other now (if still not to a truly realistic scale), etc.  That alone provides a strong sense of immersion, which I can't wait to dive into!   

[Martok]

The latest dev diary talks about adding "terrain" and how it affects space travel in DW2... 


https://www.matrixgames.com/news/distant-worlds-2-dev-diary-4




The main takeaways appear to be: 

1.)  The free/open travel from the first game remains, but nebulae and space "storms" will now generally force (or at least strongly encourage) you to navigate around them. 

2.)  This, in turn, will often require multiple jumps to reach your destination, especially since... 

3.)  Your jump range is now generally shorter than your fuel range. 

4.)  All of these things in combination means that star systems in DW2 can be important for their strategic location. 



On another note, I'm really digging the ship models shown in the screenshots.  There's no question they've got a bigger art budget this time around.   

[ojsdad]

3.)  Your jump range is now generally shorter than your fuel range. 

I really hope this means that the AI will not send my ships from point A to point B with no hope of getting there before they run out of fuel.