Emperor of the Fading Suns now available on GOG!

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Having watched people get all frothy and moist about this over yonder olde place - is this still a good buy

And has ghost rider been involved in the new patch?

Cos I’m not playing it without a swishy haired big boobed girl baddie

Well, if you delve into techs that have been proscribed by the church, you can get into genetic engineering and make commando assassin units with stealth camo.  I'm sure you could "alter" the camo (and the unit gfx). 

[Undercovergeek]

Sold

[Gusington]

^+1...I had closed my GOG window after looking at it...I was intrigued. But SDR just pushed me to purchase.

[Gusington]

Are there current existing patches to update the game available? Or only that one posted above?

[Martok]

Are there current existing patches to update the game available? Or only that one posted above?

Not patches, but there are a couple mods that still get recommended quite a bit.  One is the "Emperor Wars" mod, and the other is the "Hyperion" mod. 

I seem to recall that Emperor Wars is the more "standard" mod, with its primary aim being to improve the vanilla game and fix/balance things as best it can.  In contrast, Hyperion is a bit more exotic and/or for more "hardcore" players, though I admittedly forget the details as to how/why that is. 

[Gusington]

^Thank you. Do you think a beginner/newb (me) should start modded or unmodded?

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

A modded Gus.  That sounds...lascivious.

[Martok]

^Thank you. Do you think a beginner/newb (me) should start modded or unmodded?

The general consensus seems to be that ideally, you should play with one of the above mods (it's one or the other -- they're mutually exclusive)...providing that you can get it installed. 

I recall installation being somewhat tricky -- and that was the Emperor Wars mod, which I'm pretty sure is the easier of the two.  By most accounts, both mods *do* markedly improve the game once either of them is installed, but doing so can be a bit of a process. 

[Gusington]

^Eek - alrighty thanks Martok

[Martok]

It's official!  Twenty-five years after the game first released, the 1.5 patch has dropped: 


https://items.gog.com/emperor_of_the_fading_suns/emperor_of_the_fading_suns_changelog.pdf

Due to the numerous improvements the patch makes, GOG now lists the game as Emperor of the Fading Suns Enhanced: 

https://www.gog.com/en/game/emperor_of_the_fading_suns



Feels a bit grandiose to me.  But then, how often does a developer release  a major patch for a game that came out a quarter-century ago?   

[Martok]

Sounds like this patch isn't just a "one-and-done", either.  The devs had this to say on the EotFS Discord: 

It's nice to see how active all the comments are! One thing to note, is that we are going to continue to work on improving the game. The tentative plan is for a release before the end of the year for a V1.51 if there are any issues that are preventing people from playing or to fix / improve some existing features that don't require a signficant amount of effort.


We then plan to get back together early in January to begin development of V1.6. The 3 most important things for V1.6 right now are:

1. Improve the user interface by providing in-game information for the various DAT files. A lot of players during the beta test mentioned a desire to have more information presented in game.

2. Improve the AI - most likely a complete rewrite of the AI.

3. Fix any remaining crashing bugs, fix issues with the implementation of new features / any remaining issues with MODding.

Note that everyone on the team is working on it because of our love for the game. We're always looking for new people that would like to contribute in some way, shape, or form and if you would like to join the EFS development team, please contact @HDIAndrew. If you have programming experience in C++, we're especially looking for people to help in this area.
Also, if you are not on GitHub, you can go here: https://github.com/HDIAndrew and submit any problems or issues that you have playing the game.

Also, @Framer is working on a "rebalance" mod that will essentially fix the largest issues with the standard DAT files - we plan to put that in the V1.51 update at the end of the year so that the general playing experience out of the box, without MODs, is better than what it is today.
Consider this a very fluid time with EFS - based on feedback with the V1.5 patch and additional player involvement, we're going to try to make it better and better. Thanks, everyone, and enjoy playing!

Lastly, here is the current list of outstanding issues that still need to be worked on: https://github.com/HDIAndrew/EFS/issues/78

An improved/rewritten AI would be absolutely amazing.  Given that was one of the single biggest criticisms about this game -- if not *the* biggest -- this could literally be a game-changer. 

I realize none of this will happen overnight, but it's great to have something to look forward to!   

[bbmike]

Good news! I installed the GoG 'Enhanced' edition (1.5) and after turning off the video setting in EFS.INI it ran without any issues.

[Martok]

1.5 livestream by the dev!  Commentary starts around the 1:30 mark, and actual gameplay around the 10:00 mark. 

[Martok]

I keep forgetting to mention it, but the new patch released back in February: 


https://www.gog.com/forum/emperor_of_the_fading_suns/new_patch_for_emperor_of_the_fading_suns_enhanced

What are the Main Changes?

* We have reduced how aggressively the AI builds new structures and units on its worlds.

* Units have been rebalanced for cost and effectiveness. This means that units requiring higher levels of technologies are more dangerous, and some starting units take longer to build. This also increases the value of combined-arms tactics.

* Most technologies take longer to research and require you to build (and protect) more labs.

* We have doubled the number of relics you can find in ruins.

* The combat screen now displays more of the combat modifiers in each encounter.

The dev has also continued a LP with the new patch that he started a while back, with the latest episode having just posted (actual play/commentary begins around the 16:00 mark): 

[Undercovergeek]

Like age of rifles I know nothing of this game other than the love and respect it receives from those that do

Is it a stable, working game that’s sits happy on windows 10 or does it need lots of support and jiggery pokery to play it

And what is it about it?