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The big 4X thread (also unofficial patches + mods, also questions about these)

JarlFrank

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Sup guys.

So I'm in my 4X gaming mood again. Started with Fallen Enchantress, which isn't bad, tried Endless Space, which is okay but didn't really grab me, and now got hooked on a nice little Civ4 mod. Since 4X is probably my favourite subgenre of strategy that I can spend hours upon hours on playing, I decided to make a little thread where we collect those addictive little time-wasters, as well as their mods and unofficial patches that remove bugs, improve the AI or even do a total conversion of the game.
I also have a couple of questions about some certain 4x games and their unofficial patches, as in, which of them is the best.

4X in SPAAAACE:

Master of Orion 2 - still the best of the bunch, nothing even comes close to it. Are there any fan patches or mods that improve the AI?

Galactic Civilizations 2 - I never liked this one as it just feels soulless and there's never much to do except for choosing research and pressing the end turn button. Meh.

Distant Worlds - RTwP, but the best space 4X game since MoO2. Definitely recommended. Has two expansions that improve it significantly. A third expansion is in production.

Space Empires Series - only played IV, which was quite decent, and V, which had a lot of very nice ideas but was buggy as hell. Definitely worth looking into for anyone into space 4X games, but beware the bugs. Are there any fan patches that bring SEV to a more stable state?

Lost Empire: Immortals - tried it once or twice but it never managed to grab me. Planetary management is rather minimal and combat is automatic, too, so there's not a lot of gameplay here. Felt very lacking. Doesn't seem to have any significant fanbase or modding community either.

Star Trek: Birth of the Federation - decent space 4X set in the Star Trek universe. The game has a decent modding community and is freely available here, including major mods.

Sword of the Stars - space 4X with good realtime combat and a randomized tech tree. Too bad the planet management is so simplistic, it kinda drags the rest down for me.

Emperor of the Fading Suns - this one seems very interesting but I haven't played it before. I read that it's rather buggy and badly balanced, but there are two fan patches out there that fix most of the issues. Now, which of the two patches should I use? Any recommendations from the local Codexians?

Endless Space - 4X in space with solid research and planet management, and a curious card-based combat system. Solid game overall.

4X on the ground (historical, scifi, fantasy):

Alpha Centauri - humans colonizing a new planet in another solar system. Look for fan patches and mods here.

Master of Magic - the classic of fantasy 4X. Any fan patches for this one?

Warlock: Master of the Arcane - a fantasy version of Civ5 with some inspiration from MoM. Heavy focus on hex-based combat with a variety of different units.

Elemental: Fallen Enchantess - the sequel to the horrible fiasco that had been Elemental's original release. Manages to be a lot more fun than Elemental, but it's no MoM killer. Hopefully the community will mod this one cause it has a lot of potential.

Civilization series - the founder of the genre. A lot of modding going on especially with Civ4. Check the Civ4 mod section below.

Free Civ - an open source clone of Civilization 2.

Civ4 mods:

Fall From Heaven 2/Master of Mana - FFH2 is a fantasy mod inspired by MoM with unique factions and interesting new game concepts. Master of Mana is a modmod based on FFH2 that adds some new features and does some things differently than FFH2. Recommended.

Caveman2Cosmos - probably the largest mod of them all, this one adds a long prehistoric age to the beginning of the game and expands it far to the future so you can reach cyberpunk techs. Criticized by many for adding too many features just for the sake of having tons of features, but if you love mods that add a huge quantity of content, you will love this one. Takes ages to load and is very prone to crash though, thanks to Civ4's shitty engine.

Pie's Ancient Europe - the perfect mod for antiquity enthusiasts. The game takes as long as a normal game of Civ4, but rather than from the stone age to the modern age, you go from the stone age to late antiquity. Play as any civilization from ancient Europe, North Africa and Near East. Very fun mod.




So, if you guys know of other 4x games, their fan patches and their mods, please post them so I can add them to the list!

Also add recommendations for fan patches to the games already in the list so I can add links to these. Thanks!
 

Eyeball

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Dune Wars mod for Civ4. We had a thread on it recently. It is my favourite Civ4 mod.

More old-school: Cave Wars. A dark, ugly and fairly simplistic strategy game that nevertheless shines in the amount of different units you can customise, the variety in the playable races and in magic being genuinely good and useful for both supporting your empire and hurting the opposition.
 

tindrli

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Space Empires Series - only played IV, which was quite decent, and V, which had a lot of very nice ideas but was buggy as hell. Definitely worth looking into for anyone into space 4X games, but beware the bugs. Are there any fan patches that bring SEV to a more stable state?

Yes, like half million fixes at least, and double of everything else. I made an instruction several months ago with essentials for IV part. Will try to find it and update here. In a meantime the vault for SE saga www.spaceempires.net.

The Fifth part is totally stable, evrything improved a hell of a 4x .. the bad thing is that turns take a eternity to process
 

tindrli

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SPACE EMPIRES IV
First of all:
1. Install the game.
2. Chek if your game is base/gold or deluxe
If you have Base or gold version install this patch.
http://www.spaceempires.net/downloads-details-528-SE4_Deluxe_Patch_1.94.html
It will convert your base/gold version to fully patched stock 1.94 Deluxe
If you allready have deluxe version install this patch
http://spaceempires.net/downloads-details-529-SE4_Deluxe_Patch_1.94.html#dldetails
and then this one
http://spaceempires.net/downloads-details-539-SE4_Deluxe_Patch_1.95.html#dldetails
Important: TO INSTALL 1.95 YOU MUST HAVE 1.94 INSTALLED

-good. Next things are mods and since many of mods have all kinds of shit that that does not comes with a stock youll need IMAGE MOD pack.
http://imagemod.spaceempires.net/download.php

or download it from torrent
http://bt.spaceempires.net/torrents-details.php?id=72
its 69.11 MB so you should not wait a week to have it downloaded
and new component pack V33
http://www.spaceempires.net/downloads-file-692.html
-now youll want to see beter stars nebulas space objects and such so you need
Fyron's Quadrant Mod
http://bt.spaceempires.net/torrents-details.php?id=6 torrent
or direct
http://www.spaceempires.net/home/downloads-file-506.html

Beside the 1.94 which is installer everything above should be extracted in a main space empires IV folder OVERWRITING ALL.. if it doesn't offers you to overwrite then you are probably extracting in the wrong place

Now, before you download any mod first download Fyron's Mod Launcher v.0.23 it will make a life easier
http://spaceempires.net/downloads-file-600.html
and extract it to game folder.
with this little app you can manage/start/load your mods and it requires .NET FRAMEWORK 2.0
which i think everyone have already.

MOD LIST
Allright, this one shuld be the most recent one with codex type challenging AI (Updated 24.FEB.2014)
ReStock Mod Version 5.0
http://files.spaceempires.net/user/2911/ReStock5.7z
(optional)to play ReStock_Mod_Version_5.0 beside all that i mentioned above you will also need
Master of Orion II Music Mod
http://spaceempires.net/downloads-details-625-Master_of_Orion_II_Music_Mod.html#dldetails


if you like Star trek then this one is for you:
AST Mod v2.0
http://www.spaceempires.net/downloads-file-947.html


and if you want to play stock 1.95 ONLY without any improvement but with kick ass AI then
TDM-ReMod Pack 1.1
http://spaceempires.net/downloads-file-904.html

and last and oldest kick ass AI if you prefer Fighters/missiles/carriers
Carrier Battles Mod 1.7
http://spaceempires.net/downloads-details-729-Carrier_Battles_Mod_1.7.html#dldetails

allright. this should be more less everything with AI
:salute:


p.s, There is currently 277 Shipsets for SEIV
http://spaceempires.net/downloads-cat-7-orderhitsD.html#categorystart
 
Last edited:

Destroid

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I too am interested in some of these, especially Emperor of the Fading Suns.

Anyone played Imperium (1990) ? Sounds interesting, but it would want to be good to trudge through this kind of UI.

GgxDn.png


JarlFrank maybe put a screenshot of each of those games you mention in the OP?
 

JarlFrank

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Thanks for all the suggestions, will update the thread later!

tindrli Thanks! Can you give similar instructions on how to get the perfect SEV experience with community patches and mods?
 

JarlFrank

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I was actually wondering whether to include AoW cause it's more like HoMM than a 4X, while AoW2:Shadow Magic has some more 4X elements like founding cities.
 

Kane

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yeah was talking about shadow magic mostly.
also, sins of a solar empire is regarded as an 4x
disciples series is missing
total war series is missing
europa universalis is also pretty 4x'y

also, there's shattered suns but that one was pretty terrible i think
then there is hte little known c-evo, which as the name implies is civilization II 2.0 http://www.c-evo.org/text.html
 

JarlFrank

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I don't really count Disciples, Total War and Paradox games as 4X games, they're pretty different in principle. Disciples is more of a HoMM clone, TW is its very own beast again and Paradox games are pure grand strategy games. Only going to take pure 4X games or at least games with almost 4X-gameplay into the list (like Shadow Magic).

It's really quite difficult to put in words what actually makes a 4X game into a 4X game, but you notice it when you play it. For one, building your own cities rather than having pre-made cities/provinces on the map is an important aspect, as well as having a random generator for maps.
 

Alex

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Hey guys, I never played it much (it kept crashing on my machine), but a really cool thing about Emperor of the Fading Suns is that it is based on the Fading Suns RPG. If you are fan of one of these, it might be nice to try the other. In fact, I think it would be a blast to try to mix an RPG campaign with a 4X game.
 

Kane

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It's really quite difficult to put in words what actually makes a 4X game into a 4X game, but you notice it when you play it. For one, building your own cities rather than having pre-made cities/provinces on the map is an important aspect, as well as having a random generator for maps.

You're right though wikipedia lists all these games as 4x. Notably mpst homm-style games. my definition of 4x is basically that they're very complex strategy games.
 

Destroid

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Actually, looking a little deeper, Emperor of the Fading Suns looks ridiculously complex, in the bad way.


Another major difference is that 4x typically have explicit win/loss, while grand strategy games do not.
 

Marobug

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I second Star Lords, really promising game and one of my top 5 "Games I want in 2013". I already pre ordered and I've been enjoying every minute of the dev builds.
There's also Eador: Master of the broken world (not sure if it applies) and Ascendency (best atmosphere in a 4x game ever imo).
Also I didn't know about freeciv, downloading as we speak :D
 

Turisas

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Caveman2Cosmos - probably the largest mod of them all, this one adds a long prehistoric age to the beginning of the game and expands it far to the future so you can reach cyberpunk techs. Criticized by many for adding too many features just for the sake of having tons of features, but if you love mods that add a huge quantity of content, you will love this one. Takes ages to load and is very prone to crash though, thanks to Civ4's shitty engine.

Bullshit, actually. They recently (well, months ago) added viewports which eliminated a lot of issues related to the crummy engine. It'll split the map to sections (the dimensions can be adjusted) so you could play a massive map and it'll load only the section you're currently in. Still not the most stable game out there, but now you can at least play those larger maps where before you would've gotten a MAF error after few turns every time.
 

Zewp

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Codex 2013
Anyone know of any decent 4X games for Android, or is my best hope to install emulators for Moo2 or Civ?
 

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