I’m the same. On paper, Stellaris sounds like a game that could be my all time #1. It has everything I love in games, but my lord … the learning curve. I have tried it three times now and I could just never get over it. It’s like it’s not even a curve lol, it’s a flat straight up vertical wall.
For me part of that is that they massively rejigger the game mechanics all the time. Now, that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as they’re trying to improve game rules, but if you learn to play the game as it works one way and then there are some major changes in how things work, it means that you have to do a mental reset (especially if you don’t start a new game realizing that things are now working differently, so you don’t realize that you need to reset). And it’s a game where you need to understand how things work and plan ahead using that understanding, so not knowing what you don’t know is kind of a liability.
EDIT: That being said, of all the Paradox games that I own, Stellaris has definitely been the one that I’ve gotten the most enjoyment out of.
This was my problem trying to get into it after MegaCorp. Suddenly production went from a familiar mechanic like in Endless Legend or Civ to a convoluted mess with all the branching resources. One day I’ll get back into it…
honestly i think having been in on the ground floor makes things easier. its way easier to learn the changes to mechanics you already understand than it is to learn mechanics that were designed to be, in almost all cases for Stellaris, more complicated than the original, already complicated mechanics.
I’m the same. On paper, Stellaris sounds like a game that could be my all time #1. It has everything I love in games, but my lord … the learning curve. I have tried it three times now and I could just never get over it. It’s like it’s not even a curve lol, it’s a flat straight up vertical wall.
For me part of that is that they massively rejigger the game mechanics all the time. Now, that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as they’re trying to improve game rules, but if you learn to play the game as it works one way and then there are some major changes in how things work, it means that you have to do a mental reset (especially if you don’t start a new game realizing that things are now working differently, so you don’t realize that you need to reset). And it’s a game where you need to understand how things work and plan ahead using that understanding, so not knowing what you don’t know is kind of a liability.
EDIT: That being said, of all the Paradox games that I own, Stellaris has definitely been the one that I’ve gotten the most enjoyment out of.
This was my problem trying to get into it after MegaCorp. Suddenly production went from a familiar mechanic like in Endless Legend or Civ to a convoluted mess with all the branching resources. One day I’ll get back into it…
honestly i think having been in on the ground floor makes things easier. its way easier to learn the changes to mechanics you already understand than it is to learn mechanics that were designed to be, in almost all cases for Stellaris, more complicated than the original, already complicated mechanics.