Endless Legend - 20/20 hours

That's another one in the bag. I've avenged myself on easy mode (in as much as it's possible to wreak vengeance on a collection of data and code), and learned a thing or two about how this game operates. I played the Broken Lords, who are a kind of magical robot that runs off of "dust" (Endless Legend's equivalent of currency, which apparently has some kind of mystical power).

It was a real nail-biter. Once again, the AI was out-pacing me in score (it was the same faction, too, which makes me believe that the scoring system favors aggressive expansionists), and I was only able to squeak out an economic victory in the last ten turns before the time limit. I was held back by a lack of critical resources that would have let me build certain powerful late-game economic buildings.

That said, it probably wasn't as close as it felt. Basically, my income was growing at a geometric rate, so not only was I getting more money, but the increase of money per turn was also getting larger. I played the game for 140 turns, and I'd estimate that I got about two-thirds of the dust necessary for the economic victory in the last twenty.

As much as I enjoyed winning (despite only being "easy" difficulty, it still felt like an accomplishment), the most enjoyable thing about this most recent game is the fact that the Broken Lords felt completely unlike the factions I'd already played. Obviously, it's the same game, so there are some fundamental similarities, but not having to worry about food while simultaneously being so reliant on dust completely upended my usual strategy (towards the end, I was just buying everything in sight, rather than waiting for it to get produced the normal way).

It's a rare trick for a 4-X to have that kind of diversity, and makes me excited to try out some of the other factions. It's at times like this that I regret my quixotic crusade to play my entire library. I'm going to have to move on from this game far sooner than I'd like.

But not necessarily today. I think I'm going to fool around with this game for a couple of days, explore the other factions, maybe try and get a wonder victory. I'll be back on January 1st with an end of year wrap-up and a special surprise sub-project.

Happy New Year, everyone!