Distant Worlds: Universe - 20/20 hours

I was trembling with anticipation as I walked from my bedroom to my computer. Would my automated empire be functional and prosperous? Would they be galactic overlords? Would they even still be alive?

Unfortunately, in my eagerness, I interrupted the autosave and corrupted the save file. All I know about that version is that they had at least 60 fleets. Luckily, there was an earlier autosave from a half hour prior.

The AI was not exemplary, but it survived. It went from 3rd place overall when I went to bed to 7th when I woke up, but that could likely be attributed to the other AIs being more successful. It had more colonies, more technologies, and an unimaginably huge military. But the NPCs were even bigger. I doubt I could have done better myself.

The most astonishing part of the fully automated playthrough was that it somehow earned 16 achievements. Sixteen. Most of them were for fighting wars that I would never have approved, likely because they were totally ineffectual. The AI destroyed 1000 enemy troops, conquered 50 enemy colonies, and destroyed more than 100 enemy vessels, but also somehow failed to eliminate even a single enemy faction. It also earned the achievement for being at war for more than 90% of the time, which is absolutely bonkers.

I guess I'd call it a qualified success.

Enough, at least, that you should only imagine a moderate amount of hysteria in my voice as I announce that I'm moving on. This is undeniably my least legitimate completion since Sakura Spirit, but it doesn't really bother me as much as it should. Me getting 20 hours in this game was always pretty much inevitable. Indeed, I started this entry with 5 hours and I wasn't even trying to play it.

Distant Worlds: Universe is probably the third-best real-time space 4X I've played so far (behind Star Ruler 2, but ahead of Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity), which puts it in an odd place. I have absolutely no objection to playing it for another 20 hours more, but I can't imagine any circumstances in which I'd want to play this and not Stellaris. That may well be because Stellaris makes you do a lot of tedious micromanagement that Distant Worlds: Universe automates away. (For those of you who are new to the blog - that is not a typo).

That's what I'm going to remember most about Distant Worlds: Universe, the fact that it can, indeed, play itself indefinitely. As much as I enjoyed being the chief galactic executive, I couldn't help but feel more than a little superfluous to the whole enterprise. Granted, I would have kept the AI out of a few of its more disastrous wars, but I doubt I would have come any closer to total victory. The only reason I won the game I controlled manually was because I set the number of opponents to 1.

If I do play it again, it will be to redeem my honor as a human being. To learn exactly what it is the AI does, and then find a way to do it more efficiently. A worthy challenge, to be sure, but one that is only sparsely connected to my usual reasons for playing a space 4X game. It will take a very particular mood for me to want to revisit this game.

Maybe, when I do, I'll just leave it on all day again, see if I get another result - that I could do indefinitely, just for the sheer fascination of pitting AI against AI. I never did figure out why they would bother to include a mode that required no human intervention whatsoever, but maybe that's it. Distant Worlds: Universe is my own little sci-fi-themed robotic gladiatorial pit, and I am the blood-crazed emperor who decides its fate.

I'll try not to let the power go to my head.