Game intel
Endless Legend 2
With a mysterious, ever-changing world, unique factions, and epic storytelling, the much-awaited sequel to the strategy game classic ENDLESS Legend is here, op…
This caught my attention because Endless Legend 2’s best idea-the roaming, stormborn Doomwraiths-has also been its biggest early frustration. Amplitude Studios’ October State of the Game reads like a checklist of what players actually asked for: cap the economic pain, teach the AI to value its soldiers, make simultaneous turns legible, and clean up the UI. It’s the sort of course correction I expect from Amplitude, a studio that built its reputation by iterating publicly with its community, from Endless Legend to Humankind.
Amplitude isn’t gutting its signature threat, but it’s sanding off the punishing edges. “We want them to be a real threat and provide a midgame emergent goal for the player,” game director Derek Paxton says, “but your economy shouldn’t be crushed by them if it takes you time to get the resources together to deal with them.” The first update caps corruption at 50% after ten turns, with maluses ramping up rather than detonating your city overnight. That’s the right move: Doomwraiths stay scary without making a single unlucky spawn feel like a reset button.
Two key actions-“Bait Doomwraith” and “Close Rift”—now unlock by default. That alone removes a nasty bit of tech-tree RNG where a good plan could be held hostage by research order. Baiting now scales by distance and gets pricier with each monsoon (smart), while the “Collective Sacrifice” technology halves that cost (also smart). Paxton even floats a separate Doomwraith difficulty setting, which is exactly how you turn a cool systems toy into a flexible sandbox rather than a one-size-fits-none headache.
The open question is whether the 50% cap makes them too manageable for veterans. If the midgame becomes trivialized, expect higher difficulties or map intensity sliders to carry the weight. But as a baseline for a one-month-old 4X, this is a player-friendly calibration that preserves identity.
Amplitude promises AI that respects its own units: better compositions, fewer idle stacks, and longer-lived armies that can actually earn veterancy. The note about not letting larvae sit around unused is a subtle but telling fix—anyone who’s watched the AI drip-feed cannon fodder knows how quickly the late game collapses when opponents refuse to scale. If EL2 can sustain credible enemies past turn 150, that alone will extend the campaign sweet spot.
On the turn structure: simultaneous turns are theoretically great for pacing, but they’re a UX minefield. The new “Always show empire statuses” adds clear indicators next to your end-turn button so you can see what other factions are up to. Paxton explains that turns remain simultaneous, but you can “wait for all the bubbles to fill and know that the AI is done with their turn.” That’s a compromise I like—real-time speed when you want it, transparency when you don’t. My only worry is that players will end up waiting anyway, which erodes the whole point. A future iteration that locks in visible orders (so the AI won’t path through them) could push this over the top.
The top-left empire menus are getting a first pass to reduce click-hunting, and the research screen now more clearly shows what’s unlocked and in progress. These are exactly the sort of quality-of-life upgrades Humankind needed earlier at launch. The more interesting tweak is the city screen “flip”: you pick your district first, then choose where to place it. That mirrors Civ VI’s district flow and should help EL2 surface optimal tiles without making you scout the map with a magnifying glass. If the game’s recommendations are honest (and fully tooltiped), this could lower the learning curve without dumbing down the system.
Paxton admits victories are still coming too early, mostly around turns 100-200. “The goal isn’t to have all players play until turn 300,” he says, but the curve should “ramp towards the endgame, not hump at turn 170.” That’s the eternal 4X tension: snowball vs. stall. The fix likely needs a mix of victory condition tuning, AI scaling that preserves threat without rubber-banding, and mid-to-late events that create comeback windows without feeling cheap.
Multiplayer and an overhaul to diplomacy are slated for the next major update. Prioritizing MP early is wise; desyncs and edge-case exploits need months of live testing to iron out. If Amplitude nails simultaneous turns readability in human lobbies, EL2 could carve out a niche that Civ’s slower pacing doesn’t scratch.
Finally, the studio is running a contest to design a new minor faction “99.99% based on your ideas.” That’s classic Amplitude community energy—the same spirit behind its long-running Games2Gether approach. If you’re entering, think mechanics-first: tie faction traits to the monsoon cycle, resource rites, or interactions with Doomwraith rifts. Flavor is great; a unique economic loop is better.
Endless Legend 2’s first big patch makes Doomwraiths challenging instead of catastrophic, buffs AI competence, clarifies simultaneous turns, and starts cleaning up the UI. Multiplayer and diplomacy are next, and the minor-faction contest is a smart way to let the community help shape the meta. This is the kind of quick, player-focused iteration that keeps a young 4X in rotation.
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