Distant Worlds: Universe annouced!

[tgb]

I've been playing around with the Extended Universe Mod today and it's the bee's knees. Aside from addressing some balance issues and adding another dozen races or so, it also includes improvements to the graphics, sound, and look of the interface.  Highly recommended.

[Grimnirsson]

My only complaint is that even on my new laptop this game takes a long time to load up.

What are your nb's specs W8t? I bought the German version of the game for cheap to see if my nb can run it - it can, but I see folks complaining about larger galaxies and mid to late game problems (frame rate, game slowing down etc.) so I am not sure with Universe...

[Darkspire]

My only complaint is that even on my new laptop this game takes a long time to load up.

Never been confirmed officially but confirmed physically that when DW loads it also loads the current theme and checks it for errors, confirmed physically in a few ways.

If you add files to a custom theme or alter a textfile when DW loads the theme will have the changes, no need to change themes once it has loaded to see the changes.

Easiest error to create, mix a gas and strategic resource on a planet type, load DW, DW will crash with the error in the theme while loading.

Delete defaultOptions in the app folder for the DW version number you are playing, it will then revert back to the default, vanilla, theme. This is the preferred manner for dealing with problems in custom themes that mange to get past the loading error check.

Darkspire

[mikeck]

So I'm assuming that the extended the mod now works for universe?

[tgb]

So I'm assuming that the extended the mod now works for universe?

Yes.

[Kushan]

So I'm assuming that the extended the mod now works for universe?

Yes.

Make sure you get the right one. There is a mod called Distant Worlds Extended and one called Universe Extended. DW: Extended just adds some new races, while Universe Extended is a compilation mod that contains the first mod and a few others.

[Ian C]

I've been playing around with the Extended Universe Mod today and it's the bee's knees. Aside from addressing some balance issues and adding another dozen races or so, it also includes improvements to the graphics, sound, and look of the interface.  Highly recommended.

Downloaded. Very nice. I may get to grips with my own mods at some point. Anyone know if you can have multiple images for the same race?

[W8taminute]

My only complaint is that even on my new laptop this game takes a long time to load up.

What are your nb's specs W8t? I bought the German version of the game for cheap to see if my nb can run it - it can, but I see folks complaining about larger galaxies and mid to late game problems (frame rate, game slowing down etc.) so I am not sure with Universe...

My nb has an Intel Quad Core i7 2.4GHz processor.  She's fairly fast when loading other games like Napoleon Total War for example.  But with DW it is noticeably slower.  There is no problem when loading the save games, it is the initial startup that is slow.  After playing now for a day I've gotten used to it though.  The game is really a great experience with so many subtle nuances to master. 

[Nefaro]

My only complaint is that even on my new laptop this game takes a long time to load up.

What are your nb's specs W8t? I bought the German version of the game for cheap to see if my nb can run it - it can, but I see folks complaining about larger galaxies and mid to late game problems (frame rate, game slowing down etc.) so I am not sure with Universe...

My nb has an Intel Quad Core i7 2.4GHz processor.  She's fairly fast when loading other games like Napoleon Total War for example.  But with DW it is noticeably slower.  There is no problem when loading the save games, it is the initial startup that is slow.  After playing now for a day I've gotten used to it though.  The game is really a great experience with so many subtle nuances to master.

The initial startup loading has always been slow, on every computer I had it installed.  I'm sure it'll be a bit faster if I put it on my desktop's SSD but I'll probably play it on one of my others more. 
I tend to just start it up and go get a beverage, do some laundry, or write a novel while it's loading.  :P

[Ian C]

Started pre-warp. Finding my first viable colony and exploring is a real kick. Discovering other races equally fun, forged alliances and happen to be sat close to the real bad asses of the galaxy, a thoroughly evil race of warmongers.
30 years in and I have a pretty good situation. I'm allied with three races, trading well and now one of my outpost colonies got massacred by friends of the evil space bastards. I declare war on them and a bunch of alliances kick in like falling dominoes and next thing half the galaxy is up in arms. On top of this, I have pirates raiding my fringes, I'm into seeking some forgotten tech treasure and there's some weird subplot with the Ancients.
I'm personally overseeing operations of my prize 2nd Fleet, which has my top Admiral and two best Captains. I've not even started tweaking ship designs yet.

Superb game. Yeah, small text on the news feed and slow to load but simply one of the best games I've ever played.

[Martok]

Argh.  For some reason, only my copy of Return of the Shakturi and Legends are showing up as being registered at the moment -- the base game and Shadows don't even show up on the list, thus denying me the full $40 price break on Universe.  Have been waiting to hear back from support since yesterday afternoon. 

[bbmike]

Argh.  For some reason, only my copy of Return of the Shakturi and Legends are showing up as being registered at the moment -- the base game and Shadows don't even show up on the list, thus denying me the full $40 price break on Universe.  Have been waiting to hear back from support since yesterday afternoon.

Same thing happened to me. Luckily I was able to find the original email I received after I bought it.  :)

[Kushan]

Argh.  For some reason, only my copy of Return of the Shakturi and Legends are showing up as being registered at the moment -- the base game and Shadows don't even show up on the list, thus denying me the full $40 price break on Universe.  Have been waiting to hear back from support since yesterday afternoon.

If you have your serial numbers, you should be able to go into the Matrix member club and register them. After you log in, its on the right side below "member services".

[Yskonyn]

Argh.  For some reason, only my copy of Return of the Shakturi and Legends are showing up as being registered at the moment -- the base game and Shadows don't even show up on the list, thus denying me the full $40 price break on Universe.  Have been waiting to hear back from support since yesterday afternoon.

If you have your serial numbers, you should be able to go into the Matrix member club and register them. After you log in, its on the right side below "member services".

This. Nowadays the system is automated. If you buy at the store the serial will be linked to your account. At the time of the original game's release and that of its first expansion you had to manually register your serial numbers.
If you kept your serials somewhere you can still manually register them.

[Nefaro]

Has any big DW mods been updated to Universe compatibility yet?

I played the Extended Mod awhile back, and it's quite nice for some extra variety.  :)  I was thinking more along the lines of themed mods, such as some of the Star Trek ones, perhaps.

Been doing some unusual PC hex wargaming (even some WW2 stuff  :o ) so I'll eventually get the upgrade before long.  Just wondering if the modders have been at it yet.