SINS 2 the good, the bad and the ugly

First: the good

·         So many fewer deadlocks (I think mostly through reduced defensive capacity)

·         no more penalties for increased fleet supply / capital ship crew

·         better ways to kill capital ships / titans / star bases

·         overhauled system with trade ports / unity focus / phase resonance (still don’t like that trade ships go wherever and get killed all the time)

·         minor factions finally do something

the bad:

·         the UI is a mess imo

o   I still struggle to find most things (planet items and research for the most part) and I’m currently on 28 hours of play

§  I would suggest that (if that’s doable) it would pay dividends to have much simpler symbols for those things => I can always find the extractor research and the matter hypercompiler or the shield research, since those are “that dome shape”, “that big vertical thing” and “that green circle thing” (I use flux, colour might be different), Administrative or defensive uplinks, as well as dark fleet towers and Justra Statsis labs for example can look really samey at a glance (dark circles with a splash of red/white/blue around it)

§  If possible, it would be cool to allow for even more research to be done outside of the actual tech tree (alt+click on weapons, shields, antimatter, extraction rates etc to upgrade those, maybe even planet colonisation unlock?

·         As a sub-idea of that: is it at all possible to have a condensed view that does not show the things in the tech tree that can be researched without the need for the tech tree (like upgrading a planet types capabilities)?

o   In the tech tree it’s difficult to distinguish between “researched”, “available to be researched” and “unavailable to be researched”

·         Ships sometimes seem to disregard orders (there were a couple of instances when just a few ships stayed behind). Additionally, sometimes attack or movement orders don’t go through at all...

·         logistic slots seem very restrictive (I struggle to make enough labs and factories even with fully developed planets), though I acknowledge that this might be intended

the ugly:

·         I find the portraits to be very samey, I preferred the fewer but more distinct portraits of SINS1

·         I find it sad that there’s no other spoken languages (other than English)

·         Extractors cannot be scuttled from planet view or through the “build orbital structure” menu (other structures can)

·         There’s a message that pops up every time you open the game, trying to direct you to the forums and Discord, while that’s helpful, I’d love to be able to have that tucked away with a setting in the menu

·         I still don’t understand where a trade ship will go to (in other words, I can’t plan on how to keep a trade route safe before I pay attention to where the trade ships fly to)

·         I would love to have a way of customising voiced announcements. I don’t much care about “extractor was built” or “control group created”, but I’d love to hear when I’m being attacked (or even when enemy ships are about to arrive).

Opinion on balance

·         Vasari (Exodus in particular) seem really strong (early + midgame), I usually struggle to afford things in the early / midgame, but float recourses with Vasari

o   Vasari has an advantage on logistical slots due to the Administrative uplink

o   Vasari Exodus can save on many logistical slots with shipboard labs (now that the capital ships no longer need crew)

·         Vasari’s capital ship does free mining upgrades upon colonizing, meaning you save on both commerce upgrades and mining upgrades in the early game

o   Slave camps also help with cost reduction

o   Ravastra Skirmishers being tanky helps too

Please let me know if there's further questions.

Thank you for all the work put into the game