ENDLESS™ Legend - Tempest DLC

It's really really good. Utilization of naval spaces was something that Endless Legend sorely lacked, and now there's actually incentive to add large oceans or play an island-based map. Naval combat functions much the same as ground combat, but there are dedicated naval units now as well, and you can gain certain advantages and city improvements by building along the coastlines. The oceans themselves now have a variety of different terrain and weather effects, as well as the ocean fortresses, which are the big draw of this expansion. I was afraid they were going to be glorified watchtowers, but they're really well done and provide crucial benefits to your empire, as well as advancing along in tech and usefulness as your empire moves through the scientific eras. The new faction is also extremely interesting and has a huge advantage on sea, which is balanced by them disadvantaged on land. You will still be building primarly on land, but the oceans are actually capturable regions now instead of just being empty voids. If you capture all the aforementioned fortresses (the same ways you would capture a minor faction village) you gain control of that region of the ocean and it is highlighted like one of your land regions. You can't develop the ocean fortresses like you can your land cities, but the larger the ocean the more fortresses there will be in it, and they are garrisonable so you can defend them from attack very easily.

This is a really nice DLC. The new faction is quite unique and fun, and it includes an entirely new system for navigation, sea battles, sea exploration, climate for sea tiles (that makes for a more interesting environment due to the lack of terrain or elevation)... very worth it. The only downside is that most factions have very little incentive to invest in naval tech and units, making it an "all or nothing" (and most frequently nothing) deal for all but the Morgawr... it could be a bit better integrated into the game. But still a particularly good implementation, different from most strategy games where naval conflict is just boring.

A Bullet Point DLC Review: -Tempest adds a Naval expansion and overhaul to the game. Every civilization now has access to naval units via tech, and ocean regions have Fortresses and Facilities to control that give luxury and strategic resources. There are also a Minor Faction and a unique neutral super seamonster that roams the oceans. -There are also dozens of new quests and items to find and make. -The new civilization is the Morgawr, and as expected, they have a naval focus. They only have one land unit, that can mind control land based Minor Factions to build an army. All other units are water based only. The means playing the Morgawr is like playing an entirely different game - you can expect to have the Ocean as your plaything, as it's almost never worth contesting the Morgawr on there. The need to research separate military units, while the Morgawr has them as main trio units, means it's often not worth the time. -The Morgawr can also use the Black Spot to incite proxy wars between other civs. This is part of their Quest plotline as well, and is a fun mechanic. -They are, however, incredibly weak on land, and their cities are absolutely crippled by winter, due to ocean tiles freezing over. The Morgawr are interesting, but not a very strong faction as a whole. Owning the ocean is great, but the problem is the Ocean won't win you the game. -Overall, the Naval expansion feels like a mixed bag. If you're the Morgawr, it's your entire game. If you're not the Morgawr, unless it's a very, very water heavy map and you MUST do it, you basically ignore water. If there's no Morgawr in the game, it becomes a more interesting decision, but if there is, and you're not playing them, it's a difficult sell to significantly delay other tech in order to begin to contest the Morgawr at sea, with units that won't help you on land. The Morgawr are a fun faction to play as, but the Naval mechanic, IMO, is not really a player in the game unless you are them, or make a conscious decision to go out there. Controlling the seas is pretty easy - Non-Morgawr AIs only make token efforts to do so. If you were going to skip one faction DLC, it'd probably be this one - but it's well made, the mechanic is fun, and there is the boatload of new quests and items as well.

Tempest is a swashbuckling addition to an already incredible game. As a fan of the Endless series, and more importantly nautical gameplay, I was intrigued by the fact that we finally got a sea-based faction in the shape of the Morgawr. Tempest also brings a refreshing new dimension to the gameplay for all factions with its focus on naval exploration and warfare. The addition of the naval gameplay mechanics adds more depth and complexity to the overall strategy, offering players new ways to expand their empires and interact with the game world. Some would say that this game already had enough on its plate, and sure, I get that. However the introduction of ocean regions, new pure naval units, and sea-based quests provides something more to manage besides the land based resources that are already front and center. The Morgawr are a great addition to the game focusing on elder gods style sleepy fishfolk slowly awakening to reclaim the salt sprayed shores from the landborn scum that came after them. Tempest is, in my opinion, one of the must-have expansion for any fan of the series. It tries to integrates new nautical gameplay elements with the core mechanics that make the Endless series so beloved and somewhat manages to keep the sea relevant for other factions in a tug-of-war kind of struggle for dominance. Recommended whether you're a seasoned player or new to the game!

A much needed expansion fleshing out the game to finally fill in the aquatic side of the game. It always felt a bit disappointing not being able to make use of the large expanses of water (depending on map composition). Tempest rectifies that and adds a new faction to the game. Water focused and once again with new twists to the gameplay. I can happily recommend this expansion to round out the game and taken as a whole the game is in quite a good place now.

A great expansion. It adds so much depth to the oceans in the game. No longer are they just a vast empty space seperating you from your opponents. Now the oceans come to live, with strategic bases to fight over, ruins to explore, and naval ships to fight. The new faction has some interesting dynamics with neutral factions. Being able to mind control them allows you to use neutrals early on to pacifiy villages, take control of sea fortresses, or annoy your opponents. Their ability to curse a faction is quite powerful and manipulative. You can use it to try to tempt people in alliances to break them, and gives everyone an incentive to attack the cursed player. This expansion is by far my favorite so far.

You're on the store page for Endless Legend: Tempest. You are reading through reviews of this game, and are wondering whether it is worth it. It's a valid question. Endless Legend is two years old at this point, you've probably played the hell out of it, might have even gotten bored of it and moved on to the other games in your library. You tell yourself, "Endless Legend was a great fantasy 4X game with some imaginative faction designs, but even something labeled 'Endless' can have a shelf life. What could they possibly do to make it better, how could a single bit of DLC refresh my love for this ancient game?" It was a question I asked myself. I found myself fearing, after the Sega aquisition of Amplitude studios, that this was the beginning of an age of cash-grabbing for one of my favorite developers; the Civilization V DLC point, if you will, where a developer has sown enough goodwill to merit sitting back and going through the motions, to let their giant cash cow milk itself to death. I have never been more blissfully overjoyed at being utterly wrong. You see, Endless Legend has always had a rich undercurrent of sci-fi lurking beneath its fantasy-facade, as it is essentially the story of a dying planet, and the machinations of various factions fighting over the planet's withering surface mirror the conflicts that that have ravaged the stars above them in Endless Space. For this, I've always loved it immensely. I love sci-fi elements in games, but sci-fi 4X games could never capture my interest, the depths of space always feel so soulless to me, so unimaginative, an endless series of black skyboxes and star billboards stretched across a game map with no variety, where the scale of the conflict makes it utterly impersonal, devoid of emotional value to my primitive human brain beyond some abstract comprehension of the occasional universe-destroying threat. I bring this up because Tempest's content is all hard sci-fi. From the intro cinematic, which brings cold, metallic memories of SOMA to mind as our water-bound faction escapes the underwater facility that once contained it, all the way down to the ancient observation posts that now dot the seas of Auriga, a menacing reminder that the stars in the sky are staring back. The fantasy illusion is completely shattered by this content, and this will determine whether or not it revitalizes or damages your enjoyment of Endless Legend. As I said before, I fucking love it. It takes me back to my time with Civilization V, where I would load up a few Mass Effect alien nation mods and pretend that the ocean was space, and that the islands were planets, and that the navies patrolling the oceans were made up of starships, but every once in a while, I'd zoom in on the unit models and have the illusion shattered by their conventionality, bland tin soldiers outfitted with banal rifles and bayonets. I'd eventually uninstall such mods and go back to the old way, dissapointed with the futility of the effort . With Tempest, there is no illusion, that is essentially what is happening. Alien factions are fighting for dominance, fighting to attain the resources necessary to leave this planet, and the ocean has become their space, hiding the secrets of the universe beneath its depths, with ancient cities of long dead space-faring civilizations rusting away beneath the ocean's tide. The whole dynamic has changed in such an imaginative, breathtaking way, in a way only Amplitude could facilitate. Any other studio, in this day and age, would have added naval combat in as uttely blandly as possible. They would have thrown together some copy-pasted ship models, and a pirate-themed race, given you exactly what you expected. Not Amplitude. They've turned it into a fascinating extension of the lore, as well as an engaging expansion of the game's mechanics; the underwater ruins, the ocean fortresses, the dynamic weather-based naval combat, and, most especially, this mysterious, menacing new faction of a single hivemind seafarer spread out between multiple bodies, relying on mind-control, ambushes, and manipulation. It's all so brilliantly antithetical to the modern 4X ethos, such a radical departure from what I assumed was destined to be the new paradigm; buying content that was cut out explicitly for the purpose of becoming tomorrow's DLC. It's like the Witcher 3 of 4X games, you think it blew your mind the first time, and then some more DLC comes along to blow your mind all over again. Do I recommend Tempest? Fuck yeah, I recommend Tempest.

On the surface, this expansion is great. After two hours of play I would've been happy to recommend it. But after a little longer (by the time you get a match to the 3rd or 4th era) there are so many problems that I can't recommend it at all. It is so poorly balanced, and has such obvious bugs that I think the devs can't have truly playtested at all prior to launch. - There's a known, and near game-breaking, bug that causes ocean facilities that drain resources (money, influence, etc) from all players every turn. If these facilities are present on your map, the game is probably over. They make you unable to produce influence, money, etc. - Balance with the new faction is terrible. The Morgawr is rightfully awful on land, and are designed to make up for that with strong naval units... but they aren't strong. By mid-game, upgraded ships are easily able to destroy upgraded Morgawr Vore/Leviathans. The Morgawr cities are meant to be ocean dependent and thus get bonuses from water tiles... except that when winter hits, and the shore turns to ice, you lose those bonuses and are suddenly crippled. Oh, and you can't produce your naval units either! I loved the Shifters expansion, but Tempest is terribly balanced and full of bugs. Its a hard pass. Too bad it takes a few hours to figure this out, and thus I can't get a refund.

A must-buy for anyone who wants to play Endless Legend, both newbies and veterans. This DLC fills the ocean (which previously was just empty) with fortresses, various naval ships, and a roving Leviathan. There is even interesting terrain in the ocean with the addition of weather. My personal Endless Legend DLC ranking: 1. Tempest turns a huge portion of the map into an actual playable area, which was previously dead space. 2. Shifters has some important improvements that make your cities functional during the winter, and districts that improve resource extraction. 3. Guardians add global quests and legendary buildings, but the titular guardians themselves are largely ignorable during a given playthrough. 4. Shadows introduced an espionage system, which is more of an inconvenience than anything else. Participating is too much of a time sink for your heroes, with too little of a payoff. As a final addition, the Morgawr are a fun race to play. I actually feel like they are overpowered with their ability to steamroll the minor factions so easily. Mind controlling stray warriors, and then having them commit genocide against their own home villages is a pretty cruel, but nonetheless efficient way to "mow the lawn."

As of the 19th, the much hated Center of Influence and Dust Accumulator fortresses have been nerfed. The flat penalty has been removed, and if not controlled by anyone the debuff is a lower effect, resulting in a much less ardous and punishing early game should you not instantly focus on naval warfare. As a result I can recommend this DLC now - the fortresses allow for a source of resources for people who wish to avoid expanding on the land, and can give nice bonuses should you get specific facilities (such as trade route bonuses or food/science/industry stockpiles over time). The Morgawr, while overpowering on the water, have a nice trade off of being rather bad on the land in general and are a nice introduction to the new fortress mechanics when played. Researching naval units can make you feel like you're going too far out of your way, especially when you need so much resources for upgrading them, but the trade-off for getting a strong facility can help a lot. Even then though they can just be ignored. Overall a good addition to the game I say, makes the water actually have a purpose beyond being a big waste of space.