Distant Worlds 2 Discovery Update and New DLC

Distant Worlds 2 has released its third major update to the game, Discovery, following the Aurora and Hyperspeed updates. Similar to Aurora, Discovery is focused less on core engine improvements and more on new features and bug fixes. It is timed for release near the second paid DLC that adds the Quameno and Gizurean races, both of whom have unique features tying into some of the free systems added in the update. The 2-hour Discovery update video goes into substantial detail and is a great watch, but for anyone wanting to really sink their teeth into all the changes, the patch notes are a heavy great read too. The Steam update announcements (1, 2) are also a good quick way to see what’s going on and get some more nice graphics.

Major Features

• Guardian Vaults which are also tied into the Quameno faction can contain unique artifacts within. They act as research locations with substantial bonuses. To open them the player needs to progress their ancient knowledge tree, a related new feature in this patch. The artifacts provide empire-wide bonuses.
• Pirates have been expanded. They behave and grow better than they used to with more variety in factions. Not all pirate factions will offer protection, some will require gifts to buy them off first, and others cannot be prevented from attacking you. They can now bring out cruisers, starting with one that defends their base but if allowed to get stronger they will later be able to build more themselves. Weakening them to prevent them from doing this can be very helpful if you can manage it.
• Hives are tied with the Gizurean story. Players felt that the original threat was too binary – If they woke up too early they were devastating and if they woke up too late they were trivial. Now there are smaller hive ships ranging down to frigates to provide more incremental challenges. They’re spread throughout the galaxy but are dormant to begin with. When they sense someone they evaluate them and will progressively wake up the hive starting with smaller ships before proceeding through to larger ones. They will begin by attacking pirates who due to story things are their ancient enemies. You can help the pirate empires fight them which can make them more friendly. Hive fleets will raid bases and then planets after the pirates are gone, and aren’t too fond of leaving anyone to tell the tale. It takes years to fully wake up and gather the hive fleet together so players have time to prepare their response.
• A large goal of these major features is they wanted to make the galaxy feel more alive.

Tweaks and small additions

• People wanted more AI guidance but not full automation. There will be more control for what the AI chooses to research and equip on ships but it doesn’t seem like my personal bugbear has been addressed – the ability to lock individual modules on ships, specifically fighter bays, to prevent the AI designer from swapping them out for weapons.
• Repeatable techs have been added at the end of technology lines in the tech tree for late-game specialization. Bonuses accrue from repeating these and the research-focused Quameno are well placed to make the most of this.
• New Galaxy Setup options. Changed recommendations for star number, increasing suggested cores for largest galaxies. More control over story events so can now toggle them each individually, including going completely story free if desired.
• Improved Ship Designer with statistic display that better reflects bonuses and penalties from all sources.
• Fleet and garrison behaviour has been optimized
• Some nebula effects will no longer impact ships in hyperspace, only once they return to real space.
• Graphical improvements – more game settings again. Improved HDR – added manual sliders for gamma, contrast, saturation, and brightness.
• Improved notifications.
• Improved how fleets and tankers refuel, a very complex automated system to keep your empire ticking.
• Improved fleet responses to threats, both avoiding and deciding what to use to investigate or attack.
• Expanded conditions for modding. Can have 2d characters now, much easier for modders to add new factions now.

Bug fixes

• Many bugs from all across the game. Check the patch notes pdf for the extensive list to see if your pet peeve has been addressed!
• Some known issues were deprioritized due to difficulty or lack of impact but still intend to get to them all.

New Races

I’ll save the full coverage of the new races for the upcoming DLC review but since the developer covered them fairly extensively in the update video I’ll briefly mention their primary characteristics here, and I must emphasize that, while I wasn’t so much a fan of the Soultrapped in the recent Masters of Magic DLC (though it was still an excellent addition), the Gizurean are right up my alley from design and theme to playstyle focusing heavily on fighter craft and I’m very much looking forward to sinking my teeth into them to have them sink their teeth into… everyone else.

Quameno

The race that are the fastest at researching technology. Described as “The Galaxies greatest introverts – Quameno have a particular way they like things to be done, when things are different it quickly gets outside their comfort zone making them unhappy and less efficient” (We’ve all been there…). They just want to be left alone to play video games research and solve puzzles and mysteries. They are peaceful and research-oriented, cautious and dependable and like to live in mangroves, swamps and oceans. Alongside their fast research, they produce a lot of scientists but fewer admirals and generals and are not that great with diplomacy, trade and espionage – Dhayut starting near Quameno will likely benefit greatly from Quameno research bonuses!

Gizurean

The fastest-growing race are aggressive and could be considered evil due to their penchant for war and eating people, but not devious like Boskara or deceptive like Dhayut. They’re very upfront about the fact that they’re going to eat you as they have a *lot* of mouths to feed. They prefer desert and other dry planets. The Gizurean populace doesn’t mind being at war, are good at boarding and ground combat and have cheap ship and troop maintenance. They can reverse engineer and repair things exceptionally well but are otherwise worse at research and diplomacy. Their increased generals and admirals are balanced out by fewer spies, diplomats and scientists.

The support by CodeForce and Slitherine for Distant Worlds 2 continues at a good pace with this patch and the upcoming DLC release. Beyond that, we have some information too, with Humans being the first original race in line to receive unique features similar to the DLC races which will be great to see. We also know that the first full expansion will include the return of an enemy from Distant Worlds 1 called the Shakturi who will be an end-game threat. The patch following Discovery will be similar to Hyperspeed with a focus on core engine improvements which are always welcome and will hopefully include the return of the 8x speed mode once a memory issue has been resolved. CodeForce will be comparing the community reception to the two race DLCs and the expansion DLC to inform future paid content so here’s hoping they both do well.

The upcoming DLC Quameno and Gizureans to be released on September 7 will be reviewed here in the coming weeks so keep an eye out for that. Until then, you can pick up Distant Worlds 2 on Steam, you can check out our coverage of the first Distant Worlds 2 DLC Ikuro and Dhayut or the previous Aurora patch, similar Slitherine games including the remade Masters of Magic, its Rise of the Soultrapped DLC, or Flashpoint: Southern Storm which the presenter of the mammoth 2-hour update video was Producer on.

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