When comparing Grey Goo vs Endless Legend, the Slant community recommends Endless Legend for most people. In the question“What are the best singleplayer games on Steam?” Endless Legend is ranked 96th while Grey Goo is ranked 171st. The most important reason people chose Endless Legend is:
Each faction has strengths and weaknesses, but the best part is swapping out traits before the game starts. You have 80 points to spend, and traits are more or less expensive depending on how powerful they are. Each trait gives you something other factions probably won't have, so spend those points wisely. It might win or lose you the game.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Balanced asymmetric races
Each of the three races have their own powers and weaknesses, which makes for asymmetric gameplay due in part to how each is balanced. Relying partially on a rock, paper, scissors approach, each faction has power over the others in some way, as well as exploitable weakness. Thus, when choosing a race, the player has to keep in mind what they need to do in order to defeat the other races, which results in different and unique play styles, increasing strategic longevity of the title.
Pro Accessible gameplay
Being that this is designed to be a traditional RTS game, fans of the genre should find the the gameplay familiar and easily accessible.
Pro Polished design
The graphics look great and look to be designed with care. There are plenty of tutorial pop-ups as well, which enhances the overall design and polish, as it alleviates any confusion players may have mid-match.
Pro Great map editor
Users can create their own maps with the custom map editor, which makes for a ton of longevity to the game as players can create their own maps to play on.
Pro Great soundtrack
The soundtrack features different music for each of the three available races. All of it is done well and feels as though it fits with each race making for a more immersive experience.
Pro Clever AI
The AI in Ashes of the Singularity is programmed quite well, allowing it to detect a player's weakness and using that to its advantage. Allowing the AI to have the same advantages that regular human opponents receive, in regards to Player Power Level and Mini-Map expansion detection, this keeps the player on their toes and makes for challenging single player action.
Pro Amazing building shortcuts
It's super easy to quickly select and build a specific unit and/or building, thanks to the excellent build menu.
Pro Choice of faction meaningfully impacts gameplay
Each faction has strengths and weaknesses, but the best part is swapping out traits before the game starts. You have 80 points to spend, and traits are more or less expensive depending on how powerful they are. Each trait gives you something other factions probably won't have, so spend those points wisely. It might win or lose you the game.
Pro Highly customizable
Some specific traits are unique to each faction. Most, however, can be traded for when customizing a faction, with a point-buy limitation to balance it. The world generation options are all knobs to turn one way or another as you like. Very fun option to fiddle with that can make every game a new experience.
Pro Engrossing fantasy setting
If you've played Civ V, you know how much history they put into it. With Endless Legend, there's as much fantasy as Civ's history. Faction quest-lines give you a feel for the people you're leading, and the minor factions are all interesting enough to read the flavor text for.
Pro Beautiful art style
Endless Legend represents a unique art style in the 4x genre, and it stands up graphically even after a few years. The game looks and feels very pretty, and the official art for the game is nothing short of stunning.
Pro Excellent depth
If you like exploring a game's mechanics, this one will give you a lot to chew on. The battle mechanics in particular are a serious improvement compared to Civ V's take on war, with units able to stack together into armies instead of spreading out over one tile each.
Pro Region-based territory system shakes up the expansion game
The map is divided into pre-generated regions. Settling a region claims all of it (even if it's not explored). That city can't have districts outside its region, and only one city can be settled per region. This curtails city-spamming and aggressive city placement, and creates interesting decisions about resource access.
Pro Amazing soundtrack
The music for the game is very well composed and is great to listen to. Not to mention, it's also free.
Pro Approachable without sacrificing depth
It's pretty easy to learn and get into as turn based strategy but still complex enough to give those looking for depth their fix.
Pro Interesting races, leaders and character design
Pro Combat system is more skill based than RNG based
Pro Nearly all of the races are viable
Pro DLC is great and isn't a ripoff
Unlike other games that have pieces of the game completely removed to be used as a bargaining chip for DLC, the game feels complete without DLC. Although the offered DLC is fun and adds many more aspects to the game, such as espionage and control of the seasons. You don't feel like you're missing out by not buying the DLC, however, it is recommended if you want to grasp the true experience.
Pro Art is masterful
Pro Good diplomacy system
Pro Feeling of power
When you arrive in the late-game, you, along with other empires have become very powerful and will be able to amass many resources in a much shorter amount of time. Although this doesn't give you an advantage over anyone else, it is still pleasurable to have a feeling of such power.
Pro Everything is described in the lore
From how Dust (the in-game currency) can buyout construction to the biological functions that provide an advantage (or even disadvantage), the game is careful to fully explain gameplay mechanics with lore aspects, leaving few to no plotholes.
Pro Autosaves every turn
Although the game is prone to errors, some that crash the game albeit rarely, the game autosaves at the beginning of every turn, so that should the game crash, a recent instance of the game may be loaded and strategies replicated, or entirely new strategies to be used if one wishes.
Cons
Con Terrible UI
User interface is terrible: it's hard to select units and the cursor frequently gets stuck on other functions.
Con Can't change game speed
There's no way to slow down or speed up game speed.
Con Region locked
The matchmaking component of this title suffers from the region locking instituted upon it. Due to this constraint, finding players and getting into matches can be a issue, and take a great deal more time, as you will be unable to look for anyone outside of your respective region.
Con Lack of replays and spectator mode
There is no replay feature in the game, which means users will not be able to look back at previous matches, nor is there a spectator mode to allow others to view a match in progress.
Con Maximum of four players for multiplayer is limiting
The game's multiplayer greatness is stymied due to the limit on the maximum number of players being only four. With the only large-scale battles limited to 2v2 game types, players hoping to have more epic battles and play with more friends will unfortunately have to look elsewhere.
Con Multiplayer is glitchy and sometimes unplayable
Playing with friends can be difficult. Desyncing means you have to reload the game (it autosaves every turn so that's good). For a time it would desync after ever turn, so you had to play the game 1 turn at a time.
Con Very few multiplayer games
The most games you'll play of Endless Legend will be by yourself or with friends; it's highly unlikely you'll find an open lobby at all times. The overall online life of the game is low. When and If you find rooms, they are mostly private games and no one can join without an invite. Overall the community as a whole is small.
Con Steep learning curve
Even for a 4X game, Endless Legend consists of lots and lots of deep systems that can make approaching it difficult. Though it's worth noting that there are mods that remove or tone down the complexity of the game making it more accessible.
Con Confusing tutorial
This is a game that takes experience to learn rather than reading or learning in a similar fashion. Although the tutorial has you doing things, it does not explain the various ways you can do things, nor ensure you actually understand what it is you're actually doing. It is better to have someone you know explain the game to you.
Con Weak technology interaction
When researching a powerful technology, the game does not give any feedback to your growth in power other than statistics. For example, Dust Alchemy is a very good mid-game tech that drastically increases your currency gained per turn, but all you get from it is a higher number on your screen. The same can be said for virtually all technologies. The tech tree is simply very bland to progress through.
Con Race concepts are difficult to latch onto/have specific roads to victory
It does not make use of standard fantasy races such as elves and dwarves but creates an entirely new set. On the one hand, this is great since they are fresh ideas, but on the other, it comes off feeling alien and difficult to connect to. Additionally, each race has more or less one path to victory which makes you feel pigeon-holed.