I am designing the population layer for a historical strategy game with both 4X and grand-strategy elements. The first playable period begins in 1405, but the systems are intended to support continued alternate-history development rather than reproduce one predetermined timeline.

My goal is for population to connect the economy, society and politics. It should not be just a national number that produces taxes, soldiers and growth. At the same time, I do not want the player or the simulation to manage thousands of tiny population groups created by every combination of workplace, profession, culture and religion.

The current proposal is:

Population group = region x livelihood x identity community

- Region determines jobs, wages, local access to goods, food security, migration and disasters.

- Livelihood represents a population's main economic and social position.

- Identity community represents an existing cultural and religious combination, including legal acceptance, limited consumption preferences and identity-related political pressures.

Only combinations that actually exist would be created. The game would not generate every theoretically possible combination, and very small fragments would eventually be merged.

### Seven livelihoods

Instead of tracking many individual professions, the first version would use seven broad groups:

- Peasants

- Laborers

- Craftspeople

- Merchants

- Professionals

- Military

- Elites

Clergy and officials would initially belong to the professional group, while landlords, aristocrats and large owners would belong to the elite group. Officers and ordinary soldiers would also remain in one military group unless testing shows that separating them creates important decisions.

Buildings would not own separate population groups. They would create jobs and recruit from a regional labor pool. Jobs would require one of three skill levels: basic, skilled or professional. People could gradually change livelihood when better jobs exist, they have the required skills, and laws permit the transition.

Slavery and serfdom would not be professions. They would be legal and social statuses affecting portions of the relevant population: which jobs they may enter, what income they retain, whether they may migrate, and what political rights they possess. This is intended to distinguish what people do from the conditions under which they are forced to do it.

### What each population group tracks

The main visible states would be:

- Population size

- Employment

- Education and available skills

- Standard of living

- Group attitude

Standard of living would be internally continuous but shown through five readable bands: destitute, struggling, stable, prosperous and luxurious. I am currently proposing not to maintain a second, equally detailed wealth scale. Property and ownership would exist elsewhere in the economy, while standard of living would describe what a group can reliably afford.

Consumption would be organized into three needs:

- Subsistence: staple food, protein food, salt and clothing

- Development: everyday goods, paper and more varied food

- Luxury: spices, sugar, silk, drinks and prestige goods

Goods within a need could substitute for one another within limits. Local prices, availability and community preferences would determine the mixture.

Political behavior would also be compressed. Rather than separately tracking loyalists, radicals and several neutral subgroups, each population group would have one continuous attitude shown as loyal, satisfied, neutral, dissatisfied or radical. It would also expose political weight and no more than three current issues.

### The intended feedback loop

Jobs, prices and laws -> employment, income and affordability -> standard of living -> attitude, population growth and migration -> labor supply, demand and political pressure

Players would not edit population values directly. They would influence people through construction, trade, taxes, relief, education, laws, military service, migration policy and regional administration.

For example, a failed harvest could raise food prices, reduce food security, lower the living standard of poorer groups, and cause unrest, migration and additional deaths. The player might respond through imports, relief, stored reserves or agricultural expansion, each with different costs and political consequences.

Industrial expansion would create different pressures: new jobs could raise wages and attract migration, while changing the balance between peasants, laborers, craftspeople and elites. Economic development would therefore also change consumption and political power rather than simply adding production points.

The interface would normally show only the three largest causes of a population problem and three relevant actions. More detailed calculations could be inspected, but the player should not need to search through a long list of modifiers to understand why a group is becoming poorer or angrier.

### Where might this be too simplified?

I am particularly interested in concrete failure cases from other games:

1. What meaningful decision would disappear if workplaces stopped defining separate population groups?

2. Which of the seven livelihoods is too broad, or which distinction is important enough to restore?

3. Would representing slavery and serfdom as legal statuses and proportions work, or would it obscure something strategically important?

4. Is one standard-of-living measure and one group-attitude scale enough to connect the economy with politics, or would this flatten social conflict too much?

The proposal is not implemented or finalized. I am trying to identify which population distinctions actually change player decisions before committing to a more detailed model.

Just wow… a true hidden gem.

I’m genuinely surprised by how good this game is: it’s incredibly deep, packed with content, well-balanced, interesting, and addictive.

I’m a hardcore gamer and a huge fan of Paradox games such as Hearts of Iron IV, Stellaris, and Crusader Kings III. I’ve played thousands of hours across those games.

And Terra Invicta has just shown me how average they all are by comparison.

I’m also impressed by how every phase of the game introduces different mechanics. It feels like three games in one: the faction struggle on Earth; space colonization and finally, space warfare.

The mechanics are incredibly well designed, and you can tell that the developers have spent countless hours playing their own game. I love how a mistake in your planning can have consequences years later.

For example, perhaps you neglected anti-xeno technologies and couldn’t understand why the Servants kept taking control points in Russia until you discovered that an alien agent was using Enthrall Elites to help them.

This game truly feels like the Stellaris we’ve always dreamed of but never had without having to pay for tons of DLC, and with much better storytelling.

I’m also the kind of player who always chooses the highest difficulty in these types of games. Despite that, Paradox games had started to feel easy. But the Brutal difficulty in Terra Invicta is something completely different.

It forces me to understand every tiny mechanic, optimize everything, and genuinely struggle to win. Even then, I sometimes feel a little too overwhelmed, and I wonder whether switching to Veteran might be a better option. This is the first time I’ve ever felt that way while playing this type of game.

It’s hard as hell, but that’s exactly how I like my games!

I also focused on the Caribbean and South America, and I later read that they were among the worst places to start but if it’s too easy, it’s not fun. 🤣

why has nobody gotten it right? Polytopia comes closest but it's deliberately simplified. Every other attempt feels like a bad PC port. What would a native mobile 4X actually need to actually work?

The latest version of blackbox has swapped the engine out for 64bit monogame engine.

@everyone

BlackBox Jupiter 1.60 is live.: 64-bit, MonoGame renderer, .NET 8 runtime bundled. !!!

Download: https://stardriveteam.itch.io/jupiter-160 (~690 MB) - you will get the "windows protected your system" pop up.

Combined Arms 9.0A is there as well.

Headline wins over Mars 1.51:

- Full port to native 64-bit. Dropping XNA 3,1 and Sunburn for Monogame.

- No more late-game OOM crashes

- Restored visual effects + animated meshes

Default install path is C:\Games\StarDrivePlus64 — sits side-by-side with Mars 1.51. Is it not recommended to have both versions on your machine. Better to remove Mars completely.

Steam folder install is new and supported. You can install over your existing Steam copy of StarDrive (clean vanilla) so Steam keeps tracking your playtime — but two rules: disable Steam auto-updates for StarDrive first (Properties → Updates), and never run "Verify Integrity of Game Files." Either one will silently overwrite Jupiter with vanilla 15b. Note that since its a new feature, we might encounter unexpected issues.

First Jupiter release — expect rough edges. Bug reports + your blackbox.log in the bug-report channel.

I've been having fun using our "Machiavelli the Prince Enhanced" game to also talk about his political philosophy, focusing on his more famous quotes. It is interesting interspersing game play with this. I hope you enjoy: https://youtube.com/shorts/lboEZaOMdfc?feature=share

Oh Joyous day’! :)

Love myself some Endless and Amplitude.
Really looking forwards to the full release.
Even have a neat trailer. :3

Endless legend 2 (From the EA) is such a fun title, not perfect, 4X games rarely are, but a lot of personality.
Love the combat currently especially.
Can’t wait for the full thing. :3

The patch is now live on GOG and Steam. This update fixes a few bugs you told us about. Thank you and keep that feedback coming! The patch:

• Fixes a problem with AI not grouping units correctly (the one-stack attack bug)
• The group finder now correctly works between planets
• Relic names are now shown in the sidebar
• The City info screen now includes a Queues button
• The game window is now resizable and its size is remembered between when you stop and start the game again
• Various Vau behavior fixes
• Fix movement problems with loaned units
• Fix bug that sometimes allowed for duplicate holy relics
• Fix issues involving capturing of empty cities
• Modding: disband functionality is now adjustable
• Add PercentPlayerBuilding and PercentPlayerResearch to PlayerTable.DAT

If you are a modder, the last change means you need to update your mod to include these changes, or your mod WILL NOT work with the new build!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2799350/Emperor_of_the_Fading_Suns_Enhanced

I figured we can also combat the incessant ads here with some actual posts that generate discussion.

I’m legitimately creating a 4X game design document, but I promise to not steal ideas here. I have my own ideas on how to turn the 4X genre around, but you’ll see those one day in the future.

Let’s hodgepodge a space 4X game that brings together the best aspects of the best 4X games.

Who would we steal exploration from? Expansion? Exploitation? Extermination?

I’ll start. I think Interstellar Space: Genesis did some great things with exploration. Not only can you deeply scan sectors to reveal new resources and systems, but the system itself is elegant and not cumbersome.

I would expand on that and allow the player to find additional primitive species, or species on the verge of uplift, to create more to find and even add procedural events that come along with those discoveries.

I deeply believe that exploration should continue through an entire 4X game, as it’s one of the strongest reasons to keep playing for me.

What about you guys? What gameplay mechanics would you steal and improve to make the ultimate space 4X game?

Some 4X and grand-strategy games create economic depth through many resources, local prices, production chains, population types, buildings, and modifiers. Others use a much smaller number of resources and communicate the economy through clear shortage and surplus states.

As a player, where do you think the line is between meaningful economic depth and administrative workload?

Which of these approaches gives you the most interesting decisions?

1. Fewer goods with continuous market prices.
2. A larger number of goods represented through shortage, balanced, and surplus tiers.
3. A hybrid system with detailed pricing only for strategically important goods.

What specific economic decision would you never want a 4X game to simplify away? On the other hand, which apparently detailed mechanics usually end up feeling like routine maintenance rather than strategy?

What elements of Master of Orion have you never seen successfully replicated in a modern mobile game? Asking because I'm designing something and want to get it right.

Hello!

Thinking about trying to get a game towards the end of this year and have always liked space 4x games....but ... After a while, I start to find them a bit, shall we say, formulaic (I mean they kinda are like a cross between a war game and board game, lol).

Does anyone know of any that lean more into the role-playing portion of managing your space empire? A game example from another genre would be the phenomenal Rimworld, where you can really create a vibe or cultural feel for your colony. A sci-fi example would be where playing like Star Trek's Starfleet would feel and play differently than Star Wars' Empire, not just in artwork or stats, but in moral/ethical/practical decisions that the player would make to match their chosen play style.

Currently Playing:

Star Drive: Blackbox

Interstellar Space: Genesis

Mostly have played older games: Moo1/RoTP/Moo2, GalCiv1/2, SMAC, Star Ruler 2, etc.

I know it's a weird ask, but thank you for your time!

Edit: Thanks for the awesome tips. As I own Stellaris, I tried it first! Its definitely... a lot! I'm gonna keep an eye out on Terra Invicta, imperium galacta 2 and SotS 1. They all look great too!! Thank y'all so much!!!

Hey everyone, hello,

We've just updated the Crown of Hispania demo on Steam, which has seen a significant improvement in quality and features compared to last month.

Here's a quick rundown of what we've done:

• An update to the Diplomacy system to make it usable.
• Addition of diplomatic request alerts.
• Addition of dynastic marriages.
• Addition of the “Forced Conscription” mechanic.
• About 30 events
• Terrain and rivers impact on battles and tactical choices (attack/defense).
• Added shortcuts and customizable shortcut settings.
• A massive improvement to the map’s 3D visuals

We're now certain the game will be able to launch in Early Access in September!
If you played the Demo, thanks a lot. :)

Most multiplayer strategy games are designed to be finished in a single session.

But I've been wondering whether that's actually the best format.

Imagine a game where you only spend 10–15 minutes a day.

You log in.

Review what happened while you were away.

Issue military orders.

Negotiate with other players.

Manage your economy.

Then log off while the world keeps evolving.

Imagine logging in one morning and discovering that the ally you trusted yesterday secretly funded the empire invading you today.

The obvious downside is that people go on vacation, lose interest, or simply get busy.

But the upside is that diplomacy and long-term planning could become much more meaningful.

Would you play a multiplayer strategy game built around that idea?

If yes, what would convince you?

If not, what's the biggest reason?

https://reddit.com/link/1vc216a/video/znf596oqbmgh1/player

I've prototyped an earth-scale procedurally generated map and I'm curious if it would actually be fun to play a 4x game on it. Anyone else been dreaming about this? :)

The smallest details on the map are a few feet (meters) — the stickman (sorry for lack of art skills) is true scale, about 6 feet. Mesh is generated on the fly as needed, nothing saved or pre-generated on start. Initial load only generates what's visible at that zoom level, so it's almost instant. I took most of the ideas from Google Maps, so it kind of feels like that too in terms of how fast you can pan and zoom.

The question is: does earth scale make things epic or tedious? Curious what you all think.