An Aurora, Sharpened in the Key of C

April 13, 2020 11:43 AM

Years in the making, a new version of the Aurora 4X strategy game, previously, has just been released. It was ported to a new programming language, but that's probably the least significant news.

Someone has compiled a Youtube playlist of changes, which touch almost all areas of the game. The designer is already hard at work fixing bugs in version 1.1.

posted by Alensin (11 comments total)

This game, like its' predecessor, is astonishingly accessible to me as a totally blind gamer. It's very hard to resist diving in despite the current bugs. The fact that everything, from ship designs to planetary systems, can be displayed in text form is extremely helpful.
posted by Alensin at 11:44 AM on April 13, 2020 [13 favorites]

Is there something like this, but fantasy-themed instead of space?
posted by I-Write-Essays at 1:24 PM on April 13, 2020

I-Write-Essays, Dwarf Fortress is the traditional comparison, but it's really not all that similar. I'd love to know if anyone has any others.
posted by Alensin at 1:43 PM on April 13, 2020

Dwarf Fortress is a colony management simulator, not a 4X. Completely different genres.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 1:50 PM on April 13, 2020

The sort of thing I'm looking for would be like a cross between Endless Legend and Crusader King 2. Imagine the base concepts in Endless Legend, but with the character and political systems from CK2 fused into it instead of using the standard Paradox gameplay.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 2:01 PM on April 13, 2020 [1 favorite]

It was ported to a new programming language, but that's probably the least significant news

Still significant when you realize the original version was in Visual Basic 6, a language that has its uses, but that seems like it would be terribly awkward for making a large-ish game.
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 2:16 PM on April 13, 2020 [1 favorite]

... but is it fun?
posted by panama joe at 2:37 PM on April 13, 2020

@odinsdream: The problem is that the new version is so new that many of the existing tutorials don't really apply. There are plenty on Youtube, such as this one by Quill18, and he's definitely working on one for the new game. The only other documentation is a wiki, which is still largely focused on the old version. There was sadly never much in the way of tutorials beyond the basics of ship design and tech research, learn by doing or watching LPs is the way.
posted by Alensin at 4:25 PM on April 13, 2020 [1 favorite]

I gotta admit I'm with odinsdream; I've been gaming since the early 80s and yet I instinctively don't trust any game whose homepage is a forum. But since you guys linked this and say good things about it I will try to persevere.
posted by Justinian at 4:59 AM on April 14, 2020

Heck, I’m not even interested in playing: I just want to tell a friend about the game and I can’t even figure out where to send them.
posted by Ian A.T. at 6:01 AM on April 14, 2020 [1 favorite]

The VB6 release still works, but is not being updated. It's definitely a good learning tool for the essentials even if C# changes many specifics.
posted by Alensin at 8:54 AM on April 14, 2020