How many of you are playing? A few days ago v1.1 came out, and presented us with TONS of changes. The game is fun at last! (in my opinion)

I am VERY pleased, and finally managed to finish a game last night...

Here is a great guide/demo over the changes and game-play. It might interest some of you strategy players out there to have a look.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoPCiaknvvY&feature=player_embedded#!

I was going to check that game, but TONS of bugs I've read about stopped me. Also I have not seen this game in any shop near me (English version preferred). As for digital version I'm using only GOG.com service and it's not here. ;)

Watching this video, I am very interested in this. I grew up on games like this, so if they've got things ironed out, they may be looking at a new customer in me.

I'm liking what I'm seeing in the video at least, but we need more details from people playing it, I say.

Well, the game is not polished as it could be yet, but there are no major bugs left to speak of in 1.1.

Still waiting for either a boxed version that I don't have to import or a digital version that is reasonably priced.

Of course that will never happen anytime soon, which is a shame because despite all the things that are apparently wrong with this game I want to play it.

There is little wrong with the game now with 1.1. The game is totally different than when it was released.

The price is good for a digital download, cheaper than your regular games to buy today anyways. If you are going to read up on the game, make sure it is something written after Dec 17th, because that's when 1.1 came out and changed everything.

Yes, the game was in a serious mess before v1.1.

On my to-play list. Been waiting for 1.1, and enjoyed Wardell's (and Fall from Heaven guy's) commentary.

http://www.impulsedriven.com/elemental It's $50 now for the Limited Edition boxed version, free shipping. You also get the expansion pack free if you buy before January 1.

My concern never was the bugs...I was pretty confident those would get fixed. My concern was the reported lack of overall depth from most reviewers who actually review big strategy games and spent a lot of time with this one. Everything sounded incredibly shallow, and I don't know how much of that can be altered with the game's core already established as it is.

When I start seeing the same guys saying that has been addressed, THEN I'll get interested again. :)

I'll probably pick this up out of a bargain bin sometime. A couple of things have me turned off, the release bugs from a Stardock published title is getting to be old too.

I'm glad those of you who threw down pre-orders finally got the game you were promised.

What ever happened with the whole mechanic of having heirs and marrying them off to other kingdoms? Was that ever implemented well and do people actually use it?

Pryde: That has been there since 1.0 (or so). It is just that it takes MANY turns for a kid to get old enough for marriage, so it only comes into play in the long games.

Crass: What parts are you annoyed about? The game definitely needs some tweaking, but that is what modding is for, and this thing is VERY moddable.

My impressions of 1.1: Haven't had a chance to sit down for a real game, but I will say it is a lot harder now. Lost my first town, then died when a horde of spiders swarmed my town (with me in it...).

General Rant/Commentary on the debacle of Elemental's launch: Honestly, it isn't as bad as people have said. I've said this before, but worth saying again -

Best Buy and a few other retailers broke the release date. Because Stardock want to pretend they have no DRM, they let people play without authenticating. So those who bought the game from Stardock were at a disadvantage. So they decided to push forward their release.
Unfortunately, they were counting on a 0-day patch as DRM/bugfixing. Pushing forward the deadline screwed them (even though, if they were smart, they would have had the 0-day ready before it went Gold). This is partially because, due to shelf space, they would either have had to launch the game last Fall or this Spring (I think).

So we got a pretty freaking buggy game. But the problem was actually the community and news sites (even RPS, which I love :p). As is common with fanboys/angry gamers (those who were around here for the monk incident know what I am talking about :p), they made it worse.
The fanboys screamed that we should accept the buggy game and be thankful to have the bugs and that Wardell was a god for even bringing us that. The angry gamers screamed and raged and found every conceivable thing to hate about the game. So all the news sites reported on that. And it sounded a LOT worse than it really was.
Honestly, this was just a buggy release. The revamping of the gameplay is nothing that Stardock hasn't done in the past (didn't GalCiv2 originally have no distinct tech trees?).

Now, here is my opinion of the game, as originally released. Why? Because if you are reading this far you clearly don't mind me ranting/soapboxing:

A bit disappointing, but nothing that can't be fixed. I was not a fan of the magic system (too few points), but that could EASILY be fixed by mods (I suspect there was a file that could adjust how many points you regen per turn. If not, there would be a community hack pretty quick). Same with the overall lack of spell variety (that was VERY easily fixed. I know because I started on it :p). But the core game felt right (well, as right as any 4x game can ever feel).
Oh, and it was buggy as hell. But that was being fixed

My thoughts, now that 1.1 is out: The new magic system (global pool) makes me very happy. And I still need to make more spells.

Even if I was interested in this game I have been banned from Impulse.

How does one get banned from Impulse?