Endless Space is a neat indie 4X game in the vein of Masters of Orion and Civilization. It has a surprisingly good interface and isn't as intimidating as it looks.

Battles are handled in a fashion more interesting than Civilization; you and your opponent set abilities to activate at different ranges, and once the battle begins, the strategies come into effect, amplifying damage, shields, or become negated by countering abilities. The battles shown in Steam's store screenshots aren't really representative of the whole game, though. Going through them lets you change your strategies on the fly if you want, but you can set them and auto-fight instead. It's faster, but not as pretty, and some of the ships are quite nice looking.

Building can be awfully sparse at first but quickly ramps up, and by the end of the game, building choices can be quite numerous. The opposite can be said of units; there are six ship types per race, but the in-game ship editor requires you to customize the fleet you want to build. The system menu offers an extra level of customization. Each planet is different, and you can specialize them in food, research, manufacturing, or money. Progress further down one of the tech trees, and you can even terraform planets to your liking.

Research is split into four trees in technology, expansion, military, and trading/diplomacy (or something like that). No matter what race you play, you *have* to progress down all four (well, military isn't mandatory, but if the AI declares war on you, the starter class ships won't be good for much) to succeed. Not really a knock against the game since as you progress and increase your research score, you can research multiple techs per turn if they're cheap enough.

Lastly, the AI. It's proficient. Once you discover another faction, you're in a cold war unless either of you researched far enough down the diplomacy tree to make peace. The AI takes advantage of the cold war state by actively blowing your scout ships to bits. Once the game really kicks into gear, the AI isn't as spastic as it is in other games. They tend to be peaceful (unless you're playing as or against the Cravers who are forced to constantly be at war), but wars are common. On lower difficulties, the AI will make a few incursions into your territory, but they are more willing to conquer each other. From what others have said, higher difficulties are more than competent at fighting. One oddity, however, is in how they manage their planets. Desert and arctic planets aren't ideal for farms, but the AI will often specialize every planet in a system in a less-efficient manner, choosing to create huge breadbaskets (with equally huge populations, I don't know if this is the AI cheating or they're managing to build tons of improvements). They're still able enough, so it's not like they're impeded in any way.

In all, Endless Space is worth it, at least on sale and if you like Civilization and want a game that feels like a turn-based Sins of a Solar Empire.

It's a great lovvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvve letter to Hong Kong aaaaaaaaaaaaaction movies like Haaaaaaaaaard Boileddddddddddd, but the contrrrrrrrrrol lag, sticking, and Wei's spontaneeeeeeous Parkinson's disease dddddddddddduring gun fights mmmmmmmmmmmake parts of the game unbbbbearable.

But jump kicking civilians in the backs of their heads is always strangely satisfying.

At first glance, Skyrim may seem like a vast ocean. Enter the water and notice that at no point does it pass your ankles. That's Skyrim. Every quest is the same: kill draugr/bandits and retrieve this item. Every town is (generally) the same: general store, tavern, forced quest when you first visit, armorer. Every cave is the same: draugr or bandits (sometimes both!). There's no depth. At first it's fun (and even after that, just look at my time played), but mods are the only source of real content in the game. Bethesda is good at painting a landscape, but that's about it. It's a theme park; a game entirely created for a player (though what game isn't?) to experience all content in one playthrough. In retrospect, it's a terribly disappointing title, but with the course Bethesda seems to be set upon, future titles will be even more castrated in the name of "streamlining." Can't wait for The Elder Scrolls VI: Fable.