Why do the DLCs have such low reviews?

[Mpreg Enjoyer]

It seems like none of them get good reviews. Are they all that bad? Should I just get the base game and ignore all the DLCs?

[Natans]

Only Utopia is considered necessary and is by far the best. Distant stars is also pretty good and adds additional story content. Just get the others if they really interest you.

[Mpreg Enjoyer]

Originally posted by Natans:

Only Utopia is considered necessary and is by far the best. Distant stars is also pretty good and adds additional story content. Just get the others if they really interest you.

But are the rest bad or just not considered as good as Utopia? Even Utopia only has "mostly positive".

[Zibblsnrt]

Most of the non-cosmetic DLCs are somewhere between "fine" and "great." A lot of people like to review-bomb Paradox expansions merely for existing.

[Mpreg Enjoyer]

Originally posted by Zibblsnrt:

Most of the non-cosmetic DLCs are somewhere between "fine" and "great." A lot of people like to review-bomb Paradox expansions merely for existing.

I feel like people like to review bomb DLCs in general for some reason. You see "money grabbing" thrown around a lot as if video games aren't a business for profit like any other...

[Garatgh Deloi]

Originally posted by DOG, the Eternal:

Originally posted by Natans:

Only Utopia is considered necessary and is by far the best. Distant stars is also pretty good and adds additional story content. Just get the others if they really interest you.

But are the rest bad or just not considered as good as Utopia? Even Utopia only has "mostly positive".

Some have issues with paradox DLC policy, to me it seems like a lot of the negative reviews are done to protest those policies rather then reviewing the DLC itself.

That said, this is not always the case.

There are plenty of youtube videos and the like going through what the different DLC's add in details, it wont take long to research if a DLC would be worth it for you or not (with the downside that you get spoilers).

[Natans]

Originally posted by DOG, the Eternal:

Originally posted by Natans:

Only Utopia is considered necessary and is by far the best. Distant stars is also pretty good and adds additional story content. Just get the others if they really interest you.

But are the rest bad or just not considered as good as Utopia? Even Utopia only has "mostly positive".

None of them are "bad" necessarily, people are often frustrated by the number of them and the cost. This is what often drives down the reviews rating. Also when many were originally released there were often many bugs associated with them or the adjoining update. These have since been fixed. Without at least some of the DLC the base game can become a bit bare-bones after a couple playthroughs.

[Jurazon]

Utopia is by far the best DLC and was a game changer. The other DLC's are good and I think a lot of the hate comes from Utopia setting the bar really high. When Apocalypse, Megacorp, and Synthetic Dawn came out, people were expecting it to be like Utopia and they were not. They are still good, just not as awesome as Utopia.

[ThunderOrigin]

Originally posted by Natans:

Only Utopia is considered necessary and is by far the best. Distant stars is also pretty good and adds additional story content. Just get the others if they really interest you.

+1

Utopia gives best value, and Ascension Paths are pretty much considered core for most builds.

Distant gives a fair bit of content for early to mid-game, though arguably a lot of the extra anomalies could be covered by a mod, leaving just the L-gates.

[Oku]

Because crybaby gamers resort to review bombing things and using review sections as a platform for being preachy instead of just reviewing the actual content and being useful, which is one of the reasons Valve is implementing a new algorithm that removes reviews it thinks are part of a review bomb from the main listing, as well as issuing punishments to people found to be attempting to fraudulently influence a review score.

[Mansen]

Originally posted by Garatgh Deloi:

Some have issues with paradox DLC policy, to me it seems like a lot of the negative reviews are done to protest those policies rather then reviewing the DLC itself.

I feel like this needs a Wargames quote : A strange game. The only winning move is not to play.

You can't review the DLC without owning it. If they want to make a statement, stop buying the DLC in the first place - Which is incidentally exactly why Paradox keep putting out DLC content. Because the players DEMAND more.

Crusader Kings 2 has only managed 8 - EIGHT years of post-release content because players can't get enough of it and content for it.

[Zibblsnrt]

Here's a question that might help OP: given Stellaris' downright bonkers mod scene, which DLCs open the doors to the best/most interesting mods and mod packs?

For example, I like playing around with mods that offer more traditions and ascension perks, which is obviously going to need Utopia.

[ComradeWinston]

Each DLC breaks the game. After the huge population update a while back, AI went from being solid to absolutely braindead. They need to be set to the highest difficulty, basically super cheat mode, to not be half a passably competent player's general strength less than 100 years into a campaign.

Also, each DLC usually comes with massive changes on top of its new content. This means many mods are broken and their creators often simply stop updating after a while. Something like half or maybe more of the greatest mods were last updated in 2017-2018, the graveyard is huge if you sift through the workshop. On top of that the AI is constantly chasing these changes and additions so it's doomed to being chronically stupid as long as this near half decade trend continues.

You basically need to rely on mods to fix everything but again, you can't rely on modders sticking through the constant changes. It's a serious attrition problem.