Machine Age is fantastic DLC, Cosmic Storms is more mixed, while Grand Archive is really good and it expands on all the anomalies. Bundled together in one season they are cheaper to buy than on their own.
One thing Millennia has over its competitors are production chains. For every resource you have, you have to think about what to do with it - for which branch of your civilization you should use it.
The biggest drawback of this game gotta be graphics. Diplomacy is also a little barebones.
The Ages - alongside quite unique Variant Ages are also very fun to play in.
Both Biogenesis and Shadows of the Shroud are amazing DLCs further expanding the already existing Ascension Paths, with each path getting unique mechanics.
It's not just a map painter like CK3. You get to stimulate the whole nation, economy and citizens living in your country. You can keep on improving the lives of your pops, changing laws etc etc. Also Devs are very active, the game gets constant updates and devs listen to the input from the community.
Previously Utopia was a must have Stellaris DLC - now it's Galactic Paragons
Galactic Paragons while adding a slight power creep, also adds new and improved leaders. Finally they matter, they are no longer no-names you'll just roll every single time. Now each leader can get specialized and losing them can hurt. You also get council agendas, which give you some more stuff to do in peace time.
Cities Skylines is not Caesar 3, but it's still good. The vanilla game in itself will easily last you for 20-40 hours, but the real timesinker are the mods you can find.
If you think it's just yet another species pack, then you are wrong. It gives you pretty fun origins and the civics which could make you quite OP if played right.
If you were fan of CK2, then this game is NOT for you
New review as of 03.2026: 2/5
It has been 6 years since the game originally released in 2020. Since then the game did not improve by much. The common criticism is "as wide as ocean, as deep as puddle" - and believe me, they are right. No matter in what area you are playing the game plays more or less the same. Each expansion adds yet another new currency that is "totally different than the previous one, trust us" and is only available for that one specific expansion. The game has a lot of systems, but all of them are completely separated, they do not interact at all.
The Devs after years of criticism on official forums finally started adding depth... and that depth included ledger and "situation tab", rather than addressing any of the core issues.
The only reason why this review is not 1/5 is that if it's your first interaction with Paradox game, you might enjoy it.
***
Original review as of 09/2022: 5/5 Right now it is pretty barren compared to the CK2 especially in regards to the number of events, but the vanilla CK3 has all the most important stuff that you needed DLCs for in CK2.
With the recent price increase for CK3 DLCs Royal Edition is the best way to buy them.
by Olgierd K., Poland - Sep 2nd 2022 (updated Mar 31st 2026)
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Wasted potential
Let me start it with - this is by far the worst big expansion (so not Story Pack like Synthesis Dawn or Species Pack like Plantoids) that Stellaris has received.
Let me start with Espionage. It is by far the biggest problem strategy games of all kinds have problems with. Either it is completely overpowered and makes the game trivial and unfun or it is complete afterthought and can easily be ignored. With Stellaris it's the latter - there are only 2, maybe 3 useful operations. Getting intel takes some time and some operations does not scale well (arm privateers). But I'm honestly not blaming them.
Next thing we have is Galactic Custodian - sounds nice on paper, but it's basically undercooked premise of Galactic Imperator. Some of the resolutions really should have been swapped with Galactic Council. It doesn't help that the Galactic Community in itself is faced with problems that needs to be adjusted (low amount of resolutions, too many modifiers, same resolutions being voted again and again, long time between sessions etc).
Becoming the Crisis might be only saving point of this expansion.
Honestly the only time I recommend buying this DLC is if you want to play the Crisis and if the DLC itself is on huge sale.
Necroids in itself is really great species pack. New origin that promotes new gameplay is pretty fun. Origins are also very original and thematic. Also more shipsets is always nice.
Federations DLC alongside a 2.6 patch threw a whole new life to Stellaris. The expanded Federations make the universe more divisive: from the Hegemony where Overlord gets the biggest bonuses through Galactic Union (space EU) to Research Cooperatives which ultimate goal is... well research. On top of that You get Galactic Community, so basically the biggest game-changer since inclusion of mid-game crisis with Khan. There is a lot of words that could be said on the inclusion of Space UN in this game, but one is for sure - it completely changes the whole dynamic of game from early through mid and up to endgame, with resolutions pushing the whole map towards specific ethics and giving bonuses to all empires and breaches providing huge penalties, emergency meetings during crisis times and so on. And that's not even mentioning Origins and new Megaconstructions! One of the best DLCs to Stellaris.
The title basically sums it up. This DLC gives You yet another species (the more the merrier IMO), but unlike Plantoids, Lithoids have new mechanics - they don't use food, they have higher habitability but on the cost of using minerals and much slower pop reproduction. It's still good, but only buy it after getting every other DLC first, but before Plantoids.
As You know the Stellaris DLCs can be divided into 3 categories: Expansion Packs that feature a lot of new things (Megacorp, Utopia, Apocalypse), Storypacks (Distant Stars, Leviathans, Synthetic Dawn) and cosmetic stuff (Plantoids and Humanoids DLCs), and from Storypacks Ancient Relics is the best one.
Why You may ask? Well, here's the thing: Ancient Relics gives You a lot of content in a early and mid game. Relic Worlds, 2 new precursor civilzations, minor artifacts (which You can use to boost Your research or sell for cash), titular ancient relics... There is a lot of stuff going on, including a lot of stories to fully immerse You in the game. It really is awesome!
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