I have been thinking about making my own 4X game since buying Torque Game Engine in 2010. Back then, I had a plan to recreate Master of Orion II, but learning Torque while working 70 hour weeks as a web-developer/programmer but beyond me. After that, I occasionally would get interested enough to buy a book and download a game engine, but the realities of game development always became overwhelming.

I lost my parents around the COVID lockdowns, and realized a few things about myself and the games I have been playing. My biggest takeaway was that I do not really enjoy the 40 hour 4X games very much anymore. I am sure I used to, but after thousands of hours into games like Stellaris, I noticed that I keep starting new games, and lose interest 50 years in.

What do I love about 4X?

• Exploration
• Empire building
• Ship design and fleet assembly
• Pitting my fleets against intractable foes

What gets in the way of my enjoyment of 4X?

• Huge time investments
• Game systems designed to make the things I enjoy, more difficult to accomplish
• Game systems that distract from the core gameplay or stretch out the time investment
• Obvious "meta" plays that create cycles of nerfing and rebalancing by developers

I am still in the initial game planning stages, but my goal is to create a streamlined 4X space empire game that plays quickly but still feels deep. I still have to come up with a name, since "Hardspace" was used by another game in recent years. It will have to be unique, but evocative of the "galactic empire" theme as well. 

Checklist for the next week

• Install Blender, Unity and Unreal Engine
• Find some courses or tutorials for the above software (I have to start somewhere, and I have zero experience with them)
• Start compiling lists of things like potential titles for the game, mechanisms, empire features, ship components, etc. 
• Start thinking about the business side... taxes, how to fund development, time-frames, etc.