Which one's your favourite? MOO1 or MOO2?

[fanatic civver]

MOO1 is a classic. Everything works extremely well - the ship design, diplomacy, spying, combat and slide bars. A pity that the AI isnt that great!

I find MOO2 really boring, mainly because the enormous ship battles are long and tedious. Iin a one sided affair you still have to sit through the AI moving its 100 ships just to destroy your single battle station that never had a chance to begin with. I dont see the point in playing in strategic mode either since the game is based around designing your own custom ships and sending them into battle. The combat was fun with MoM and MOO so why was it changed so much?

So, what one is YOUR favourite?

[pchang]

Maybe your computer is too slow. I never noticed space battles taking a long time. On the other hand, I never had space battles with more than a couple dozen ships. Ever.

[Master Marcus]

I voted both of course. I'm like the cameleon, I can be a macromanager ,OR a micromanager over all the details in the case of great games in the civ tradition. Why not to adapt if the game is worth it, like the upcoming MoO3 I hope. As for MoO2, it's still a landmark game worth playing and not beaten in the genre. A masterpiece. Period. You may not like it, and be glad to hear the macro side of MoO3 - perhaps the returning of an "elegant simplicity". But don't let that fool you: MoO3 will be ...elegant, we hope, but for the simplicity thing....it will be the most complex game to date, 10 times more detailed with a learning curve x10 next to the prequels - even without micromanaging the "boring details".

Hope your computer is not too slow for handling these upcoming huge battles ( forget the minimal requirements ), otherwise you may want to stick with the original MoO ( perhaps unbeatable ) like some addicts still playing the original Civ ( the originator ).

[Sarxis]

Never played MOO1.

And I just recently (2000) got MOO2.

[Rhuffin]

MOO1, definitely.

It was simple, effective and fun. I love the design ship module (with which you could more customize your ships than with MOO2). But it was the slider bar system which made the game so effective (you could manage your empire as you wanted but it was not too tedious).

MOO2 had too much micro-management. Too many thing to build on your colonies. It was difficult to have a fast paced game as in MOO1.

I remember a usenet discussion way back in 95 when MOO2 was announced. The subjet was "we want MOO gold not MOO2". MOO gold being MOO with better AI, better graphics and a few more races, techs ... After playing MOO2 I definitevely agreed with that statement. I still play MOO from time to time, but not MOO2.

[The Mad Monk]

MoO2 got me into the TBS genre, and it is still in my 'active rotation'. My only complaint was that spce is too small.

BTW, what is your definition of 'huge'? I've never had a battle involving more than thirty ships on either side (and if that many were headed toward one of my systems, you can bet they'd be met by more than just a battle station...).

[Father Beast]

MOO the original, without a doubt.

What do you call a huge battle? 30 ships per side? how about when I went and attacked a planet with 20 missile bases, protected by 430 small ships and 18 medium ships. I attacked with 22 huge ships and 65 large bomber types.

I would have loved all the new options in moo2 if they hadn't destroyed the game.

[vmxa1]

It is not that easy of a call for me, but I guess I will have to say MOO. I would haved loved a MOO gold, make it windows instead of Dos so XP and beyoond is not a problem.
I do like Moo2. The battles are only a pain to me if I screwed up and forgot to do something and have to redo it. 40 or so on each side is boring. I run on PIV 1.7GB so speed is not the issue. I like the ability to upgrade ships and the improved ground warfare. I like the Leaders and the sound.

[Urban Ranger]

The original of course.

There are some improvements in MoO 2, for example upgrading ships, outposts, and multiple planets per system. Others are definitely no good, such as all the tedious colony improvements, spies, and tactical combat.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Father Beast
What do you call a huge battle? 30 ships per side? how about when I went and attacked a planet with 20 missile bases, protected by 430 small ships and 18 medium ships. I attacked with 22 huge ships and 65 large bomber types.

That's nothing.

I remember a battle where I fought the Meklars with several hundred huge ships on each side, together with thousands of large and medium ships in support.

[vmxa1]

As for the large fleet battles, I am not sure if you are talking about Moo or Moo2. In MOO the numbers are of no concern as they can only have 5 or 6 fleets (never counted them after about two thousand of games I should know) any of which can have up 32xxx ships and I have whacked that many lots of times. In Moo2, why would you let them get that many ships in the first place? Once I get plasma cannons I start to stalk the AI's fleets and kill them. I start with the biggest one I can find. I do not want them showing up on my door with a large fleet and me with no ships in range. On the hard level they seem to have one big fleet and some very small ones, I just get the big ones as the small one can not hurt my planet, only blockade it. Once all of the big fleets are gone, I can just start annexing planets and pump up my score.

[Deathwalker]

I love MOO2 the best. I tried playing MOO1 but could never get into it for some reason.

[Garth Vader]

I like them both, but since Moo2 can still be easily played on my computer I'll pick that.

I got tired of Civ3 after 3 games, and I went and played a couple of Moo2 games. I would guess that Moo2 has occupied the most of my time out of any computer game, moo being second.

What really extended Moo2's life for me was finding the MeltPot race editor now I play on impossible with a custom race against super custom races. When I bump into the Borg early in the game it's usually over for me!

I prefer the Moo2 combat with shield facings and weapon arcs. I have had some real large battles, I once fought a Dominion fleet of 65-70 doomstars, they actually had more ships in the fleet but they wouldn't all fit on the screen. The only time a large ship battle is a problem is when the computer is using tractor beams and plasma webs

The micromanagement can be annoying, but compared to moving around a bunch of workers or formers it is quick and painless and everything can be easily done from the colonies screen so you don't have to click on each system.

[vmxa1]

I have always said that people will tend to prefer the version that they used or heard first. If you are old enough to know more than one version of a hit song, you tend to like the one you heard first. You may like both or how ever many version you have encountered (hits, not covers). Games are the same only more so. I say that because songs are not impacted by technology. So for Moo2 if you played it first and then tried Moo, the sound and graphics are very dated. If Moo3 is good, people who get it and have never played MOO or MOO2 will probably feel they are inferior. Moo2 did introduce some very good functions as you say shielding and arcs, ground combat with more variants (tanks/battle droids), leaders. Moo has played on every box I ever had from 386 to PIV and all operating systems from DOS, OS2 to NT. As for Civ3, once I stop for awhile it will probably a long time before I come back. MOO/2 are very easy to come back to as you can have a fast game and it is easy to remember the strategy. Civ3 you had better use the better strategy or you can not win. You can not start a game and then realize you should have done this or that and forgot, you will lose.

[tonic]

I've only started playing MoO(1) for the first time about two weeks ago and have to admit to a severe case of addiction perhaps even more intense than Civ2. Although the game can be shorter than Civ2, there is sufficient depth and challenge in the strategy (as well as the distinctively different qualities of the available races) to make for a high saturation threshold.

I haven't played MoO2 but it seems, reading the feedback here, that I have not missed much. Now if only the OpenMoO Project can gather more momentum. What's news, UR?