Should You Buy Stellaris: The Machine Age?

[@MontuPlays]

GRAB 70% off Stellaris & up to 50% off Stellaris DLC in the Humble Bundle Stellaris SALE: www.humblebundle.com/store/stellaris?partner=montuplays This link will take you to the Stellaris humble bundle store home page where you can then find other DLC recommended below in 'Related Content' or search for 'Stellaris' (or whatever else you want).

[@nwahally]

I have accepted Stellaris DLC as a personalized form of taxation by now.

[@dacedruss]

I have accepted pirating as my personnel form of tax avoidance

[@dangerface300]

From the moment I understood the gap in my dlc list *crrrrrrrrshenk* It disgusted me.

[@matthmatthmatth]

@@dacedrusscongrats who cares

[@craigwatkins3569]

Yes! But unlike taxation. We actually get stuff. Now my digital society can exist! Religious machines! Muwhahaha! All will praise the source code!

[@melliehaertel2404]

​@@matthmatthmatth 26 people, they are greedy and we avoid it

[@ziggytheassassin5835]

I think it's safe to say the "its so over" period of stellaris dlc is over for now, and we are now in a "we are so back" phase.

[@alternateending4841]

Just wait till the next one

[@ziggytheassassin5835]

@@alternateending4841 ya the storm one will suck lmao

[@LordMaceWick]

Do you know how "its so over" it must have been in order to be this "we are so back"

[@_Lumiere_]

​@@ziggytheassassin5835 tbf, that one is a smaller dlc. I think the archive one is the one to look at.

[@joshuasmith5289]

Dear Paradox, I'm buying my first full priced release date dlc. Partly because of the content . Mostly because of this review. Pay this man.

[@RandomUser2235]

I mean they probably did considering he did like 2 pre-release review videos for Paradox

[@leshtricity]

oh believe me, they certainly are.

[@nwahally]

The Mommyssiah came from nowhere and nowI have coffee in my keyboard.

[@isimiel3405]

beeeep

[@toastededcat1709]

Shodan?

[@heavyhebrew]

PRAISE THE MOMMYSIAH!

[@ElysiumCreator]

Seeing the word yes in the thumbnail without any asterisks was such a relief

[@MontuPlays]

There's a first time for everything!

[@PhthaloGreenskin]

From the moment I discovered the weakness of my flesh...

[@Thorne14]

it disgusted me

[@qhu3878]

I craved the strength and certainty of steel

[@christophebedouret9813]

I aspire to the purity of the blesses machine.

[@NotA-Real-Therapist]

Your kind cling to your flesh as if it will not decay and fail you

[@reeven1721]

One day the crude biomass you call a temple will wither, and you will beg my kind to save you.

[@briwanderz]

there is actually a few more (minor) additions i don't think you mentioned.. a new advisor voice: Cyberpunk. two new city backgrounds: Robotic and Cybernetic. (might be new 'windows" as well, not sure) new namelists: cyberpunk, individualist robotics... also i think a new cybernetic one. (still think this should be something we could mod without losing ironman mode / achievements)

[@briwanderz]

there is also now "Mechanical leviathan traits" such as defeating the scavenger bot leviathan gets you "+50% Mechanical pop assembly speed".. unfortunately it costs 3 trait points. the others are listed on the official wiki.

[@killerp2612]

and main menu image

[@christophebedouret9813]

2:40 The movie is "children of men"

[@paulcatindig2260]

The goat dystopian movie

[@InternetHydra]

Funny enough that's the name of the first empire I made in Stellaris, though it has nothing to do with that movie.

[@vasheroo]

I was thinking the same! Such a great movie.

[@arkstone3753]

I hope the next major one is an update to evolution mastery as it doesn’t feel nearly as powerful now to the other ascensions

[@jameshildebrand907]

I miss the days when biological ascension could copy the cybernetic and psionic traits if their species received it in another empire.

[@arkstone3753]

@@jameshildebrand907 yeah I miss those days as well

[@テッラリア]

I hope it will add biological ships

[@xxgaelixsxx8151]

Im good if it is either something related to psionic or hives.

[@arkstone3753]

@@テッラリア yeah biological hive minds need a real expansion since they feel bare bones compared to machines now some biological ships even would go a long way

[@sylxeria]

Machine Age setting a new standard for DLCs/Expansions moving forward woah, hard to imagine its like two or even three content updates for the price of one

[@sigmamaleaffirmationhypnob7340]

given the price, yeah I'd expect at least this much content

[@constantinethe27th33]

Super excited/hopeful for the genetic version of this…improved terraforming, ecology, habitation rework, planet strengths, etc.

[@ElysiumCreator]

It’s like Utopia, we are so back

[@cantstopthepun]

​@@sigmamaleaffirmationhypnob7340 it's not even just the amount of content but also the quality of it.

[@forsee2328]

I've seen someone said exactly that when astral planes came out. So I wouldn't extrapolate those things like releasing a good DLC or a poor one straight away

[@Aeidotronics]

The amount of content pleases this unit.

[@heavyhebrew]

Paradox loads up a new DLC "Ah sh*t. here we go again"

[@Aegis-_-]

Those arc furnaces are way better than I thought they’d be

[@123FireSnake]

From the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh, it disgusted me. I craved the strength and certainty of steel. I aspired to the purity of the Blessed Machine. Your kind cling to your flesh, as though it will not decay and fail you. One day the crude biomass you call the temple will wither, and you will beg my kind to save you. But I am already saved, for the Machine is immortal… Even in death I serve the Mommyssiah.

[@Axxikon]

Appreciate that you put the answer in the thumbnail, you're the interplanetary GOAT Montu

[@torpedodeuce]

Anticlickbait

[@RobT192]

Thanks Montu, im going to buy this dlc tonight. This gives more role-playing options and enemy empires to fight. Im so happy they added some new endgame crisis, ive been asking for that for a while. Now all we need is a few small satellite galaxies we can invade late game. You are right bro, this adds so much replay ability and role-play options

[@ValosarX]

This is what I've always wanted for Stellaris machine races!

[@Itharl]

That's an insane amount of content, truly impressed at the value. Will definitely be picking this one up, though I might pick up overlord and nemesis first to take full advantage.

[@aza7866]

Def worth it for the amount of content you get

[@HS-lv6wc]

"Church of the Cube" Was this a reference to Rimworld or Rick the Cube?

[@Haspen89]

Me every half a minute or so: oh damn this can't get any better now *few seconds later* oh damn it just did

[@Nemo2342]

I for one welcome our new machine age overlords.

[@asham868]

I really like the synthetic fertility origin, it was a lot of fun. I've tried synthetic ascension before but every single time I'd always get the techs for psionics and genetic ascension long before I'd ever get the tech for synths.

[@GuerillaBunny]

Synths is possible to get *relatively* early, but you really have to chase it. The problem is that while the tech might be available, it has a much lower chance to appear in your selection than the other ascension techs. To mitigate this issue, you should choose the Roboticist origin (it might not be called that, it's been a while, but it's the one with robots) and have an industrialist researching engineering tech. Both of these things will increase the draw chance of the synthetic tech. Giving Robots the best rights available (I think full rights with Cyborgs) might also help. Of course, you'll also need a way to generate a lot of Unity to obtain 3 Ascension Perks as well.

[@kauz33]

While i absolutely agree this dlc is great in content, i urge the european and american creators to realize how expensive this expansion is for more economically disavantaged countries, paying 89 reais for am expansion to a game is like ludicrously expensive here in brazil. so i, myself, could never recommend it for anyone to buy it

[@ChaoticNeutralMatt]

Yeah pricing should be considered in that direction as well.

[@rodrigobogado8756]

you guys should ask Steam to add you to the Latam regional pricing

[@Gizz101]

Problem is it'll be dirt cheap in some countries UNLESS they make it a fixed price no mtter what but yet again can cause problems iirc​@ChaoticNeutralMatt

[@rodrigobogado8756]

@@Gizz101 they already did

[@Umur64]

that's why I pirate it. I even add DLC to my steam stellaris's files and play it on steam with workshop.

[@Zaela_Zhezzaia]

Best DLC if you like playing with Machines. Not so good if you like Genetics/Psionics. Though you have to get this if you want to play tall. Because they had to put tall in this one DLC. *Sigh.* Hate when Stellaris forces you to buy a DLC for you to use like 4% of the DLC.

[@marcelgrabowski5939]

So now we need turbo DLC for Biological and Psionic ascensions, and Hive minds. Those are most overlooked now, and yet curious things to explore.

[@zacharysilver911]

Astral Planes focused on Psionics. Toxoids has a lot of content for Biological.

[@marcelgrabowski5939]

@@zacharysilver911 I don't have Astral Planes so I can't discuss it, but Toxoids had only one biological origin that give you bunch of traits with side effect of lower lifespan. It isn't complete remake like with machine age. It is one origin that let you have more resources at a price of leaders dying more often. Machine age, on the other hand, open multiple avenues of ascension for all machine empires, not even considering all the rest of stuff, it isn't origin-specific. Honestly, I think that each ascension should have its own theme: Psionic being high-risk high-reward, except it isn't, only end-of-the-cycle event is powerful enough to matter in this case. Biological uniqueness; like traits that make pops produce some resources all the time without proper jobs for them, like on example scilinating skin, that give your pops unique properties (each pop of species allowed military service will produce defense army no matter where it works, species consuming more food instead of consumer goods, species with in-built chemical behavioral alteration that result in them being unable to not being model citizens of your empire no criminal activity or non compliant ethics from them or exact opposite making species members as independent as possible for more egalitarian empires and many, many more) Cybernetic multi-role and synergy, (idk if it is how it works in machine age now) Synthetic about raw efficiency and specialisation that it does very well as of now.

[@FantasticKruH]

Hive mind dlc could be super cool.

[@marcelgrabowski5939]

@@FantasticKruH Yeah, I feel like there is a lot of possibilities, since hive mind DLC would neatly fit into both psionics and genetics. Hive minds are psionic by the lore after all. I feel like genetic ascension theme should be uniquety (passive generation of resources like scilinating skin, each pop allowed military service generating defensive army no matter where it works, pop being able to support more than one assault army, pops being completely compliant to empire ethics, unable to rebel or generate criminal activity, etc etc) instead of raw efficiency, uniqueness. And psionics, well, high-risk high-reward that it really isn't now, even with side effects of deities, safe for End of the Cycle. I feel like using more meaningful modifiers instead of flat increases and decreases, unless very big ones, would improve it, like instead of +10% from pop jobs, +10% monthly resources for empire at large.

[@drewlarsen5226]

It is friggin awesome so far, made a diplomatic individual machine empire and Stellaris said ok, here is a devouring swarm, a fanatic spiritual crusader and a mid crisis 2 systems from my home world…. Looking forward to try 2 tomorrow lol

[@pieterfaes6263]

If things work out, then I look forward to the next DLC-set 'The Selfish Gene' to make bio-engineering more fleshed out. There's already a few things (Overtuned, clone Soldiers), but it feels a bit underappreciated compared to the rest. Perhaps let our empires become a crisis of Genetically Enhanced Leviathans, or whatever the Dimensional Horror belongs to!

[@jameshildebrand907]

Honestly, this DLC did get my interest.

[@MartinPeters-gr5bk]

I would have really liked if they added some kind of super bio ascension somewhat like the cylons in Battlestar galactica

[@justprivatelywatching0293]

2:10 BY THE OMNISSIAH! :D

[@larrythecow1568]

Now we need an expansion like this for genetic and psionic ascensions

[@Gizz101]

Meh ones with the mastery of flesh need more

[@grayrook8637]

Me happy, Alloy Monke find new home in Arc Furnace.

[@LaneThePlane]

If Montu says "best DLC ever" the last time we've ever had something like that was when Utopia came and we got megastructures. I can't wait to get home and do a playthrough!

[@khaisinclair2798]

7:25 *"Every. Thingle. Month."* Yuth. Thith "DL-Thee" pleatheth me.

[@Konzon]

Puny flesh machines shall bow before superior synthetic lifeforms.

[@skeltaldelegate5408]

Amazing DLC. Into year 80 so far and having a ton of fun as a virtual spyware machine empire.

[@tommygrnhj1736]

Many prior dlc was unreasonable expensive But they have also done good work on the game admittedly. Tbh i Think its expensive.. but if its quality.. adds to gameplay (and story). I dont mind paying If only they would either just keep a high standard or relate the Price better to the “actual playable value” of the package. Still its one of the greatest games ever and its still develloping.

[@sharojak9401]

Who else loves the new portraits of cybernetic mushrooms that replace their heads?

[@Brother_Rony]

Unlike CA with shadows of change, paradox seems to understand that with a higher price there should be more content

[@pszepek]

I bet you're getting tons of questions like that but here I go - I want to start my adventure with Stellaris. I've watched some of your videos and reeeeally enjoyed them. Now with this new DLC can your recommend what other ones are best to buy to fully enjoy the game? Some race packs as well?

[@Lydeck3r]

I remember there was a mod that made the cyborg implant appear in Species when you took the Synthetic Evolution perk and also when you took the Mind over Matter Perk the Psionics glow started shining on your Species. Stellaris doesn't get properly good dlc anymore and everything is always broken at the end of the game and the artificial intelligence can no longer do anything against you that would even challenge you.

[@Pangaron]

What a great news! I love playing tall.

[@theodoremccarthy4438]

I’m so ready for this. I’ve been playing Rogue Servitors since before they were meta. Having more machine options is great.

[@cfdcfd15]

This just makes me want player Hive ships models now

[@hti5795]

I like that this DLC has a focus on boosting space resources because as they were before its really not worth the minerals until you have invested into your planets

[@andypham4216]

Ive been wanting non gestalt machines forever now. Im sooooo happy with this

[@andypham4216]

Machines+trade value+trade federations is amazing!

[@revboost4342]

I liked this DLC. It's so meaty and also the music sounds very cyberpunk-themed. I was jamming to the music before I started the game lol. The music on this DLC is bangers!

[@Preston241]

Cries in psionic.

[@RylTheValstrax]

2023 was pretty catastrophic for stellaris DLC releases and updates. I think this is bringing me back to the game!

[@Demirocky-pg3op]

So bought all the dlcs for 150 which is quite good and that includes the new bundle with 4 dlcs for the future… I literally have no idea what I’m doing in the game lol

[@Asgardians3t]

watching this video after i bought the DLC as soon as i found out it was out :P def worth it guys!!! SPEND YOUR MONEY!!!!!!

[@jamiesullivan6602]

Been wanting to get this game for a while, and this sale seemed like perfect opportunity. About 3 hours into my first play through. Do I know what is going on? Not at all. Is it fun? Absolutely.

[@vaniellys]

Machien Empires are my favorite way to play the game, so I am extremely happy to see such a full expansion for this price.

[@Darlf_Sevil]

Utopia: Ah, finally a worthy opponent

[@mister_enemy]

5th day of asking for a new megacorp civic tierlist ;p (good video btw😊)

[@wedgeantilles8575]

I can play my Roman Empire as Mechanicus? Hey, that's good enough for me to buy the whole Season-Pass! This expansion alone is worth it at full price, so with two more expansions being included the 40 Euro for the season pass seems like great value!

[@Llewellyon]

Finally able to RP the great Lord Yawgmoth in his quest to bring blessed perfection to the stars.

[@kingnekogon]

Just dawned on me, I can RP pseudo-Precursor Humans with Genesis Guides. Drop ai empires to 0, x5 pre-ftl, and build/expand, gifting technology and and uplifting wherever I find new friends!

[@Hunter-pt4zy]

Hope they add new fallen empires based on ascension paths, like a Psionic Fallen Empire or a Synthetic Fallen Empire

[@heomji7216]

Honestly, I just bought it and launched it. Just hearing the new OSTs makes it worth for me.

[@johnclifford4185]

Lol arc furnaces are crazy good. Anyway this whole DLC put a smile on my face as I was playing this afternoon. And I was kind of expecting disappointment but instead I was actually having fun! who knew! Best value DLC in a long time.

[@folvenson]

My favorite bug from this update is that when I synthetically ascended with synthetic fertility my politicians became unemployed for a month until they had their citizens rights restored

[@Uniikum]

I preordered, waiting on a day off to learn how to play robotics 😅😂

[@Critical-Mass-Gaming]

This looks like a lot of fun

[@theshadowrunner100]

Now they just need to update the bioscience centric options. I want my flesh cult/church origin.

[@Teyloune]

If more DLCs were like The Machine Age, I'd be more inclined to buy them, feel overall really good about my purchase, and be looking to purchase more high-quality DLCs like this one.

[@SirMac27]

So jealous I have Console Ed. and I can't play this yet. I have it for the PC but I never play PC games as often as I do my Console. I can't wait.

[@ericlondon2663]

Holy #@&!, buy it already. Amazing expansion IIMO.

[@naturalbornpatriot6369]

I did $30 USD for 6 months of dlc access. It’s worth it cause there’s only so much of it I can play in a spurt of playing nothing else but it for a few weeks then I move on for a while. Same with every other paradox title, and game.

[@hebrux]

Sounds like they took some features from mods and added a pricetag to it

[@_paddy]

Do I need the older main DLCs? I stopped at apocalypse and everything in between looked not really good. But I would like to get back in the game with this one

[@thelensimon7862]

When im in a "goated af" competition and my opponent is The machine age:😲

[@LoLaSn]

ngl "synthetic fertility" initially made me think that robots were able to procreate like bio pops

[@AsbestosMuffins]

man i can't believe they made an expansion that makes me want to ditch mods entirely and play the base game. we need way more kilostructures

[@keithspoelker6384]

I have just started down the Stellaris rabbit hole. I generally lose within the first hundred years so there's that. Machine age looks awesome, but I feel that I need to work on the base game first. Is that a good assumption or should I just add DLCs and go for it???

[@TheDestinyGamez]

Learn the base game and make sure your not using super challenging settings. Often times the 100 year point can feel like your falling behind while new. Id 1000% say go get as many dlc as possible, they add so much to the game, so many more options and ways to try new things. You'll learn more, try more, and have more fun with all the additional content. Id also highly recommend delving into mods eventually, I can't play without them now. This game has an astonishable potential to have massive amount of third party content added to it. Love it!

[@barryevans791]

It breaks mods. I only had the small menu mod installed and it crashed on startup twice, removing it fixed it.

[@Gizz101]

That always happens with updates

[@barryevans791]

@@Gizz101 They fixed it yesterday, so I'm happy again

[@Farisbun]

I was actually wondering which book you were referring to when talking about uplifting. Just want to look into the correct one in the ocean of book names

[@Cramblit]

They knew what they were doing paying you for a review. I was totally not going to get it because of the price hike. I have bought almost all other DLCs except toxoid one. I am now immediately purchasing it thanks to your review.

[@MontuPlays]

Paying us for a review? I can unequivocally say that has not happened. We got early access (allowing us to make a review) and paradox did sponsor one video that came out on Sunday of gameplay but overall our financial relationship has been minimal/negligible (to the point where the idea that they paid for good words from us would honestly be laughable).

[@Cramblit]

@@MontuPlays Let me rephrase then. They're fools for not paying you.

[@MontuPlays]

Ohhhhh, haha. Well we wouldn't feel comfortable being paid for a review! They made a great game here, it speaks for itself!

[@eiohnanananunu9871]

Genesis Guides, sounds like a pre-origin for enigmatic observer fallen empire

[@vnrobbie1896]

Wasn't there also a trait that gave you several months worth of Unity when clearing a blocker?

[@anna-flora999]

My ONLY complaint so far is that mommy mommyssiah's voice is way too silent considering she's put on the same slider as the advisor. If I turn it up to where I like her volume, the advisor shatters my ears

[@a_brazilian_guy_named_luiz]

My honest reaction to all the videos in this series: "cool... I'll give it a chance. Now where did I leave utorent?"

[@rylorthreev1353]

At first I was worried about the price increase for dlcs, now I can say it's worth the price, the question is: is this the new expectation for dlcs from now on? Anyway I'm broken this month so I'll have to wait another month to actually play this lol

[@derjadebaum9159]

6:45 - lol they added predators

[@typhado5975]

Good thing I booked a couple weeks off towards the end of the month

[@ifoundmemallet3394]

I’m just curious if A: we can get the traditions trees without being a machine empire (such as the nano tech one), and get the fallen empire ascension without being a machine empire? As well as the new structures. Would be pretty limiting if you HAD to be machines/synthetics to get them

[@MontuPlays]

Only machines can go for nanite ascension. Anyone can go for cosmogensis (the fallen empire powers). Anyone can research and build the arc furnace and Dyson swarm. Hope that clarification helps!

[@ifoundmemallet3394]

@@MontuPlays Ah ok. Kinda ruins the purpose of the tradition tree if you have to be a machine empire considering if you encounter an empire from the L cluster that uses nano tech they aren’t ever machines or synthetis

[@TheStartrek99]

Arch furnace and habitat interactions are going to be interesting.......

[@conradkai9705]

machine empires are my jam!

[@makiiavely]

I get the feeling this dlc was inspired by orion's arm, a collective sci fi worldbuilding project because orion's arm is all about trans-humanism, it is a regular thing to have a computer interface integrated in your organism and there's tons of different types of "people": cyborgs, intelligent computers, enhanced humans, human minds uploaded into computers... it's bonkers and very hard sci fi but i'm deadass sure this and some other things are the inspiration behind this dlc, pretty cool

[@feminem2488]

"This basically allows for truly tall play for the first time ever" was old void dwellers a joke to you?

[@KeinNiemand]

I'm still going to wait until it's for sale at 30-50% off, no DLC is worth full price. Maybe I'll get it a bit earlyier at 20% off since it's a really good DLC, but I won't pay full price.

[@JimJWalker]

Paradox needs to fix the "perceived loudness" of the Cyberpunk voice. It is substantially lower than the rest.

[@ryorai5804]

Montu, it would be cool to see a video about the use of AI in the making of this DLC.

[@MaxHaydenChiz]

It's a shame that this released at the same time as Hades 2. Seems like a lot of cool stuff that I'm looking forward to trying once I get over my "just one more run" problem.

[@swedizzle12]

So with this new DLC. what would be a fun Borg empire build and ascension path? Resistance is futile.

[@aboller319]

I hope they make a superhero DLC specifically for genetic mutation. It'll be fun if there's an origin where people just become mutants :))

[@moochiethemartian6342]

THEY MADE THE FUCKING NECRON ORGIN TOO THIS NEEDS TO BE ON PS5 yesterday

[@damonedrington3453]

6:44 Am I reading right- does that say you get +60% resources from jobs… for 1 dark matter per 100 pops (0.01 per pop)? Please tell me I’m misreading