If you’re in the mood for a spot of space domination this weekend and somehow haven’t yet given Paradox Interactive’s galactic empire builder a whirl in the six years it’s been out, now’s the perfect time to do so, given it’s free to play for the next few days.
Stellaris, a sort of space-faring amalgam of grand strategy and 4X action, burst onto the scene back in 2016 to significant acclaim. Six years on, it’s a substantially different beast, with Paradox having made some sweeping changes along the way, most notably in its radical 2.0 release.
The many faceted road to galactic supremacy it present is still a tonne of strategic fun though, even if – as is generally the way with Paradox titles – the purity of the base game has now been somewhat muddied by an increasingly unwieldy stack of post-launch DLC.
