Over the course of five centuries, the Greater Terran Union transitioned from a devastated
civilization struggling to take its first few steps past the boundaries of the Solar
System, to an interstellar hyperpower that would shape the fate of the entire Galaxy.
But with the story of the Greater Terran Union and the first Season of Stellaris Invicta
now over, it seems appropriate to look back on the series and figure out what worked,
what didn’t, and what we can use to make Season 2 even better.
A type of post-mortem if you will.
So first, for the benefit of anyone confused as to what Stellaris Invicta actually was,
let’s review.
The basic premise was that the Templin Institute would embark on a campaign within the game
Stellaris which would be streamed over on our Twitch channel.
As voted by our supporters on Patreon, the focus of this campaign was the Greater Terran
Union.
Roughly once a month we would produce a scripted, documentary style episode covering what happened.
I think in delivering on this idea we were largely successful.
It took 34 streams and 10 episodes including a prologue and epilogue, but we finished both
the campaign and the story.
This might sound kinda straightforward but having never attempted anything like this
before and being aware that there was a ton that could potentially go wrong, just the
fact we managed to finish without any huge setbacks is a huge victory.
So, what else went right with Stellaris Invicta?
Well, I think the biggest success we managed was the Greater Terran Union itself.
When we first announced the choices that would be available to our Patrons to vote on, there
was only a few paragraphs worth of backstory for each nation.
Expanding upon those sparse details to create a much more fleshed out system of government,
society, culture, and history was a unique challenge.
Having seen the immense support for the Greater Terran Union across our streams and here on
YouTube, it really seems like we really created a unique faction that appealed to a lot of
people.
It has been incredibly gratifying to see the GTU mentioned alongside the likes of the Galactic
Empire or the Imperium of Man, I’m so happy that people really took to it.
There’s a lot of factors as to why I think that was, but one that stands out is of the
four original choices, the Greater Terran Union was the only one that had a sort of
built in story.
While the other nations were presented as simply going into space, the GTU had a purpose,
finding the alien species that had previously invaded the Earth and delivering some form
of retribution.
I think in Season 2 we’ll try to expand on this and give each potential nation more
direction.
The second major thing I think we got right with Stellaris Invicta was figuring out how
to take upwards of 8 hours worth of streaming time and convert it into a 10- or 15-minute
episode.
We couldn’t possibly include every single detail and figuring out what to include and
what to omit was another major challenge.
One of the first choices we had to make involved the discovery of a planet that would eventually
become the GTU colony of Elysium.
Within the game it was first inhabited by a primitive alien race which was then annihilated
by a vastly superior civilization through a series of triggered events.
It was a little convoluted and because of the nature of the game, wouldn’t have any
meaningful impact on the GTU once it was over.
It didn’t quite fit the character of the narrative we were going for and it was never
mentioned in our episodes.
Every stream had a bunch of events like this, but I think for the most part in each subsequent
episode we were able to deliver a fairly accurate representation of what occurred.
We’re interested to hear your feedback though, was there something from the streams you wished
had been mentioned?
Now one of the biggest problems posed with this series is that within the scripted episodes,
we frequently mention things that either aren’t really covered in the game or don’t really
look visually engaging.
Things like ground warfare, political developments, and the more nuanced elements of interstellar
society.
For this we were fortunate enough to be given permission to use the work of a bunch of talented
artists.
This series would not have been anywhere as successful without their generosity.
So, enough of the self-congratulation.
What were some things that didn’t work out in Stellaris Invicta?
The most obvious answer is we severely underestimated both the potential of this method of storytelling
and the interest it would garner from our audience.
The original plan for this series was just two episodes, one covering the overview of
the nation, one covering the events of the game.
Looking back, that now seems insane and thankfully we were able to expand the scope of the series
without too much of a headache.
The other part of this though was the way we handled alien submissions.
When we first announced Stellaris Invicta, we included a template that anyone could fill
out with their own design for an alien empire and then email it to us for a chance to have
it included in the game.
We expected a few dozen submissions but instead got well over 800.
We had no real system in place to sort through all these submissions and instead just had
to put in a lot of time.
Next season, we’ll be limiting alien submissions, but how exactly?
We still need to figure that out.
Another thing we could have improved on was something we saw mentioned again and again
in the comments and that was maps.
Because we limited each episode to artwork or gameplay footage, it was sometimes hard
to understand where exactly things were taking place, which alien nation was which, and how
it all related to one another, especially if you hadn’t caught any of the streams.
The reason we didn’t include maps was because I wasn’t totally happy with how they looked
ingame and the names of star systems and other elements was often changed over the course
of our campaign.
In Episode Three I actually made a map from scratch in photoshop, but keeping it updated
over the course of the game and continually adding on new regions as the GTU expanded
proved impossible.
I’m not sure what the solution is here yet, whether just relenting and including ingame
map views, or spending a ton of time recreating the entire galaxy in photoshop.
The last thing I wasn’t totally happy with in Stellaris Invicta was our limitations when
it came to footage.
While we had a ton of room to work with across both our captured gameplay footage and donated
artwork, we still sometimes had to use the same images across multiple episodes to depict
different events.
We tried to keep this to a minimum, but sometimes it was unavoidable.
We also were unable to depict any type of change across the GTU as the series went on.
The capital of nation looked identical in both the year 2200 and 2600.
Sadly, without a budget of a few million dollars and an army of artists we can commission,
there is likely no way around this.
So that’s what I took away from Stellaris Invicta, but before we wrap things up, I’d
like to mention a few other brief points.
First, we were able to produce 10 episodes of Stellaris Invicta because of the support
of our Patrons and our members here on YouTube.
If you enjoyed Stellaris Invicta and want to see a second season, consider supporting
us, depending on your pledge level you’ll get some cool gear out of it.
Also, during our streams on Twitch, we produced a series of radio advertisements for products
and services within the Greater Terran Union, these will be released on the Templin Archives
channel over the next few months and the first one is available right now!
If you’d like to hear all about Prikki Plushie toys, or watch some our past streams, you’ll
find both on the archives.
Lastly, if you’d like to discuss the Greater Terran Union or Stellaris Invicta further,
or just speculate on whats happening with Season 2, head on over to our Discord server.
We have a great community there and we’d love to have ya along.
So I think Stellaris Invicta went pretty well but that is just my opinion, an unshakeable
zeppelin of truth flying above the clouds and currents of deceit.
I’d still like to hear your opinion though.
Have any suggestions for how we could improve for season 2?
Was there something about the series I completely forgot to mention?
Will we ever find out what happened to the Mist Man?
Let us know in the comments below.
Until next time, this has been Incoming.
The Templin Institute investigates the nations, organizations and factions of alternate worlds.
If you’ve enjoyed this video and would like to directly support us, vote in polls to determine
future topics, and receive some cool rewards, please consider pledging to our Patreon Page.