Stellaris: Necroids Species Pack – Game Review

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Fabius studied the ancient being. “How long have you been here?”

“Longer that your race has possessed the ability to stand upright.”

“You are immortal.”

“I am persistent.”

Cloneworld, by Josh Reynolds

Stellaris is the kind of game you get lost in. Hours and hours spiral away as you wonder how to conquer the galaxy this time, outwitting your opponents or, more likely, just smashing their fleets into space dust. If you’ve found this review, you likely already know that it’s a dangerous time warp, and you’re wondering whether or not to invest in it.

Paradox’s latest offering, the suspiciously Warhammer 40K Necron-like pack they’ve titled as Necroids. It allows you to play as space-necromancers, essentially. But is the price tag worth it?

As with the other species packs, they are much smaller than the larger fare, like Utopia, Megacorp, or Federations. They also don’t add flavour or new pop-up quests to the game either, nor do they add big space monsters like Leviathan. But if you are looking to play a particular civilization, that is evil undead overlords, Necroids is a worthy investment. I’ll dissect some of the additions below.

The Necroids as a species type are obtained by using a unique Origin in species creation known as “Necrophage”. The Necrophage origin functions similarly to the cyborg race that you can play as with the Synthetic Dawn DLC, in that it gives you one primary race, the Necroids themselves, and another supplicant race that you can style as you like with their own traits.

So, the two species share one homeworld, and the origin is framed as “the other species developed their own society, but then your secret society of undead monstrosities seized control of their society, and started converting them to the undead, as well as began your expansion into the stars”. You are indeed essentially running a necromantic cult that can also soar through the stars.

If you’re into Star Wars, it feels like you are playing as one of the ancient Sith Empires. You absorb other pops into your civilization and then convert them into your main pop. This is also your only means of reproduction, so you have to expand and devour (I mean, peacefully induct into your great new religion) new civilizations to become more powerful. 

The DLC also adds a couple of new Civics, which add some new governmental bonuses to your society that serve to further your evil(?) cause. They are as follows: 

Death Cult

Enables powerful edicts which require the sacrificing of pops. The Death Cults allow you to activate good buffs that require you to cull portions of your population, but you know, you did sign up for this sort of business.

Reanimated Armies

Allows the deployment of morality-immune, undead armies. Instead of army camps, you build undead tombs which can summon the dead. There’s nothing more terrifying than an army you can’t kill heading straight for your home-world.

Memorialists

Erect monuments to the galaxy’s past, improving planetary stability and honouring tomb worlds. You essentially create a new subset of jobs that allow you to make tourist attractions and science experiments out of tomb worlds.

There are also, as with the other species packs, some new portraits, fully animated, and with a few colour palettes each (at least, all the ones I tested were). They are all suitably undead-looking, with a variety of space-zombie/space-parasite/space-cultist looks that make you look really spooky.

However, I wouldn’t recommend buying just for the new portraits, no matter how neat they are, since there are plenty of mods that give you cool-looking portraits already. Be sure you like the sound of the new game mechanics before purchasing. The new ships are cool. They look very sharp and evil and are essential for evil empires.

The best new cosmetic feature however is easily the new advisor. It is a female voice with a distinct echo to it. This makes it sound very very eerie, and it makes your space empire feel as though they are timeless and really filling the void of space with their own special brand of horror.

To round out the experience, there are a few more cosmetics, a building set of black spires, a new room, three new name lists, and some new building appearances. These aren’t anything to write home about, but they do exist. They’re just more things to make your experience as a Necroid more immersive.

So is Necroids worth it? If you are interested in running a monolithic space death cult, absolutely. However, it has little to offer the casual player, especially if the premise is entirely uninteresting to you.

Playing against a Necroid empire could be fun flavour-wise, but the way they operate as AI will undoubtedly be no different than other AI government types, aside from the fact that they’ll devour your people if they beat you. So, buy it if you’re keen on the concept at all, but if you know for a certainty you will never, or will rarely, play as them, you can safely give it a miss.

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