Contrary to popular belief, 4X grand strategy games aren’t a way for micro-managing masochists to torture themselves.
Well, they are, but they can also be a lot of fun – especially narrative-based ones like Paradox’s Stellaris.
Some of the events you’ll experience in this game can be just as exciting or comedic as anything you might find in less “serious” titles – and the possibilities for silly roleplaying are infinite.
If you want to have pure unadulterated fun with Stellaris, you can’t overlook the vibrant modding community.
Let me show you my picks for the most straight-up fun (and funny!) mods for Stellaris.
Comedians have known that loud equals funny for a long time.
For example, yelling out the punchline to a good joke can surprise your audience and get them to laugh even harder.
Meme culture took this principle to the extreme sometime between 2016 and 2020 when unintelligible “bass boosted” sounds seemed to be in every meme video.
Bass Boosted Mega-Cannon brings this hilarious trend to Stellaris by replacing the Mega and Giga Cannon sound with a bass boosted blast that makes any military victory feel like a total meme.
The hardcore Stellaris fans who pay attention to the Dev Diary might remember the C6 species featured as concept art for the Aquatics Species Pack in DD #231.
To be honest, it’s easy to miss.
It’s just one among 20+ concepts of an aquatic species based on crustaceans – and yet, people who did notice couldn’t get them out of their heads.
Maybe it’s the simplistic design, the wobbly tentacles, or that they look nothing like a crustacean.
One thing is sure: this thing looks hilarious, and we wanted it in the game.
After reading dozens of requests for this memetastic species to be included, the Art and Animation teams at Paradox came together to release this mod.
Choosing the right namelist for your empire can mean the world in terms of immersion.
Imagine how confusing it would be if a race of Fungoid fanatic purifiers invaded your planet and you heard them calling each other “Jeff” as they massacred your people.
That’s exactly what’ll happen once you install the Jeff Namelist, which renames everything and everyone to Jeff as an homage to Channing Tatum’s “My name is Jeff” meme line from 22 Jump Street.
Hi, my name is Jeff, hailing you from the Jeffleet in the name of the Jeff Sovereignty – and you’re about to get Jeff’d.
The power to turn whatever you touch into gold is like the Holy Grail of capitalist society.
The Greeks wrote some story about a guy named Midas who wasn’t so happy with this ability, but what do they know?
The Midas Apocalypse Golden Colossus mod lets you determine whether turning everything into gold is a viable survival strategy by giving your Colossus a “Mass Transmuter” cannon capable of turning entire planets into perfect golden spheres.
They’re capable of piloting spaceships, operating giant robots, casting spells, communing with interstellar beasts far beyond human comprehension – and they do all of this while looking adorable.
Instead of turning planets into gold, I’d rather transform my entire population into cute anime girls with the Animaris mod.
Animaris features no less than 132 new anime character portraits, of which 120 are females and 12 are males.
Gotta have those Anime harem situations, am I right?
As a star-sailing species expanding our influence beyond our native star system, it can be easy to lose sight of where we came from.
A great way to keep our feet on the ground and re-connect with our roots is the Monkey Advisor mod, which introduces a chattering, screeching, whooping primate to help you run your society.
It’s not just any random yelling and chest-beating, either.
Every one of the sound clips matches the overall “tone” of the situation. You’ll get an eager and curious whoop for discoveries, victorious yelling after winning space battles, and communal gibbering when making new friends.
If you prefer something more high-tech but not necessarily more complex, consider the DALEK Advisor mod based on the same-name species from British TV series Doctor Who.
The Daleks are the OG fanatical purifiers of the sci-fi genre.
They’re all about exterminating “inferior” species, and though their outer shells look a bit outdated by today’s standards, they’re still quite effective.
The DALEK Advisor is perfect for any authoritarian, militaristic, and expansionist empire with no qualms about engaging in genocide to conquer another planet.
Conquering the galaxy is easy if you just “EXTERMINATE” everything in your path.
You better remember and repent for your terrible sins against fruits before the fearsome Cavendish Empire brings fire and vengeance to your solar system.
With the Banana Animated Portraits mod, it’s easier than ever to play as a society of fully-animated sentient bananas.
Peeled or unpeeled, these potassium-rich conquerors won’t rest until a yellow curtain has fallen over the galaxy.
I’ve always said that hyper-intelligent AI overlord is the only way for humanity to grow past its primitive monkey nature – but I sure didn’t mean this specific AI.
GLaDOS is the maniacal and seemingly omnipotent overseer of Aperture Science labs in the Portal universe. She was designed to help the facilities run smoothly and supercharge Aperture’s productivity, but she ended up supercharging the staff’s lungs with a potent neurotoxin.
You’ll want this sassy advisor for any society that values technological advancement above all else.
If experimenting on sentient species and reconfiguring their DNA to turn them into brutally efficient conquering armies is an everyday thing in your empire, GLaDOS is a match made in hell.
If there’s one thing I learned from a childhood of Call of Duty, The Mythbusters, and access to pyrotechnics without adult supervision, it’s that explosions are cool as hell.
You’d expect that massive explosions in space fueled by futuristic nuclear reactors and the like would be just as cool – but in Stellaris, they’re underwhelming.
I don’t know if it has to do with the lack of oxygen in space or something, but come on, Paradox, this is one place where you can forget the realism and just give us the flashy combat.
Epic Explosions fixes the issue by making spaceship explosions much larger and brighter – just like we like them!
Japanese anime, manga, and video games have spread the love for giant humanoid robots worldwide.
There’s even a moving 1:1 scale MS Gundam statue outside a shopping mall in Odaiba, Tokyo – and I’m sure once we figure out the technical details, we’ll have real-life giant robots fighting our wars too.
The Transformed Battleship mod takes that concept to the stars with a colossal “super-dreadnought all-purpose battleship” that can morph into a humanoid form to play catch with your enemy’s fleet like the Beast Titan in AoT.
It’ll take a while to research all the technologies.
But once you do, you’ll have the most badass fleet in the game for sure.
But why would you even need a fleet of giant robots when you can take care of things yourself?
The Origin: Living Planet mod lets you play as – you guessed it – a sentient planet-size organism based on Starlord’s father from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
In this game mode, your objective is to grow by consuming other planets with all of their buildings, leaders, and population.
The more worlds you eat, the stronger you get.
You’re basically Galactus the Devourer! What could be more fun than that?
I’m an old-school guy with a love for vintage items and an immense appreciation for the history of our species.
One way I found to bring a little bit of human history to the stellar playing field is the Terran Empire Shipset, based on the anachronistic spaceships from Disney’s 2002 film Treasure Planet.
They may be capable of interstellar flight and FTL travel, but these spaceships look exactly like the typical wooden gunships, galleons, and men-of-war that sailed the seven seas before steam engines took over.
If you’re playing a traditionalist human empire or just like to roleplay space pirates, these ships are a lot of fun.
Fans of the Tropico series will remember Penultimo – the most steadfast and loyal advisor a Caribbean banana republic dictator could hope for, and the most incompetent.
Penultimo is the perfect advisor for “democratic” interstellar states where totalitarian policies, electoral fraud, and deception are staples of the government’s inner workings.
Having your advisor address you as “El Presidente” is a real privilege – especially when they’re as much of a bootlicker as Penultimo.
Make sure you make your leader’s title “El Presidente” for extra immersion.
For the most part, the advisor is there to give the game some flavor and alert you whenever something really important happens.
Having different advisors depending on your governing ethics and current objectives is also a great way to help you feel immersed and connected with your empire – but after enough time, you might start hating their constant chattering.
My favorite alternative to this unnecessary small talk is the Microwave Advisor, which replaces every advisor comment with microwave sounds.
Once you realize playing Stellaris is around 80% waiting for stuff to happen, it’s not so different from watching your food spin around in a microwave, making this mod all the more fitting.
Speaking of household appliances that could find a second life in service of the galactic empire, consider the HP DeskJet Wireless Printer mod.
This mod introduces a fully-functional HP printer species, complete with animated portraits, HP logo flag icons, and a preset empire that can spawn in your game as a rival society.
One of my favorite parts is the new HP namelist, full of printer puns my dad would be proud of.
Captain HP 1510 of the Toner Cartridge Fleet, reporting for duty!
Easily my favorite part about populating the stars and expanding past my home planet is the possibility of filling every inch of empire space with awesome megastructures.
Dyson Spheres and Orbital Habitats are just the beginning!
With the Gigastructural Engineering mod, you’ll be able to construct some of the most absurd and overpowered projects ever conceived by humankind.
Some of my favorites include the Alderson Disc – which creates a massive system-size plate your pops can live and work on – and Weaponized Celestial Bodies like an Attack Moon.
Back when Avengers: Infinity War came out, the validity of Thanos’ plan to snap half of all living organisms out of existence was a topic of heated debate among moviegoers.
What would you have done if you had such immense power?
Zero’s Infinity Stones mod gives you a chance to find out by introducing every Infinity Stone featured in the MCU as a functional relic in Stellaris – in addition to the Infinity Gauntlet.
Each of them holds immense powers based on their effects on the movies.
For example, the Soul Stone will let you create a powerful leader from the combined souls of your best citizens.
Things will really heat up if you actually gather all six stones and the gauntlet.
Will you end universal hunger? Snuff out half the galaxy’s population? Destroy the stones so nobody may use them for evil?
Nelson Chitty is a Venezuelan expat living in Argentina. He’s a writer and translator passionate about history and foreign cultures. His ideal weekend is spent between leisurely playing games of Civilization VI and looking for the next seinen anime to marathon.
