Stellaris: Console Edition - Expansion Pass One (DLC)

I have logged more hours in Stellaris than I care to admit to my family, and Expansion Pass One is the bundle I would have told myself to buy on day one of the console version. It collects three pieces of DLC - the Plantoids Species Pack, the Leviathans Story Pack, and the Utopia expansion - and the gap in quality and depth between base Stellaris and Utopia-enabled Stellaris is wide enough to fly a Colossus through. Let me start with what actually moves the needle. Utopia is the headliner and it earns that billing. It introduces Ascension Perks, the system that lets you commit your empire to a philosophical and biological destiny: go full synthetic, transcend into a psionic consciousness, or pursue biological perfection through genetic modification. These are not cosmetic choices. Each path reshapes how you build your mid-to-late game, which traditions you prioritise, and how your pops interact with their environment. Megastructures also unlock here, including Habitats that let you settle previously uninhabitable systems and the Ringworld that sits at the top of every long-game wish list. Without Utopia, the late-game stretch that keeps most strategy players coming back is largely absent. That is not a small omission. Leviathans is the second-most valuable piece. It scatters powerful neutral entities - the titular space giants - across the galaxy, each guarding rare resources or story outcomes. It adds the Enclaves, which are independent factions you can trade with or cultivate relationships with for bonuses, and the Curator Order in particular is useful early for surveying anomalies. The strategic texture these additions create is real: early-game decisions around whether to provoke or avoid a Leviathan near a resource-rich system become genuinely interesting calculations. Plantoids, by contrast, is purely cosmetic - new plant-based portraits and ship sets. Nice to have, zero mechanical impact. Bundle padding, but honest padding at that. On the console port itself: the controller interface holds up better than you might expect for a game of this complexity. The radial menus and contextual button layouts do most of the heavy lifting, and anyone willing to spend two or three sessions with the tutorial will find that the learning curve is steep but not hostile. The bigger concern for buyers considering this pass today is version parity. The Console Edition has historically trailed the PC release in patch content, and while Paradox has kept updating it through multiple expansion passes, newer passes (up to Expansion Pass Six at time of writing) bring features that interact with Utopia systems in ways that deepen them further. Expansion Pass One is the foundation layer. It is not the full building, but the building does not stand without it. The verdict on value hinges entirely on how serious you are about the base game. If you have put in thirty-plus hours and feel like the late game lacks direction, that is Utopia-shaped hole you are feeling. If you are brand new and wondering whether to buy the base game at all, the answer is: buy it, then buy this pass, in that order, before you develop any habits the expansions would have changed.

Diego · Scout Team

Strategy & simulation

Be the first to comment on Stellaris: Console Edition - Expansion Pass One (DLC).