Imho, that was the charm of Orion 1 - it was flawed about it of course, but the basic ideas that
1) You didn't have to manage individual buildings, they were just priority bars on planets...
2) Ships of the same class stacked.
meant that scaling up the empire wasn't the kind of tedious nightmare we see in more civ-style 4X games. Sadly Moo2, while a superior and more polished game than Moo1, moved away from this innovation into more conventional construciton and ship management.
This is why I couldn't get into a game like Stellaris.
Way too many mechanics that seem complex on the surface, but as far as game impact are actually irrelevant, so it feels like busywork. As opposed to MOO, where 1 slider early game can change the outcome of the entire game.
1) You didn't have to manage individual buildings, they were just priority bars on planets...
2) Ships of the same class stacked.
meant that scaling up the empire wasn't the kind of tedious nightmare we see in more civ-style 4X games. Sadly Moo2, while a superior and more polished game than Moo1, moved away from this innovation into more conventional construciton and ship management.