Sins of a Solar Empire

[ThunderTitan]

Anyone play this yet? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sins_of_a_Solar_Empire

I heard it's pretty good... but right now i don't have any room on my PC... is it worth makeing more room?

[AngelEyes]

This looks really interesting. I always loved the 4x games (MoO1 is still the definitive 4x game to me!) and this looks really good. I'm kinda curious as to how exactly they blend in the RTS elements. Do you know if a demo is available?

[MistWeaver]

What I didnt like about this game, is that you need to handle too much stuff for a RTS-type gameplay (science, diplomacy, warfare, economy, production and construction - all like in most 4x TBS)
Generaly, its like playing starcraft with ~20 bases all over the map, and huge science tree.

Thats my impression on beta, however, and Im still going to try release.

[groovyash]

I've been playing this game almost every free moment since its release. Although its in real time, I've never felt rushed in my planning, empire building, research or combat. "Stately pacing" has been mentioned often by reviewers.

This game has a great deal of polish and amazing support by the devs/publishers so far. If you check review roundups like Metacritic, its getting about 9/10 on average. The major "negative" is that it has no regular single player campaign, but each of the included maps can take several hours to complete, and I haven't gotten to the truly huge maps yet. So far I haven't really missed a campaign, which is saying something for me, since I seem to be one of the few who spends most of my time with any given game finishing up the storyline.

In short then, this is one of the most addictive titles I've played in some time, so give it a whirl, I hope you like it as much as I have.

[ThunderTitan]

Seen a few vids... looks pretty good.

[Avonu]

Demo has arrived:

Gamespot

Unfortunately it has only... about 2h playable time
But it is very, very good game (at least to me) - AI can be challanging even of easy level, diplomacy is good (you can have mission from another faction, ex. to destroy specify number of (their) enemy ships/space buildings), you have piracy (Do you have enough money for bounty? If not except soon visit from them), your capital ship gain exp in battle (you can have 8 or 9 of it - but only first is for free, reaserch for next are expecive) and of course, you can conquer enemies by cultural influence, not just by war (like in GalCiv2).

One minus (there maybe more but I didn't see them for now) - battles are in 2D (not like Homeworld) and they lack of tactics (just select target, use ships' special weapons and that all).

If you liked GalCiv or MOO then SoSE is for you.

And one more thing:

[Pol]

by cultural influence, not just by war (like in GalCiv2).

and GalCiv(1). Which was having more options than GC2 on that field. (heard never played GC2)

[Avonu]

Well, I have MOO1-3 and GalCiv1-2 (without expansions ) and I can tell you one - in GalCiv 2 you also have Death... sorry Terror Star.
GalCiv2+expansions have all and even more than GalCiv 1 (at least that what I heard/read - and I read much about GalCiv2 expansions).

[ThunderTitan]

Did they implement a campaign yet?! Coz i don't have the patience to learn playing without a story...

[Infiltrator]

I liked homeworld very much.. is this anything like it? I haven't played any 4x games before.

[ThunderTitan]

It's like Homeworld when it comes to the fights... the building stuff is what i need to learn more about...

[Infiltrator]

Well there is a demo out..

[groovyash]

Try the demo. 90 minute per game time limit, but should give you the gist of the gameplay. The game may not appeal to all, but see for yourself. Also, as I noted above, the dev's are a small gang, and keep up a surprising presence on the forum.

They are also commited to frequent updates, patching, and feature additions, which many (myself included) feel is almost worth purchasing the game to promote.

Oh, and they firmly believe in copy protection free software (they posted a big blog on why they think this is the right thing to do.)

PS You actually can use some 3D move orders, though they are mostly not too useful, and as for tactics/strategy, check out their appropriate forums, I've learned a surprising amount I wouldn't have noticed on my own.

[ThunderTitan]

No effing way:

Oh, and they firmly believe in copy protection free software (they posted a big blog on why they think this is the right thing to do.)

http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/po ... tid=303512

And i think they also had: "Customers aren't criminals" on the games box... but i can't find any pics.

[Avonu]

And i think they also had: "Customers aren't criminals" on the games box... but i can't find any pics.

Maybe you should sometimes read earlier post - especially these with pictures?
IIRC Stardock politicy is use no copy protection software but rather frequent patching and updating system - so it isn't "new feature".

BTW - demo have a PDF manual within - I don't remeber if any other demo had something like that.

[ThunderTitan]

Ups... that will teach me to cheat on you guys with other forums...

[Ethric]

Bought this on impulse now, with a couple expansions, for not much money. Anyone played it lately, is the complete game good?

[Banedon]

Played this game (vanilla, no expansions), it's pretty decent. It's a nice mix between RTS and 4x, sufficiently so that although the game is undoubtedly a RTS, it's also slow enough that you can micromanage your empire pretty easily. Units take a long time to die for example, even under overwhelming firepower. Plenty of time to manoeuvre them to escape. Still, balancing this is that units also take a long time to turn and flee, so although you don't have to worry about reflexes to save a unit, you do have a time window to do it. Units take a long time to produce and an even longer time to ship to the front lines, so watch out.

Beyond that, it's a pretty standard RTS. You build research labs, build mines, send out colonizers, climb the TeCH tree, etc. There're fleet supply caps in place that serves as a production limit, as well as caps for capital ship numbers. Both can be upgraded, but get increasingly expensive.

There are 3 factions in the game - the Vasari, TEC and Advent. All three have (as you would expect) different units, TeCHs, playstyles, etc. The TEC farms money really fast compared to the other two, but their military gets weak fast once the higher-level units come into play. Vasari focuses on military with the very powerful Phase Missile TeCH, something that allows their weapons to directly damage the hull of a ship, bypassing shields. Advent has their own style and synergy. It gets powerful TeCHs late-game with outstanding synergy, but getting there is difficult.

You get to deal with pirates and treaties etc in the game, but I find both pretty silly. With pirates, every now and then there's a bidding war to see who gets attacked by pirates. Depending on map, it can be completely crippling to get hit by them ... or it can simply provide experience to your opponent's capital ships. They can be destroyed on the map, but their defenses are so strong they might as well be called a new faction than pirates. Pretty silly option if you ask me, but then again you can turn pirates off. Treaties ... every now and then another faction might ask you to do something for some resources etc. But I generally don't have time to do them, and sooner or later everyone hates me. Sigh.

There are two big problems with the game (imo). The first is that there's no single-player campaign. So pretty soon all you have to do in single-player is fight the AI. The AI is reasonable but nothing too impressive; they can be tempted to suicide into your Phase Jump Inhibitor-defended planets, for example. My brothers and I have won 2v4 against the AI actually, even on hardest setting, but the games were hard-fought, especially given the territorial advantages we were forced to concede the AI. It's fun, but the games take a long time to conclude. We played against each other a few times as well, but those got too stressful too fast.

The other big problem is game balance. Vasari is far and away the most powerful race right now, and Advent far and away the weakest. It's been that way for months, and it doesn't look like it will change. There's nothing that can be done except live with what the developers have given you, unfortunately.

I think overall Sins is worth playing, but you're not likely to be absorbed in it for long.

EDIT: O_o there's been a Sins update in March. Neat. I take back what I said about game balance (for now, at least).

[Ethric]

Nice summary

Yeah what I bought was called Trinity, so all two expansions and all updates (don't know how interoperativity between expansions work, but choosing chapters does at least change the starting video). I assume some of your complaints are addressed, and that all features from the expansions are present, anything else would be silly.

I've played through the tutorials, seems straightforward enough. But starting a new game, I hit a snag. I start at a planet around a sun, and then there is one celestial object furth in, and one on each side. The ones to the sides were one planet and one asteroid... in the same orbit as my starting planet That's not right! Do the RMG just place stuff willi-nilly with no regard to physics?