Sins of a Solar Empire

[Guynemer]

Anyone play this? Came out in 2008, I've heard good things... how would fellow Polytubbies describe it?

[Felch]

It's fun. It's got the play style of an RTS with the game length of a 4X. You can fight across huge maps from planet to planet, and from star system to star system. There's a diplomacy aspect which is enhanced by the Diplomacy expansion pack, so it's a bit deeper than your Starcraft or Red Alert type games. The only problem is that it is a gigantic time suck, just like Civ.

[Guynemer]

So, recommended for the low low price of $30?

[Felch]

If it includes both expansions, then yeah, definitely.

[Spaced Cowboy]

This game is awesome, you will not be disappointed. It is a timesink, but when I'm stuck in Shanghai/China with nothing but my lappy.

I'm going to get the expansions before I go back.

[Boris Godunov]

Guy, you said in the other thread the game wasn't really doing it for you. Care to post a full report? I've been looking at this game myself.

[Gibsie]

I also request moar plz

[Guynemer]

It's not a bad game, by any measure. But it seems like a typical RTS space game, including space being abstracted into 2D with "space lanes", so what's the point, really, of it being set in space at all?

There are only three factions, but everything seems samey-samey, just different names. It doesn't appear to have much strategic depth in SP, and I'm loathe to attempt MP, never knowing what dark corner of the intertubes your opponents may come from.

[Gibsie]

Well I got a cheap copy of it, not especially impressed though. Interface is very Starcrafty, maps are really bad as they are spacy, the zooming doesn’t work right and it’s often quite hard to get a good perspective of what’s going on. In some respects it reminds me of Elite 2 in that way- except in that game you would pause time before spinning the camera around to get a lock on your enemies or find the celestial body you were looking for. As noted the space setting seems poorly realised, with planets not orbiting their stars or moving and entirely 2D basically. I think that would have been a really cool feature, if you would plan your attacks for when planets are closest, and space lanes changing to match, instead of being really static. Not quite got the hang of it, and does it really not have any story mode? Seems like many wasted opportunities.