[starbug]

i was wondering does anyone have this game? I think it looks good, but i am not sure wether to buy it, because i have not seen any reviews for it since i live in the uk and from what i can gather there is no publisher for europe so i was wanting to know what you guys think it, if any of you have it? is worth me paying for the download?

[Rictor]

Ditto. I really want to play a demo. Usually, I'm hopelessly out of my depth when it comes to strategy games, especially 4X ones, but something about Sins makes it look appealing.

AFAIK, a demo is supposed to be released about a month after the game ships, which would mean within the next few weeks.

[NGTM-1R]

I'm told the manual is 90 pages long, which could be either a good or a really, really goddamn bad sign.

[Ashrak]

oh god, so many buttons hurt my head ....

[Prophet]

I tried it. The gameplay is ok I guess. It has some nice ideas. Like a very SupCom like view of the galaxy. You can zoom with the wheel all the way out and in. The graphics are okay. Not incredibly heavy, which I like.

Unfortunatley the universe, races and stuff stays a bit distant. There isn't any campaign as far as I can tell, just scanerios. That wasn't so bad in SOTS, but Sins doesn't have any kickass lore anywhere AFAIK. At least not as interesting as SOTS had.

Also there is a big emphasis on pirates. You can put bounty on other players and the pirates periodically go after the biggest bounty. With a fleet that depends on the bounty. And there is a counter that tells when the next attack happens. Thus you have to wait until the last second and spam the bounty button more than the other player, to send a huge pirate fleet at him. And meanwhile attack the other side of his empire. The computer knows this too, and IMO it's annoying.


Gameplay is decent overall. There are good ideas there. Unfortunatley that's pretty much it. I recommend you try it out somewhere/somehow before spending any money on it. Though you might want to support the non-bloomFPScrap industry even if you don't fall in love with it.

[starbug]

cheers guys, i'll wait for the demo and try it out, i've just seen a whole load of brillant looking mods for it already, ie star wars, games workshop Battlefleet Gothic, which is problably the only reason i would go for it .

[Ghostavo]

I've just tried it and I have to say it's awesome. It's like Homeworld and Supreme Commander had a bastard child.

The only thing I don't like is the pirate thing Prophet wrote about. The bounty thing is annoying and unnecessary, but it's passable if you are a fortress type base defender like me.

[Gloc]

This game eats time like nothing else I've played. I'm still trying to figure everything out, with this being the first 4Xish game I've played, but goodness, it's fun. I think I've sunk almost twelve hours in already, and I've only played one faction of the three.

And yeah, the pirate thing is kinda so-so, but so far I've just been using them to level up my cap ships at the point of invasion. Granted, this is on easy, so I figure that tactic may not be quite as viable as I move up.

[Singh]

Its a good game, that much is for certain. Its sorta like a cross between supreme commander and Galactic Civ II rather than Homeworld. I've been having fun with it, if nothing else - would love to play online with someone tho

[NGTM-1R]

Sins is essentially a crappy SupCom clone with some bits of O.R.B. and a few not-really-original ideas tacked on. It doesn't really have anything going for it, IMO. The gameplay's not that great and is actually quite deceptive about its depth (it doesn't have any), the graphics aren't that stunning (Unless you're playing Advent, you'll see more pretties playing a game of Homeworld 1), no single-player campaign, and it feels consolized. The lack of customizeablity is particularly annoying; even Mo0 gave you more control over the ships you were building than than this, and there are just not that many of them when you get right down to it, all of them serving very strictly defined roles outside which they are hopeless.

In the words of my brother reguarding a different game "It's like they took all that was good and holy in the genre, put it in a blender, and set it on puree." Sins could have been good, really it could, but it's not, and there's very little left from that time.

[Dough with Fish]

Don't listen to ngtm1r.

For starters, the 'default' graphic settings blow. Reason for that, the game is meant to run on low-end rigs. If you've got the horsepower, crank that baby up to max. The ships are extremely detailed on max. How does this game feel consolized, by the way? Everything from the empire tree, the tech trees, down to how you group your fleets and manage the abilities screams PC. Yes, it's streamlined, and not as in-depth as something like GalCiv2, but the way they refined everything down is amazing. Each of the three sides play different from each other. The TEC are balanced, you're cliche starter race. The Advent sway more towards culture and special abilities, instead of a vast economy and massive fleets. And the Vassari are you're standard marauding space baddies. Their ships are big and powerful, but their culture abilities suck. As for ships having defined roles, well.. ever heard of combined fleets? Theres a reason for the light frigates to be fast, the siege frigates to be useless in space combat, and for capital ships to be literal wrecking balls.

As for the whole customizable deal, the developers tried this. As a matter of fact, it made it very late into development. They scrapped it because it wasn't conductive to the game. They found players being overwhelmed by the options, and spending too much time just making wacky ass ships instead of teching up, expanding their empire, or what have you. They, however, might bring that function back in an update down the road if they can get it to work right.

I'm not trying to be an apologist here, by any means. I want a ****ing singleplayer campaign. The scenarios and multiplayer are fun, but only for a little while. And I am sick to death of the damned pirate bull****, especially against the AI. With other players, it's a fun kind of ebay sniping but thats about it. And the midgame sucks, once you secure a few planets and have a fleet that can secure your boarders and not much else, and all you have to do is tech up, things move a little slow.

[Polpolion]

capital ships to be literal wrecking balls.

Is there really such a ship?

[NGTM-1R]

For starters, the 'default' graphic settings blow.

Oh come now, those are actually the "high" settings, did you know? There's only one above them, and I'm playing at it. (Of course, it only offers one choice of widescreen resolution.) Or maybe my card's better. You could make the argument that the graphics don't actually matter that much, since like SupCom you'll be zoomed out so much of the time you just don't see them, but Sins shot itself in the foot that way because units get stacked 3D style and you have to zoom to make sure you get the right target. Or while placing structures. Or while bushwhacking the somewhat laughable AI. (They invariably go for any group of ships they think they can beat, no matter what's next door, so it's easy to lure them to a point you jump in on top of them and then drop the hammer on a couple capital ships before the AI scampers off. Have to zoom to get the best targets...)

Yes, it's streamlined, and not as in-depth as something like GalCiv2, but the way they refined everything down is amazing. Each of the three sides play different from each other. The TEC are balanced, you're cliche starter race. The Advent sway more towards culture and special abilities, instead of a vast economy and massive fleets. And the Vassari are you're standard marauding space baddies. Their ships are big and powerful, but their culture abilities suck. As for ships having defined roles, well.. ever heard of combined fleets? Theres a reason for the light frigates to be fast, the siege frigates to be useless in space combat, and for capital ships to be literal wrecking balls.

The list of achievements doesn't inspire confidence, and the very simple rock-paper-scissors play is less than intelligent. Sins is actually much worse than SupCom in the regard of being unable to finesse things. Problems you couldn't solve with four or five T3 artillery and a few SCUs, properly employed, were very rare. In Sins, you have to solve your problems with brute force, every time. There's simply no other way. A mob of heavy frigates or heavy cruisers is usually the best response to any situation. Capital ships are really only useful because some of them have passive special abilities that help, and they can bombard planets while still surviving a fight. The lack of antifighter armament on most ships might be laughable, except for how simple it is to nuke the carriers and watch the fighters run out of gas. Fighters themselves are almost useless. Only bombers really serve a purpose, and, once again, only in large numbers.

Interestingly, my read was a lot different. The Advent come off as most powerful in direct combat; some of the firepower ratings for their ships when upgraded are insane. (They're also the only people who can dodge the fleet cap, since the Rapture has a "swipe frigate" ability.) The TEC are more development-oriented. And the Vasari are just unlucky bastards who don't really do anything well.

[Ashrak]

i didnt get the "oh i wana play this" feeling in the first half hour, so its not worth it imo.

[starbug]

well i ended up on getting the game, and so far i am enjoying it, plus not that bad for £20. should keep me going until DOW SS and starcraft 2 come out.

[Ashrak]

the fleet battles are fun, as much fun as fleet battles in eve ...... (and no its not a compliment!)


maneuvering == useless, so ships just stand there
and randomly shoot eachother BOOOORIIIING lets get some motion shall we



its a building game apparently on of the "lalala im mining roid" and then when someone decides to come shoot you you ban that person from the server, cuz no shooting is allowed just tedious boring building,


anyway Blah

no story = ****
crappy graphics, eve Hegemonia looks better and thats a game from i dont know how long ago, also Imperium Galactica 2 whoops this games butt, in every sence, including the building one.
n


but since im a nice person, ill try it one more time, and try to play it for a few hours, unless im utterly bored to tears, ill write something else bout it, sofar i am unimpressed.

[TrashMan]

One word:

SOTS...it beats every other game like that. SOASE can't touch it. Nuff said!

[BloodEagle]

*snip*

*snip*

Graphics does not a game make! 

[Ashrak]

for a game with NO story, graphics is everything.

[BloodEagle]

 

Remember the NES? 

Gameplay trumps everything, then audio, then story, then graphics.