I still dislike the star map in SOTS....

I can't see why... I think it is the best star map so far. Rotatable, zoomable, measurable distances... The only drawback is somewhat confusing navigation when you have a large number of stars. And even that is about to change with the 3D political view.

I play it and love it. I bought and installed the expansion but... I have been too busy to try it out. I love the tactical combat aspect, and the design choices for building your ships. The combinations of sections and the ability to choose which weapons to carry gives you real potential for making a difference just through designing your ships.

Oh, and the fact that there's an option to auto-resolve combat if you don't feel like doing it in real-time. Llovely.

Oh yea, and FINALLY a game with a full-3D starmap.

Give a man a 2D map and he'll complain about lack of depth. Give a man a 3D map and he'll complain that it's "too complicated"

In any case, SotS' biggest advantage is being streamlined where it counts - at the empire management. The fun parts (researching stuff, designing your ships, combat) are the deepest of the game, while the things that are boring for the majority (taxes, politics, etc.) are abstracted into neat and easy to use sliders. I'm the General and Supreme Commander of the race, not an accountant.

I loved the 3d starmap, and I actually thought dealing with obsolete ships was one of the cooler parts of the game. It added a huge amount of strategy in when to roll out a new ship class and how to best utilize the older ones.

The guys at KP are also really good about updating the game and talking on the forums.

Unfortunately, my game disc is someplace very far away, so I haven't been able to play in quite some time. Still, I'll probably pick up a copy of Born of Blood sooner or later.

Two other quick points

If you were having severe performance problems, you may have bought it from direct-to-drive. They put some ridiculous copy-protection on the game that slowed it to a crawl. My retail copy ran fine. (That disaster is one of the reasons I'm starting to love Stardock)

Secondly, some of you who didn't like the demo were probably put off by the horrible destroyer stalemate it could turn into. There is a newer version out that allows you to build some early cruisers, which goes a long way towards making the game end. Still, I think the main problem for most people was the lack of a tutorial. If you had been hanging around the forums for a while it was ok, but I don't know how many posts I saw where new guys didn't realize they needed to build command and control ships if they didn't want to be horribly outnumbered.

I must say I discounted it at first but decided to give it a try after reading some of the comments here and I must say it has that addictive feel to it and is sublimely complex. So much so that it all may be lost on everyday average players. Right now I would say I hold it in about the same regard as GC. I still have some issues with it but they are matters of preference and not game play and the same for GC. Now about Sins...

Well, I'm glad to say StrategyCore is doing a review of the expansion (Born of Blood) as well.

Again, SC's SotS review; http://www.strategycore.co.uk/pg/sotsreview

I'm hoping we'll also get Sins review - it would be great to review a real-time empire builder as a contrast to turn-based one.

Hi,

I'm playing Sots for one year now and I love it play it every weekend. But its different then Sins of a Solar empire. SoaSE is more like homeworld of Imperium Galactica 2, while Sots is more like master of orion, ascendancy or such games. I think you cant really compare these two games

I'm a devoted Hiver player, though I do play the other races, most commonly humans. Current game's getting a bit dull, just me and a liir faction left. Chances of an NAP, let alone an alliance, are slim, so it's just going to be a hard slog for his worlds by my siege dreads.

I'm mostly a MP on this game with me and a core group. I'm also the devoted Hiver. I dunno why, just the thought of being able to have 3 or 4 defence fleets within my web that can mop up any incoming fleets along with my wave of ramscooped gates as scouts is great. Yeah, it might slow me down in the long run as this particular tactic only works in the begining land grab, but it's just an interesting thought that these problem worlds get sucked into this intricate web then pounced upon by a mop up fleet with a couple gate ships shortly behind.

It's really too bad that the transport technologies of the different races can't be intermixed. Even after you start collecting pieces from your fallen foes. Imagin gate ships with stutter drives.

I had it. what I really disliked ís that when I controlled a battle my ships refused to shoot, which was quite annoying...

That should only happen on first encounters, but there's a button you can push to clear your ships to fire.

ah lol OK thanks I better reinstall. but gotta play SINS first

all i can say is that if i had a choice between Sword of the Stars and Starcraft, i'd play starcraft.
basically its a really crappy rushed version of sins, dont get it, trust me, not worth the time to complain about how low end it was.
stick with playing sins

Wow, I am shocked that so many of you disliked Sword of the Stars. And many have complained about the galactic map? well the spiral galaxy map is fairly flat, and there is a 2d map also that is totally flat

There are some things i do like way better in Sins, like experience for capitol ships, and the sidebar management system.. those are great.

But planetary defense is sooo much better in SotS, defense satelites that rotate around the planets and can actually kill enemy ships is a real plus in my book, defense structures in Sins just sit there and are useless. imo

And SotS is only turn based for movement and research, building etc.. all battles are Real Time (although they do have a time limit, that can be changed).

I am not against either game, i like them both for what they are, but Sword of the Stars is also a great game, if you give it time. The games are much longer to play, so I play them more solo or Lan with a friend. And Sword of the Stars Collector's Edition (includes soundtrack, expansion pack Born of Blood, and more) I picked up at Circuit City for $25.00, not bad at all.

They also have a patch to be able to play the collector's edition vs. the regular edition if you need to.

If you guys only played the Demo then you really don't know much about Sword of the Stars, try the full game cause it is pretty fun

just my 2 cents, not trying to take anything away from Sins, I have it too and like them both.

Just wish some dev would put all the best together in one awesome game.

Sword of the Stars has great random tech tree and research. Great satelite defenses for planets, different travel types for each race.

Star Wars Empire at war had great Space Stations, planet structures and ground battles (that could have been better)

Hedgemonia had nice espionage/spy craft etc.

Conquest: Frontier Wars had very cool Hero Units that could be assigned to ships, and nice wormholes to different systems. (would be cool for Sins to have wormholes to different systems instead of using the suns)

Homeworld had great motherships, and figher craft, good formations for all ships as well.

would be nice to finally have a game that would put things like those into one great game..

I played it and actually like it.

I think the main draw of the game is its combat orientation reminds me of Nexus: Jupiter Incident which I still hold as having the best space combat gameplay.