sins-of-a-solar-empire posts

The July 4 weekend is just a few days away and it looks like some downloadable PC game sites are getting a head-start on offering deals from their library of titles. Impulse has put several of their games on sale for the holiday period including a Sins of the Solar Empire bundle (with the original space strategy game and its mini-expansion Entrenchment) for $29.99. It has also put all of the Unreal franchise games on sale for 25 percent off.


Meanwhile Strategy First has put all of their games on sale for 50 percent off at their online store. This includes their "Take No Prisoners" bundle which has a whopping 20 games. During the sale you can get the bundle for a mere $34.99. The sale lasts until July 12.

Update: GamersGate has annouced they will put one game on sale on their site every day in July for at least 50 percent off. Here is the list of games for the first week:

July 1: Buccaneer: The Pursuit of Infamy - 75 percent
July 2: X-Com Complete - 50 percent
July 3: Atlantis Collection - 50 percent
July 4: Men of War - 60 percent
July 5: Arena Wars Reloaded - 50 percent
July 6: Painkiller Universe - 50 percent
July 7: Civilization IV: Colonization - 50 percent

Ironclad Games hasn't forgotten about their 2008 space-based RTS game Sins of A Solar Empire. Today folks who own the registered versions of that game and the more recent expansion pack Entrenchment can now download and install new patches via the Impulse client from Stardock.

The patch (1.17 for the original Sins and 1.03 for Entrenchment) contain some new unit balance adjustments along with some other bug fixes and changes. Ironclad is reportedly working on the second expansion pack for Sins of a Solar Empire but so far they have declined to give any specific details other than it will deal with the diplomatic features in the game.

With fans now enjoying the first micro-expansion, Entrenchment, for Sins of a Solar Empire, many are wondering when the second of the three planned expansions for Ironclad Games' space strategy title will be released. Well you may have to wait a while. 1Up.com quotes Ironclad's co-founder Blair Fraser as saying, "I guess the only answer I can give to the second micro expansion release date is it'll be done when it's done. "

As we have previously reported the second micro-expansion (which doesn't have a title yet) will concentrate on expanding the diplomacy features in the game. However, Fraser said that in between expansions they might release some special things that "have nothing to do with patches, upgrades, or expansions". Some of that stuff was content that Ironclad cut due to issues with the ESRB ratings board. Hmmm. . . . we wonder what that could be.

It's been over a year since Sins of a Solar Empire released and successfully combined the careful planning of a 4x (eXploare, eXpland, eXploit and eXterminate) empire building game with the fast paced real-time strategy action. Its developers, Ironclad and Stardock, have been working on a multitude of game enhancements since then and the product of all that hard work comes forth in Entrenchment, the first mini-expansion for Sins.

It look a little longer that first anticipated but today developer Ironclad Games and publisher Stardock have finally released the first of three planned "micro-expansions" for their best selling 2008 space strategy game Sins of a Solar Empire. The expansion, titled, Entrenchment, is available exclusively via digital download from Stardock's Impulse service for $9.99

As we have reported before, Entrenchment is all about adding defenses to your space fleet including space mines and the building of huge star bases to protect your fleet and entire planets. The second micro-expansion is expected to add more diplomacy features to the main game while the third expansion is a secret for now.

The economic news in the real world isn't good and it looks like its going to get worse before it gets better. While corporations go bankrupt and more people lose their jobs as a result, we at Big Download have to ask ourselves, "Why don't business people take more hints by playing games?"

Yes, there are a ton of different economic models in various PC games over the years. You can manage to grow a whole city from nothing in a game. You can even grow an entire nation or even a vast space empire through the use of managing your money and available resources. Indeed the in-game activities of certain MMO games can actually be felt in the "real world." Here's a quick look at how managing your money in certain games is a good thing. Perhaps our current political and economic leaders can learn a thing or two.

Click on the image above to continue reading Money Mattters - Finances and PC games

It looks like you will have to wait just a little bit longer for the first Sins of a Solar Empire "micro-expansion" to be released. Originally the plan was to release the $9.99 download, Entrenchment, by the end of 2008, and then it got pushed back to Feb. 11.

Now publisher Stardock's have sent over word that Entrenchment has had its digital download release date pushed back yet again. The epansion for Ironclad Games' space stategy title will now be released via Stardock's Impulse service on Feb. 25. Stardock said the delay was to "allow for Ironclad's development team to incorporate feedback to date and allow for another round of beta testing."

[Via email press release]

While so many game developers and publishers are feeling budget crunches and cutting staff members, PC game publisher Stardock is actually expanding, thanks in part to tax breaks given by its home state of Michigan. The Mlive.com web site reports today that the developer of Galactic Civilizations II and publisher of Sins of a Solar Empire plans to expand its Plymouth, Michigan base with 55 new employees.

The expansion was due in part to the granting of tax breaks by the Michigan Economic Growth Authority and was actually mentioned by the state's governor, Jennifer Granholm, in her State of the State address this week. Ironically, Granholm signed a bill a few years ago that would have restricted the sales of certain games from minors in the state (that law, like all other such legislation, was thrown out in the court system as being unconstitutional).

Big Download got a chance to chat with briefly on the phone with Stardock's CEO Brad Wardell about the new deal today which will allow the company to build a second game development team. Currently Stardock has one game development team working on the fantasy strategy game Elemental: War of Magic. Yet another team is working on Stardock's non-gaming software projects. This new expansion will be to make an all new game title which Wardell told us will be a fantasy based "old school party system" RPG. Elemental: War of Magic will be completed in 2010 and then that team will move onto working on Society, a long-in-development MMO title.

Wardell said the tax breaks, which total about $900,000 over five years, will allow Stardock to update things like their Internet connection at their location. While their Impulse game download service uses servers around the world, Stardock's own Internet connection at its office uses Comcast for its ISP to upload files like new games for the service to all those servers. Wardell said the tax breaks will allow them to upgrade their ISP to a faster connection so they can upload more games to Impulse (Wardell told us they have about 100 games waiting to upload to Impulse at the moment).

The many fans of Sins of a Solar Empire have been waiting a bit longer than they thought for Ironclad Games and Stardock to release the first of three planned "micro-expansions" for the acclaimed space strategy game. Today Stardock announced that Sins of a Solar Empire: Entrenchment will finally be released via download on Stardock's Impulse service on February 11 for $9.99.

As we have previously reported, Entrenchment is all about upgrading the game's defensive units including bases that are designed to protect entire planets from attack. Ironclad plans to release two more of these micro-expansions this year. One will expand the game's diplomacy features while details on the third are being kept secret for now. In the meantime new screenshots from Entrenchment have been released and we have added them to our gallery.

We at Big Download know that you have your choice of web sites but as they say one the plane just after it lands and before it heads to the gate we appreciate you flying...er, reading with us. However we are not blind to what other media outlets are saying are the best PC games of 2008 and while we picked Left 4 Dead as our choice they certainly had different opinions.

So keeping that in mind we offer what others thought were the best PC game titles in the past 12 months:

• IGN: Sins of a Solar Empire: "Thanks to its wildly original and fresh take on RTS and its compelling gameplay that kept us up late at nights, this is our PC game of the year."
• Gamespy - Fallout 3: "Fallout 3 ended up not only being the best game of the year, but one of the finest titles of this generation."
• Gamespot - Fallout 3: "Bethesda Softworks should be credited for making Fallout 3 accessible to shooter fans and RPG diehards alike."
• Gamasutra - Fallout 3: "Creating a vast world that is a convincing representation of a dismal, post-nuclear wasteland while also being consistently compelling is no mean feat, but here it is."