HonestGamers.com gave Entrenchment 10/10.

I hope I don't come across as arrogant or anything when I write this review, but after playing Sins of a Solar Empire and Entrenchment in light of my experience as a gamer, I think it warrants one.

A month and a couple of weeks ago, after my last undergraduate exam, I decided to reward myself with a new computer game. Usually, I'd go for FPS or RTS, and mostly FPS, but there weren't any good FPS's on the market. I came across Sins of a Solar Empire on the store shelf. From the reviews I read, it had multiple game of the year awards (woot!) and was also... different than most of the other RTS's I play (Red Alert 3, Dawn of War, Rise of Nations...). It wasn't in battlefields or across planets, but in SPACE, and judging by the scale, it looked really deep. So I decided to buy it, thinking I could get into it.

I was right. Out of all RTS's I've played, Sins was probably the most immersive, most engaging, most challenging, most beautiful RTS I have ever laid my eyes on. I loved the depth of the units, the tactical, strategic, and LOGISTIC (!) approaches to victory: formations, defenses, culture, diplomacy... the works! I really feel like I'm in control of a (sinful and lustful) empire, and everything from the size of my fleets, the scale and epicness of battle. is just mind-blowing. The research trees really made you think about what you need and what you don't, and trying out new tactics and strategies is always fun. Add to that the diversity of units and their abilities, the pros/cons of each faction, and their unique research trees, and you've got a game with a real lasting appeal and depth to it. I'm really surprised that this game only took just under 2 gigs of hard-drive space. I guess I pretty much agree with Nicodaemos's review above.

Of course, this game isn't without its flaws. The lore wasn't as in-depth as I hoped it to be, although the game itself and the unit descriptions shed some light on it, but the lack of a detailed storyline kinda detracted from the immersiveness of the universe. I don't know if that really matters, though: through playing the game, you kinda shape the destinies of the factions you play in many different scenarios. Moreover, some of the sound effects sound really cheesy, particularly the sound effects of the autocannons and laser batteries of the TEC, as well as some of the voice-overs of Advent and Vasari ships. That didn't really matter much since in most of the battles, you'd hear more than just autocannons and lasers (pew pew... I was more expecting PEW PEW!). Third... the way some maps are shaped... but I guess that's just the whiny perfectionist in me.

The advantages clearly trump the flaws, and I just love this game... probably the best RTS if not video game I've ever played. Can't wait till the next micro-expansions are released!

Thanks Saracen, we hope to keep you guys Sinning for awhile yet! Glad you enjoyed the first bit!

No, THANK YOU, Mr. Fraser, for such an awesome game!

my review!

Awsome! just finished a match and looked at the total time played on that "map" 11 hours and 46 minutes.

Not bad ^^

At first i was a bit meh, and had major issues with the game, in form of getting ganked by pirates joining forces with my AI enemy.

But after reading several good forum posts i got back ingame and went from a blockade on my small empire to a standoff  where i totaly dezimated the enemy fleet and could start taking over the system with no real counter attacks (they fleed from my fleet).

Great game! im so not regreting my purpcase!

ps: yes my grammar stink.

Here's something I posted at another site:

An online multiplayer game typically goes for 1-2 hours with most going 1:15-1:30. It's possible that an epic game with balanced teams could last a little longer than 2 hours, but you probably wouldn't mind since those tend to be great games.

It doesn't take as long to play a 4v4 and 5v5 (locked teams) as what people think because you are only really responsible for taking down one opponent (not nine as in a 1v9 locked free for all in single player). Also, once the losing team sees the writing on the wall, the losing players call it "gg" and start quitting or surrendering so the winning team doesn't have to do a boring mop-up job and so that a new game can be formed. Also, these games are generally played on single star maps at Fast/Fastest speed and using Quickstart, which really shaves time off the length of games.

It would take a couple weeks to learn the game's mechanics and the three different races, their abilities, strengths, and weaknesses, and their tech trees with a basic level of proficiency. After that you would have to learn how to play against human opponents. It has a learning curve, but that's what's so great about it--it has a very deep and intricate strategy and is always challenging (to play against other people).

The online player counts are not great and Starcraft 2 took a bite out of them, but the game has a small core of dedicated players who love it. The 4v4 and 5v5 games are played on the Diplomacy expansion but you have a better chance of finding newer players on the original ("vanilla") Sins. There were enough players on the Diplomacy expansion yesterday (Saturday) to fill several 5v5 games.

There's nothing else out there like Sins. I love the game because Sins is all about strategy and is not a clickfest. In Starcraft you might focus on building as many supply depots, SCVs, Barracks, Factories, Bunkers, Marines, and Tanks as fast as you can click and even that's not quick enough. Your thought process might be, "Need to click faster, must get more Firebats." In Sins you have far less clicky micromanagement and instead you spend your time thinking about the strategy:

• Should I research something?
• Do I need more ships?
• What kind of ships?
• What should I colonize next? Is there a choke point between me and my opponent that is top priority? Can I colonize something that would cut off my opponent's expansion? Would it instead make more sense to spend the money that would be used to colonize new planets to instead build a larger fleet and surprise my opponent while he's spending money on colonizing?
• What enemy ships should I kill first?
• Should I build more labs so that I can do more research?
• What kind of research should I do (large and varied tech trees)?
• Should I build defenses?
• Where should I place the structures?
• Is my opponent vulnerable anywhere?
• Should I attack?
• What structures should I knock down first?
• Am I vulnerable?
• Where is my opponent's fleet, how big is it, and what kinds of ships are in it anyway?
• Does one of my allies need help?
• Should I feed him some credits or resources?
• Should I build one of my starbases (Entrenchment/Diplomacy expansions) at his home planet to help him survive an opponent's upcoming onslaught?
• Do I need to research and build culture broadcast centers? Is it worth the money to increase my monetary and resource income by 10 percent and make it harder for my opponent to fight and colonize my planets? Is my opponent's culture spreading to my worlds and damaging my income? Am I in any danger of getting "culture bombed"? Can I hurt my opponent with my own culture?
• Should I scout my opponent's gravity well before I jump?
• I started out between allies, should I build a huge economy and feed my allies who are fighting on the flanks or should I make my own large fleet and join in on a second front? Should I attack the opposing "eco" player across the middle? Should I have both eco and a fleet?
• I started out in a "suicide" spot with two opponents on each side and I know they have nothing to do but focus on killing me. Should I build a starbase and other defenses and try to hole up here (and be a huge pain-in-the-ass so that they cannot focus on building their economies) or should I focus all of my efforts on trying to colonize stuff in the middle and migrating to a new home planet in a safer location? Can I expect a feed of credits and resources from my allies? Should I request that or would that money and resources be better spent on a fighting flank? What can I do to consume these guys' attention and buy time for my allies to win the other battles? What if I can survive here, build up a large and threatening fleet and then attack one of my opponents once they think I'm "contained"? (You can almost single-handedly win the game for your team if you do this right; I've seen it happen)
• I have a small fleet near an opponent's undefended planet. Should I jump in right now and surprise him and do a little damage before his large fleet (which is three jumps away) can get there, or should I wait and make enough siege frigates to actually knock down the planet before he can bring forces to defend it?

There are also fleet management and combat tactics. It is necessary to do micromanagement, but the micromanagement is primarily of a combat tactics nature and it isn't too bad at all. You can control as many ships as you want with a single numerical keybind and issue the same order to multiple ships (all fire on this target). It's also very easy to cycle through individual ships. The micromanagement thought process might look like this:

• When I go to attack my opponent, on which side of the (connecting) phase lane do I want to jump my fleet and how far off to the side? Is there some sort of a structure I might want to avoid (enemy starbase--Entrenchment and Diplomacy expansions)?
• What does my opponent's fleet look like? Does he have any support ships (Subverters) with abilities that can paralyze my fleet? Is his fleet a counter to my fleet or does my fleet counter his fleet? Can I win this battle?
• Where should I move my ships?
• Do I need to retreat my capital ship(s)?
• Should I focus fire everything on my opponents capital ship?
• Should I use one of my capital ship's abilities?
• Should I use abilities on certain individual support frigates? (You have them all bound to a number key, you press that key selecting the frigates and then cycle through them one by one issuing orders to use a certain ability (heal one of my ships, etc.).
• In what order should my long-range frigates attack the enemy ships? (You can easily queue up a string of attack orders, ordering them to attack one ship and move on to another once it's destroyed.)
• Should I keep away from that enemy starbase or can I take it down?
• My opponent is retreating to his repair bays and defenses, can I take him or should I hold off?
• What should my strikecraft (air force--small fighters and bombers) be attacking?

That's an example of what the game is about and what your thought processes might be during a game of Sins of a Solar Empire. The strategy runs deep and it has a learning curve, but if you can stick with it and become proficient at the game, it is totally awesome and can hold your attention for a long time. It's very challenging and strategically demanding. There's nothing else out there like it. Oh, and thinking about strategy beats mindlessly clicking to build as many Terran supply depots and Marines as quickly as you can click.

Sins is an awesome, but overlooked and mostly unknown and under-appreciated game.  It's great for online multiplayer.

Hello, this is, probably, not the place to post it, but I didn't want to start a new thread

First of all, I want to say that I'm not really into the "RTS" genre. I suck at multiplayer pretty hard, so I was going for a solid SP campaing. One of my friends told me that this game is Homeworld's spiritual succesor. So I bought this Trinity package, finished the tutorial and then I was kinda confused, does this game has no Campaing? (I mean with actual plot)

I don't really enjoy sandboxy gameplay, and these scenarios are a big turn off.

nope no campaign (its a bummer for some of us yes) but be willing to give the game a chance, its worth it

oh and next time start a new thread, necroing is bad form here

.....the "first" Tuesday of the month...you mean to say.

Yes.

In the US, the election day is also on a Tuesday; the first Tuesday of the month in election season.

The reason for this is because Monday (the first Monday of the month) is the day people get their checks [from the government], specificially those on public aid of some sort.

Hence, elections will be attended and the government-needing residents can 'repay' their representatives by voting for them.

Hence, companies get a better chance of earning more since the [percentage of people 'with money' increases] after such checks have been sent out.

-.-

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GamingHUD.com

9/10

Review

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