Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity

I ran into the same promblem with Sins of a Solar Empire that I always run into with similar games: I lose whole days to them. What starts off inocently enough as 'I'll play an hour before bed' has at times turned into 'I've been playing for nine hours and now I have to dash to work.' Personally, I both love and hate big and detailed games. Games like Civilization IV, Oblivion and the like are so awesome to play as the experiance will always be a bit different and the freedom is incredibly intoxicating, but I never want to see the tally of the total number of hours I've played these games... I may go into shock. Anyways, on to the actual reveiw. Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity was made by Ironclad Games and published by Stardock Entertainment (of Galactic Civilizations and Demigod noteriaty). I will have to fess up though, I did what I normallly do when it comes to these types of games, I didn't ever really get around to the single player mode and headed only for the create a scenario mode. While the create a scenario mode feels a bit limited there is a map creator, which I've been meaning to play around with (just after one more match...). The basics of an RTS are all here, build some things, reasearch more things, conquer some things and build more things. Two areas that I found emensly enjoyable were the reasearch trees and the planet colonizationing (and how these two peices fit together). Those two things right there are the main things that kept me glued to the screen, especially the colonizationing (gotta catch them all you know); the ship building and the battles seemed to be just a by priduct. This isn't to say the battles aren't interesting, as the building and defending against the captial ships (big ships that level up and have and gain special abilities) will definatly keep you on your toes (the other ships are just so-so). Another really interesting aspect that caught my eye is the market. While you can mine your minerals and crystals like in any other game, you can also buy or sell them on the market, with the market reflecting your and your oponet's actions (I crashed the market an awful many times...). One aspect that I was not a fan of, though it interested me enough to keep it turned on, were the pirates who roam the starry skies. These pirates roam about, and every once in a while they will raid a player character, and who gets raided is influenced by bribes. The expansions in this set do add a bit to the game, so if you don't have the original I would recommend nabbing this pack; though if you do, I'm not sure there is enough of a difference to warrant another purchase. Some final notes: the sparesness of the universe gets pretty boring to play in, I was saddened that I couldn't manage planets as much as I wanted (it's nothing like Galactic Civilizations), the factions were varied enough to be interesting, and being spoiled by the micromanagment of games like Civilization IV I just wanted more. All in all, interesting, fun, addicting, but nothing all too special about it.

Judgement: 7.5 Planets out of 10