[DT]Star Player's Take on Sins 2

from Sins Forums

Hello everyone, and for those who play on ICO, or have played on ICO I play under the handle [DT]Star Player.

Sins has been a terrific game, since when i bought it in the beginning of '08 i had very few game play concerns.  I can only think of what the online community in this game could have been had Ironclad got to the bottom of minidumps sooner.  I had never, ever seen such a great, but technically challenged game.  I sit here now, amongst an ever dwindling online community that is lucky to pass 50 players online in primetime.  I have searched the web looking for info on sins 2 but i have found nothing solid.

Ironclad, you have a great game going here, you deserve to at least inform your community if you are going to come out with a sequel to the game.  Wouldn't it make more sense to announce now, and ask what people would like in the new sequel?  You lost your first online playerbase with minidumps, don't let it happen again in Sins 2, thats all I can say.  The sky is the limit, and so would your bottom line if you marketed Sins 2 properly.  I can't think of many people who wouldn't pay a 50-60 dollar price tag to fill their sins fix.

If you were considering another game, realize that sequels are often the most successful from a pure business stand point, and in this case, you would be loved by the RTS community.  SoaSE is a diamond in the rough, a gem worth treasuring, so give us a new gem, something new to laud and praise.  Just please have it be without minidumps.

If anyone has thoughts, feel free to share.

Happy Holidays,

Star Player

31,815 views 14 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top

Right now it's rumored that while there's *something* in the works for Sins, it most certainly isn't a sequel. The current consensus is that Ironclad's next project is some kind of land-based RTS.

Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top

I saw 75 people on the Diplomacy expansion at one point last weekend.

Sins's problems went far beyond minidumps.  Just to quickly review, when the game came out only about 15% of all players could host games.  It was also too danged slow before Entrenchment and Quickstart came out.  Minidumps and desyncs were certainly killers as were occasional ICO disconnects.  And then the addition of Impulse made it that much more difficult for people to access the online multiplayer portion of the game.

If Sins-2 could be released in the condition that the Diplomacy game is in now then maybe it could really take off.  Of course, I'm hoping for even more improvements (built-in voice comm, player skill matching, auto-download options for custom maps and mods, better chat room features, etc.).

Offworld Trading Company
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top

Of course, I'm hoping for even more improvements (built-in voice comm, player skill matching, auto-download options for custom maps and mods, better chat room features, etc.).

Not a fan of voice-comm, and the community needs to reach a certain critical mass for skill matching to work, but those other two would be very nice indeed.

If Ironclad could come out with a Sins 2 that had the level of polish that we see in the final version of Sins, it could take the market by storm.  This is one developer that has earned my loyalty with their first creation, and I'm eagerly anticipating their second.  With that said, the last thing I want is something rushed out the door.  I'm willing to wait if the prize at the end is another masterpiece.

Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top

please please please don't don't do a land based Sin.  Keep it in space and make it 3D for the 3DS for all I care.  Please don't do anything ground based.  

Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top

Ironclad, you have a great game going here, you deserve to at least inform your community if you are going to come out with a sequel to the game.  Wouldn't it make more sense to announce now, and ask what people would like in the new sequel?

Well, why announce a sequel when the original game itself is not yet dead...

Take a look at https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/400364 ... the post there is around one month old ... they announce a future update for sins... 

Sins II will be something for when there will not more be original Sins update...

Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top

imo sins has had its run, it needs an eventual sequel to revive it

Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top

I think adding land based combat to sins would be a great thing. It would really bridge the gap and hopefully give some character to the game. 

Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Destraex, reply 7
I think adding land based combat to sins would be a great thing. It would really bridge the gap and hopefully give some character to the game. 

What do you mean, adding land based combat to sins?  That would take more than one player to control everything, if you have land and spaced based combat.  I am intrigued however as to what exactly you had in mind with land based combat.

Reply #9 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting Nightraid3r, reply 8



Quoting Destraex,
reply 7
I think adding land based combat to sins would be a great thing. It would really bridge the gap and hopefully give some character to the game. 


What do you mean, adding land based combat to sins?  That would take more than one player to control everything, if you have land and spaced based combat.  I am intrigued however as to what exactly you had in mind with land based combat.

I would guess that he is thinking of something along the lines of Star Wars: Empire at War. Personally, I think it would be very hard to make a game that has both and is still fun and playable on the scale of Sins.

It's been confirmed that Ironclad's next project is not Sins 2. In an interview with PC Gamer a while ago, they said that their next project will be a land-based RTS, but gave no details beyond that. According to a later interview done by Frogboy (CEO of Stardock), Ironclad is a little burnt out on space at the moment, since most of them worked on Homeworld: Cataclysm before Sins. Therefore, they're doing something different. In the same interview, however, he also said that they are not done with Sins just yet, and he expect that there will be a sequel at some point.

 

Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting RoyalRook, reply 4
please please please don't don't do a land based Sin.  Keep it in space and make it 3D for the 3DS for all I care.  Please don't do anything ground based.  

They didn't say that they were working on a land-based version of Sins.

Only that they were working on a land-based RTS. It's simple to surmise that, because of the background of Sins, that said land RTS would be a new IP.

Quoting Destraex, reply 7
I think adding land based combat to sins would be a great thing. It would really bridge the gap and hopefully give some character to the game. 

And it wouldn't fit in the least bit. Sins is about space warfare. The extent that "ground-pounding" is represented in Sins is colony frigates and orbital bombardment.

Oh yeah, and Subversion. But that's it. There's no ground warfare. There might be espionage/sabotage, but no symmetrical (or asymmetrical for that matter) warfare.

Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top

There were many things that drove people away from SoaSE.

 

1) Lack of Campaign. Very limited background story and intensely vague story progession through use of expansion sets. And some people just love to go back and take a break from multiplayer and replay the story.

 

2) Entire faction damning balance that shifts dramatically with each patch. I can't recall a time when a single faction wasn't completely unplayable in a competitive online meta. While this shifted and strategies sharpened and perfected, our current situation is an undeniable Vasari domination. TEC is a econo-pocket-boomer faction that works best on a team with the other two factions and bleeds money into the "team economy" and really is only good for Novaliths in the late game. And Advent is a mid game faction that has such a weak early game that a neighboring Vasari is absolute trouble can take massive advantages of with an early scout raid and earlier LRMs.

 

3) 2GB RAM limit and no multi core support. This spells big problems on very large maps with lots of objects in game.

Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top

Holy Moly!

I have never heard a clear, endearing conversation online with star player ever.  Aside from all the cussing and anger brought about by SOME emotional issue, I am glad to see a person arise from behind such a wall of defense.

Bravo!

(btw, its Carpetbomb ;) )

Good on you for totally blowing my mind!

Anyways I fully support your post, this game truly needs some really good loving come sins 2. 

The developers also shouldn't make a cheap knockoff that doesn't have the depth of play of the original sins, and stick to the pure and unadulterated strategy that your core players know and love.

Developers, please don't F#$% us over.

Btw, i just gave you karma Star.  lol.

Reply #13 from Stardock Forums Top

Well, I usually don't go online because of the incessant latency. It's a geological thing, I suppose (which means I'm just too far from ICO). Which is the same reason why Starcraft 2 and possible Diablo 3 is a no-go for me. I often play SoaSE over LAN, however, if that helps. And keep going until someone wins or we desync - whichever comes first.

As for surface combat, that really appeals to me. I'm a plan-from-the-bigger-picture type of guy (ala SupCom and TA), and meting out the logistics and tactics involved in synchronous orbital and surface engagements in real time is the only thing I haven't experienced in any game yet. I would surrender a limb or two to be in charge of a full-blown planetary siege.

Sins may be all about space combat, but it doesn't seem to give off the same notion of "space combat" to me as it does for you. It's more like Risk with guns blazing - that's all.

 

Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Kilo_Bravo, reply 13
Well, I usually don't go online because of the incessant latency. It's a geological thing, I suppose (which means I'm just too far from ICO). Which is the same reason why Starcraft 2 and possible Diablo 3 is a no-go for me. I often play SoaSE over LAN, however, if that helps. And keep going until someone wins or we desync - whichever comes first.

Where do you live?  Are you having problems with other games or is it just with Sins and ICO?  People play it online from all over the world.  I've played regularly with Europeans, Australians, and even a guy from Brazil.  They haven't complained much about having a latency problem (beyond the occasional lag spikes that everyone gets now and then).