Gamasutra has posted the in-depth post-mortem on Sins of a Solar Empire.  For gamers as well as developers who want to see how a hit game was made that was done almost completely differently than the typical publisher/developer system, you'll definitely want to check this out.

It also has screenshots of very very early builds of Sins that you'll probably get a kick out of.

View: Sins of a Solar Empire Post-Mortem

Recently Joystiq sat down with Brad Wardell (Stardock CEO) and Chris Taylor (Gas Powered Games Founder) recently to talk a bit about Demigod, a little bit about Sins & Gal Civ 2, and of course about copy protection and where the PC games market is headed. 

The result?  It looks like PC Gaming isn't dead afterall, and that Stardock/Gas Powered Games have some interesting ideas on where the future lies.

Click to read the full interview, it's definitely worth a little bit of your time, and should give you a bit of a glimpse into what the future may hold.

GamerNode took at look at the PC game release calendar for this year and realized something; 2008 is a great year to be a PC strategy gamer!  While the article talks about genre giants like Starcraft 2, Empire: Total War and the highly anticipated Spore, do you know the game they led the feature with? 

If you said "Sins of a Solar Empire", you'd be right!

Highlighting Sins' scale, integration of 4X elements with real-time gameplay and an engine that performs well and looks great on a wide variety of systems, the game tops their list of PC strategy games to get your hands on as soon as possible.

Check out the full feature here for all the great strategy games coming out in 2008.

And people say that PC gaming is dead....

Stardock Entertainment and Kalypso Media are pleased to announce the signing of an agreement that will finally bring Sins of a Solar Empire to retail stores throughout Europe. 

The game will start appearing at retail beginning in late May/early June, though no specific dates have yet been set. We'll post more information as soon as it becomes available.

Sins of a Solar Empire v1.04 is now available for download.

Use THIS LINK to update to the latest version. If you are in the Impulse Beta, use the link provided here to update, don't use Impulse to update as we're in the process of updating the backend to support fast transfers of lots of little files which hasn't been perfected yet.

View: Change Log

Download: Sins of a Solar Empire v1.04

While we're not making any promises, we plan to have Sins of a Solar Empire v1.04 ready this week.  v1.04 is the first serious attempt to user-requested game balancing. 

We've gotten a lot of feedback in the past few weeks with some great ideas on tweaks to each of the different sides to make the game more enjoyable to players.  Obviously a lot of time has had to be spent play testing (and yes, we get paid to do this, so there, mom!) these changes to make sure the result truly is a more satisfactory experience.

Often times, what seems balanced (or unbalanced) on paper does not work out quite that way on-line. There are a lot of factors that just have to be played to be seen.  Moreover, a player's skill level along with strategy can completely alter one's perspective on balancing which has been both a challenge and quite enjoyable to observe. 

Both Stardock and Ironclad play multiplayer games pretty regularly (we don't usually advertise who we are) and it's really quite refreshing seeing new strategies being developed over time that we never would have considered.  This is one of the reasons why updates such as v1.04 will continue to be needed -- as players come up with new, innovative strategies, we will have to continue to update the game to ensure that no single strategy becomes too dominant -- this is what you pay us for, after all.

If all goes well, we hope to arrange a game night with the entire community.

Today Stardock and Gas Powered Games announced their partnership to develop and publish the much anticipated PC strategy/RPG game Demigod. Demigod is going to be a milestone PC game for a lot of reasons that will be made clear in the coming months.

So why should players of Sins of a Solar Empire care?  For one thing, it means that a sophisticated ladder, match making, account system will become a reality in the near future.  You see, Stardock, Ironclad, and Gas Powered Games are doing something that, to my knowledge, has never been done before. We three are combining our experiences and talents to build a unified multiplayer architecture.

That means your Sins of a Solar Empire achievements will become part of your account. Your wins, losses, and ranking (for those who choose to play ranked games) will be part of your account. You'll be able to find available games in Sins, Demigod, or The Political Machine (for starters) right from Impulse.  You'll be able to have a unified friends list, unified clan support, and much more that is supported by 3 games immediately and designed by 3 companies with a great deal of experience in this area.

Stay tuned, this is all going to happen a lot quicker than one might expect. 

PLYMOUTH, MI- April 7, 2008- Stardock and Gas Powered Games announced today that they have reached a publishing agreement for Gas Powered Games' upcoming PC game, Demigod.

Demigod is a team-based action game with RTS and RPG elements. Players take control of a massive Demigod with the goal of annihilating their opponent's position in a given arena while preventing the opponent's Demigod from doing the same to them. Although the game supports superb one-on-one duels, the title will truly shine in team play either with other human-controlled Demigods or with ones controlled by a sophisticated computer AI. As the game progresses, the player's Demigod will acquire items, attributes and experience.

Gas Powered Games, having become one of the leading PC game developers with hit titles such as Dungeon Siege and Supreme Commander chose Stardock as its exclusive worldwide PC publisher in part because of Stardock's tremendous success with the award-winning Sins of a Solar Empire and Galactic Civilizations.

"Forging our new partnership with Stardock is a big deal for all of us at GPG, and we couldn't be more excited about it," said Chris Taylor, founder and CEO of Gas Powered Games. "Not only do we have a proven retail publisher, but we get to partner with a pioneer in the digital distribution space a company that totally understands what kind of experience our customer wants and the quality game they demand. The whole proposition is truly refreshing."

Stardock's most recent release, Sins of a Solar Empire was the top selling PC strategy game at retail according to NPD, and the second highest selling PC game overall despite selling immense numbers of copies digitally which are not counted in sales rankings. The game has received universally high reviews in the media and many have noted how seamlessly Stardock and developer Ironclad worked together.

"Were very excited at the opportunity to work with Gas Powered Games," said Brad Wardell, president and CEO of Stardock. "By integrating our teams and working together, we will be able to create something that represents the best of both teams."

To fully support a public beta that will launch this summer, the launch date for Demigod has been moved to February 2009. This will give the development team sufficient time to incorporate feedback from the beta players while polishing the game. Like Stardock's other games, Demigod will be released without any on-disc copy protection and has been budgeted to receive many months of free post-release feature updates.

The official website for Demigod is in the works, but users who want to begin discussing the game can visit http://www.demigodthegame.com.

About Gas Powered Games
Gas Powered Games was founded in May 1998 by acclaimed game designer, Chris Taylor.The company's first project, Dungeon Siege, was released in April 2002 and its sequel, Dungeon Siege II was released in August 2005. Both games were critical and commercial successes. GPG's recent releases include the award-winning and genre-defining Supreme Commander and Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance.

About Stardock
Stardock is one of the world's leading developers and publisher of PC games and desktop software.Its PC games include Sins of a Solar Empire, the highest rated and best selling PC strategy game of 2008 as well as the critically acclaimed Galactic Civilizations series. Its desktop software includes Object Desktop, WindowBlinds, and a host of other programs for customizing the Windows experience.

There's going to be a rather huge announcement from Stardock on Monday...

Stay tuned...

This past week I was on a press tour visiting our friends at GfW, IGN, GameSpy, Gamespot, Wired, PC Gamer, Game Developer and more.  I had the flu so hopefully I didn't leave them any parting "gifts".

As some have reported, there will be an expansino pack for Sins of a Solar Empire. Ironclad and Stardock are just working out the best time to release it and what features will go into it.  It will have a campaign to help narrate the backstory more.  I know we're looking at more ships, more technologies, more units, diplomacy enhancements, and more.  Stay tuned.

In the meantime, here is some of the coverage:

>> IGN Sins
>> Wired