GamePro magazine did an analysis of Digital Rights Management (DRM) in PC games, and among the people interviewed for this story was Stardock CEO, Brad Wardell.  This analysis takes an in-depth looks at piracy from several different views, including those of industry professionals and “pirates” themselves.  This is a must read for anyone who enjoys PC gaming.

“Every copy protection scheme gets cracked, it's just a matter of time," Stardock CEO Brad Wardell tells GamePro. Through Stardock’s online games distribution service, Impulse, the company has spearheaded new DRM measures that respect the rights of the player.”

Read the full story at GamePro.com.

Stardock and Ironclad are pleased to announce the first post-release update to Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity (in the Diplomacy expansion).

The new update tweaks the behavior of pirates, improves diplomatic relations handling and provides dozens of small game balancing changes based on player suggestions.

Below is a change log:

Diplomacy 1.01

-------------------

Gameplay

- Pirates will now prefer planets with 2 or more modules (rather than dead asteroids and the like).

- AI players will offer pacts regardless of their feelings towards the player, as long as the other relationship requirements are met.

- When on a player mission the pirates will no longer stop at the first target owned planet they come across. When on a raid the pirates will try to stop at a sufficiently occupied planet instead of any planet.

- Pirates will always try their best to nuke a planet before leaving. It's the only way to be sure.

- Relationship penalties have been changed to make them more stable.

- Initial pirate raids are less powerful.

- Pirate gauss guns are less powerful.

- Lowered the rate at which AI players gain diplomatic points.

- Lowered the rate at which the AI relationship bonus increases.

- The various AI difficulties will now gain the AI relationship bonus at different rates.

- Lowered the cooldown on Diplomatic Immunity by 30 seconds.

- You should now be able to target any ally in a free-for-all match for pirate/regular missions, and for pirate bounty.

- Locked teams games will no longer have a diplomatic victory option.

- Increased the penalty for breaking a peace treaty.

- Experience for killing pirates has gone down.

- AI players are now more likely to send pirate missions.

- The pirates now have a unique armor type that will allow them to take less damage from all weapon types.

- Military actions now have a negative cap of -20.

Interface

- The quick bounty button will now let you increase the bounty on allies. It will prefer non-allies if any exist;

- Fixed a text placement issue on the game over screen.

- Relationship displays can now be negative.

Misc

- Added a data value to game constants (juicy planet threshold) to set the number of modules pirates look for when stopping to attack.

- Fixed an old bug that resulted in AI players offering alliances more often than they should.

- Fixed an issue with some autocast use times.

- Fixed an issue where certain pacts were not functioning properly (most notably the supply pact).

- Fixed a possible crash within the mission system.

- Fixed a bug that might cause the AI to not offer pirate missions.

- Fixed a sync bug related to Pirates.

Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity is available at most retail outlets in North America.  It can be purchase digitally for $39.95 via Impulse.  Users who already have the original Sins of a Solar Empire and Entrenchment expansion can upgrade by purchasing the Diplomacy expansion pack.

Links:

• Purchase
• What’s in Diplomacy?

Screenshots:

There have been a ton of reviews coming in today for both Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity, and the micro-expansion Diplomacy.  Since there quite a few today I wanted to a quick roundup of some of the latest that have hit my inbox.

Gaming Evolution

http://gamingevolution.info/?id=9428

“…this quirky way of being mind-bogglingly complex while maintaining a strong sense of accessibility. Ironclad Games combined two genres I suck at, and only occasionally enjoy, and got me to completely buy into the product of their incestuous union. I regret avoiding it for so long. If you have even a mild interest in the game, you should give it a shot.”

 

Hooked Gamers

http://www.hookedgamers.com/pc/sins_of_a_solar_empire_diplomacy/review/article-512.html

“Given that Diplomacy is available alone or as part of Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity e - a package that also includes the original game and its first expansion, Entrenchment - there is no excuse to not experience this improvement on an already worthwhile game.”

 

Gamer Access

http://thegameraccess.com/reviews/pc/review-sins-of-a-solar-empire-trinity

“It's VERY addicting, it even stopped me from playing Mass Effect 2. I haven't had a decent amount of sleep in four days...”

We can round of this set of reviews with a great podcast from Three Moves Ahead.  Their topic of discussion is obviously Sins, and as usual, it’s an entertaining episode.

Link

BigDownload.com has posted their review of the recently released Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity, and the 2nd expansion titled Diplomacy. 

“Diplomacy adds a whole new layer of strategy, and it's a lot to get used to. It significantly turns up the need to multitask, but at the same time, players are presented with new and powerful tools to expand their empire. Picking up the add-on and turning the game into Trinity makes for deeply challenging gameplay, and is definitely completes the Sins experience so that players have more variety in how they choose to conquer the galaxy.”

Read the full review at BigDownload.

IGN.com has published their review of the recently released micro-expansion, Diplomacy, for Sins of a Solar Empire! 

“Diplomacy comes with an entirely new diplomatic technology tree for each of the three races, and offers up the chance to spread good will, engage in mutually profitable agreements, and even pay for your rivals to undertake specific missions against each other. Being able to move from general bounties to specific targets is a big improvement and can help you soften up not only your target, but also tie up another rival's fleets while they do your dirty work for you.”

Read the full review at IGN.com.

Today Stardock Entertainment released the newest incarnation of Ironclad's masterpiece called Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity.

Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity takes the original game and combines the Entrenchment expansion pack and the Diplomacy expansion pack (also released today) together.

If you already have the original game and Entrenchment, you can get Diplomacy for only $9.99.  If you're new to the game, you can pick up Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity.

Quick Links:

• A Guided Tour
• A Gameplay Example
• Purchase Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity (for new players)
• Purchase Sins of a Solar Empire: Diplomacy (for users who have the first expansion pack already)

Reviews:

• Evilavatar.com
• Sarcasticgamer.com
• Neoseeker.com
• IGN.com
• ZTGameDomain.com
• BigDownload.com

Screenshots:

Sins of a Solar Empire: Diplomacy is also slated to be officially released tomorrow, and we have another thorough gameplay example.  This guided tour also gives a rich overview of the micro-expansion and it’s a definite must-read.

Sins of a Solar Empire: Diplomacy – a guided tour

Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity is nearly upon us, and sometimes the best way to answer any questions about a game is to show it in action, through images and video.  With that, Brad Wardell has created an in-depth walkthrough gameplay example of Sins: Trinity.  Whether you are new to the game, or a seasoned veteran, take a few minutes and check out the gameplay

Gameplay Example: Sins of a Solar Empire: Trinity

Big Download had a chat with Stardock’s Brad Wardell about Sins of a Solar Empire: Diplomacy recently.

“The second mini-expansion, Diplomacy, sounds like it will have less of a combat focus this time. Why did you want to improve on the game's non-combat features?

Probably the biggest reason has to do with allowing a lot more flexibility for players. Prior to Diplomacy, players had virtually no control over which players they were at war with. Inevitably, this meant that good players ended up with all the computer players against them which could get frustrating for players. Now, those players can play a deadly diplomatic game of keeping different sides at bay while they pursue their larger agendas.”

Read the full interview over at BigDownload.com.

IGN has posted a preview of Sins of a Solar Empire - Diplomacy, based on their experiences with a late beta of the upcoming micro-expansion.

"Diplomacy is a bit of a game changer and adds a missing element to the game. In the same way that Entrenchment helped to reorient the combat by giving players defensive options that encouraged bigger and better space battles, Diplomacy seems to give players an opportunity to compete with each other much more indirectly. Better still, it can really help you find an outlet for those resource surpluses that come up from time to time. Knowing that you can win goodwill and encourage your rivals to attack each other helps you manipulate the game in more subtle ways."

To read the full preview, just click on over to: http://pc.ign.com/articles/106/1066357p1.html