Have you played… Sins Of A Solar Empire?

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Have you played… Sins Of A Solar Empire?Slow and beautiful space battles

Slow and beautiful space battles

Try as I might, I cannot viewSins Of A Solar Empirethrough anything other than the most rose-tinted glasses. Much of it is auditory. The sound of each button press, the wonderful space opera soundtrack, and the endlessly invigorating voice line, “Scouts have found a colonisable planet!"; they’re all ingrained in the memories of a 13-year-old playing his very first real-time space 4X game, and loving every second of it.

I’d dabbled in other space strategy games before Sins (Galactic Civilizations,Alpha Centauri), but Sins Of A Solar Empire utterly gripped me from its opening cutscene. Sins would continue to be my space RTS game of choice for nearly a decade, until the arrival ofStellarisfinally made me ask whether it was time to move on.

And yet somehow, I still often have the desire to stop juggling empire needs and micromanaging fleets for a minute, disable the UI overlay, and just zoom in on one of the game’s beautiful, ponderous fights. Or even just watch a squadron line up on the edge of a system and tear open a formation of portals through which they can shloop over to another far-off point in space. I love watching things happen in Sins. I love winning too, of course. But the atmosphere and immersion still holds some sway over me. I doubt that would have been the case if I’d only started playing Sins now. Again, it’s those rose-tinted glasses at work. Just staring at the main menu makes me nostalgic. Needless to say, I’d play the hell out of a Sins Of A Solar Empire remake. But until then, the original game is still absolutely worthy of my time, and probably yours too.