Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

Multiplayer

20DeplorableConsidering the number of bugs, the tendency to crash, and the incredibly long games… don’t even bother unless you have a friend as masochistic as yourself.

Value

0InsultingThere are so many cool things here. Incredibly deep management, large tech trees with research that has to be drawn up as feasible before It can be chased after, and every single strategy game should have customizable units. There is fun to be had here. I know it. But as is, half of the game is working, and the other half is either pointless, buggy, or crashing you out. If you could pay for that half, I’d say go for it, but 40 bucks is highway robbery for this product in the state that it’s in.

Lasting Appeal

40Lousy

I lament time and time again about lost potential in games like this. The thing is, I can derive some entertainment from a buggy game.  There is a big difference between hilariously dumb stuff happening in-game, and units refusing to acknowledge orders, interface lag, and crashes to desktop happening constantly.  It’s hilarious to talk about this game, but you’re not actually talking about the game.  You’re talking about the pathetic launch and the issues.  SOTS 1 had almost as bad of a launch, but it somehow managed to become a pretty good game in the end.  Will this do the same?  Probably, but I sure as hell can’t put in any votes of confidence right now.

I can't change any options in game?   Even days later, I still feel like this game is just a joke I'm not getting.

Pros and Cons

Pros:

• Tons of data to interact with--a thinking man's dream environment for a 4X
• It's no Homeworld, but you sometimes feel that itch being scratched during a good space firefight.

Cons

• Interface has next to no tooltips, and the in-game encyclopedia is pathetic for as deep as this game supposedly is.
• I say supposedly because a good portion of the game is not working at the moment, and that includes frequent crashes.
• Because so many parts of the game are interconnected, one broken thing leads to another and the amount of fun you have with the game plummets rather than increases as you grow accustomed to it.

Conclusion

I want to like this game, but it’s simply impossible to. Sword of the Stars II is fundamentally broken, poorly programmed (null pointer errors? Divide by Zero crashes? Really!?) and a complete mess of a retail game. Come back in a year, and if Kerberos sticks with the game as long as they did the first one, we’ll eventually have a great game on our hands. There are simply too many great games in the holiday season to buy this one, which essentially amounts to investing $40 in an early beta test.