The other magical aspect to space conquest is the capital ships: the centrepieces of the Sins of the Solar Empire fleet. Of course, when you’re doing it to an AI who has been vexing you for hours, it’s a delight. That’s not just a bummer for the billions who are getting nuked from orbit, it also shuts down your space infrastructure, so your research, resources, trade and production will all be affected. If neither of those things is an option then you will just have to watch your planet burn. When you spot an approaching siege fleet in space-you can see the particular siege ship icons, which are a stomach-churning sight when they appear en masse-you have to either pray your planetary defences hold, or get a fleet in their way. Your planets are bustling with activity, and you can see little craft whizzing about across the surface. Seeing one slowly go down-and with it your precious capital crew-is heartbreaking, and can in fact spell the end of the entire game. Capital ships cannot therefore be squandered in a test battle, and must only be put in harm’s way when you know you can win the conflict. The ships are themselves immense resources, and cost a huge amount of cash and material resources to create, but they also require a capital crew, which can only be earned by having colonies under your control. The most limited resource in the universe of Sins of a Solar Empire is that of capital ship crews. Nevertheless there are brave gamers who will undertake it, and the rewards are huge.

This means that games of Sins require many hours to play: a near impossibility for the multiplayer side of things, where a single session can span most of the day. The game doesn’t do much to reduce the scope of a normal 4X game: there are often dozens of planets, three major resources, and various factions on each scenario, including pirates. You rush from one side of your empire to another, the tasks that await you spiralling upwards in an exponential ‘to do’ list as your influence expands. Rather than being able to sit back in the leathery depths of your Parker-Knoll recliner deskchair and consider the options before you, you’re now managing everything as it happens. The consequences of Ironclad’s decision to make a live-action 4X game are far-reaching. What madness is this? Can one human brain really handle all this in real-time? The answer is yes, but only just. Today, Jim Rossignol commits Sins of a Solar Empire with a game that changed the rules.

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Gog sins of a solar empire