Sword of the Stars: Complete Collection

[b]Amazing worldbuilding, amazing gameplay[/b] But, since there are other reviews detailing the gameplay, I'll mostly focus about how Sword of the Stars engages [b]my imagination[/b]. For a game with no up-front campaign mode (OK, there are story missions that form short campaigns), this game has one heck of a story. Every faction has a solid background: while each species starts off from a basic concept - space dolphins, space crows, uhh Cardassians? - those concepts are carefully developed, with a keen eye for [b]detail and consequence[/b]. For instance, the Cardas-- uh, the Tarka are a species of warm-blooded reptilians who reproduce oviparously; the game then takes the time to describe the consequences this has for the society, how it creates 3 distinct gender-based castes, how it affects social interactions, and even what the typical gender biases are. When I hear the voice of a Changed Male leading my ships, or when I see heraldry centered around an egg, I can better imagine what it means for my faction, and I enjoy it - both sweet victory and bitter defeat - so much more. The story-related particularities of each species are deeply reflected in the game. Due to differen…

Tons of weapon choices but who knows how effective they are? Certainly not the player. Need some kind of damage indicator. Like numbers of damage appearing then disappearing per hit, as with other games? The battle reports aren't reliable, maybe one ship does a lot of damage then dies. One weapon will do poorly against one ship but great against another. Weapon descriptions are mostly fakenews. Need to half the number of weapons and put that energy into damage reports (each enemy ship and their breakdown of damage taken per hit?)

This game is better then stellaris!

Great oldie!

it is a good offline space game to pass the time with, not fancy but well built and entertaining.

Awesome 4x/rts game. The unique FTL drives for each race and randomized tech tree give this game a lot of replay ability. Runs fine for me in windows 10, haven't tried win 11, and could not get it to run in proton, but I believe there's a patch for that somewhere. Would love it if someone could find and post the old mods somewhere.