Sins could have been a masterpiece, yet it settled for silver.
Let's start off by saying that Sins is a excellent space strategy game, and the fact that it plays in real time, makes it twice as enjoyable. the RTS element makes it different from others space strategy games such as Sword of the Stars, and Galactic Civ 2. But what these two titles lack in RTS they make up in endless possibilities and much deeper gameplay. Sins lacks the 4X depth to counter its excellent RTS and warfare elements. There is simply not enough here to make the game last. Micromanagement is weak, diplomacy is overly simplistic, and even some elements which exist in space such as moons orbiting planets, are left out of the equation.
The three races to chose from are also not good enough, since they all share the same tech tree, with minor differences as specific weapons or defenses. The is no depth to be found her either, and even if the spaceships each have different cosmetics to them, depending on which race you play as, you find yourself wishing that there was more to customize. Also three races are simply not enough for a 4X game, so in this department Sins fails to live up to these standards.
Where Sins really excels, is the space battles where massive fleets clash. But this gets old pretty quickly since it is overused, because of the lack of other options gameplay wise. And what really makes me try to hammer my head against my table is the fact that the devs decided to release micro expansions for this game, implementing minute content and small changes to the game, basically not polishing it enough. Entrenchment is a disappointment and the next two micro expansions will follow the same path. Had the devs concentrated in making a real expansion and making the gameplay much deeper, adding more races with new tech trees and details to the overall game would have massively strengthened Sins of a Solar Empire.
One can only hope that a sequel gets released where they fill out the massive gameplay gap and include much more micromanagement, new races and tech trees. Until then I will be playing games with far more depth and stratgic edge such as Galactic Civ 2 and even Sword of the Stars.