Shattered Suns

by Clear Crown Studios

Product Features

• A new system of 'distributed economics' which offers the player even greater challenges
• Truly epic storyline, including non-linear story arcs, realistic characters and intriguing plot twists
• The ability to design and customize spaceships and space stations
• Flexibility in creating your ultimate galactic fleet
• Three-dimensional battles in space, allowing for maximum maneuverability and tactical planning

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000UXQGYQ
• Item Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Media: DVD-ROM
• Release Date: August 11, 2008
• Average Customer Review: 2.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,828 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
  • #38 in Video Games > PC Games > Strategy > Real-Time
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com

Shattered Suns is a sci-fi adventure that redefines the real-time strategy (RTS) genre. In it players take on the role of Captain Max, a rebel leader caught on the wrong side of an imperial interstellar land grab and wage a campaign of guerilla warfare in space against the superior firepower and numbers of an ever-expanding empire. This is done by utilizing the game's unprecedented levels of mechanical customization. To succeed ships, space stations, outposts and armadas not only can be, but must be customized for specific and changing tactical situations. In addition, because the game's battles take place over the vast distances of space and utilize orbiting heavenly bodies and man-made satellites as staging areas, players must master the art of spatial orientation and deep space tactics or risk being isolated in the void, face to face with a mortal enemey and with no chance of rapid reinforcement.

The sky is not the limit

Engage in thrilling 3-D space combat. View larger.

Customize your ships and armadas. View larger.

Strategize from a compact campaign view. View larger.

And lead epic battles on a large scale. View larger.

In the Beginning: The Cradle of Life
Cushioned between two giant nebulae there lies a fertile region of space known as the 'Cradle of Life,' from which all known life emerged on seven distinct worlds. Each world developed in isolation until one species on each planet developed the intelligence and technology to explore beyond its terrestrial boundaries. After thousands of years of space travel, all seven intelligent species developed a long history of trade, immigration and cultural exchange. But all this changed with the development of space gateway technology, which allowed ships to travel vast distances instantaneously. Thanks to gateways each species was able to unite nearby star systems into groups called sectors. Gradually, eight distinct sectors emerged, settling more than twenty different star systems. Later as gateways advanced, entire sectors were united through inter-sector gateways. Before long, all eight sectors could be easily reached. As inter-sector travel became possible, so did the temptation for conquest. Weaker star systems once protected by the vast distances of space suddenly found themselves within easy reach of powerful tyrants hungry for ever more territory. Because of this, some say that the Imperial Wars were inevitable and thus also the saga of Shattered Suns.

The Present: The Rise of Empire and Captain Max
As the second Imperial War comes to a close, the known universe is carved up between two great empires. The last free sector falls to the overwhelming might of empire and a rebellion is born. Fleeing from the conquering occupation forces, one brave captain finds the means to hide and survive until the time is right to fight again. You are that captain, Captain Max, and with the help of the underground resistance, the black market and countless brave citizens longing for the return of their freedoms, you begin to build a new fleet of freedom fighters. Your hopes are that his minor rebellion will grow into a massive uprising, but that hope is far from certain. Unknown to you is that new undiscovered technologies may lay hidden that will play a part for good or ill in the uprising and that eventually betrayal may yet have just as significant a part to play.

Game Features

• Truly epic storyline, including non-linear story arcs, realistic characters and intriguing plot twists
• The ability to design spaceships and space stations
• Flexibility in creating your ultimate galactic fleet
• Three-dimensional battles in space, allowing for maximum maneuverability and tactical planning
• A new system of 'distributed economics' which offers the player even greater challenges

System Requirements:

	Minimum Specifications:	Recommended Specifications:
OS:	Windows 2000/XP with SP2/Vista with SP1
Processor:	1 GHz processor	2 GHz
RAM:	512 MB	1+ GB
Hard Drive Space:	2 GB of Free Space
Video RAM:	128 MB video RAM	256 MB video RAM
DVD-ROM:	Quad-speed (4x) or faster DVD-ROM drive
Other:	Pixel Shader 2.0 support DirectX 9.0c compatible video and audio Keyboard and mouse required

 

Product Description

One brave catain defies an empire as billions hunger for liberty. As hope is awakened, so too is wrath. In the face of Imperial power, some will fight, many will surrender, and a few will betray all. Change your definition of RTS games forever. Don't just watch the story unfold; live it! Recruit your forces, enlist your allies, and choose your battles in a completely interactive campaign of epic depth. Discover battle tactics as you've never experienced them before with fleets of space ships clashing in all three dimentions. Redefine strategy as the orbits of planets and moons bring once distant enemy stations within range of your largest base. You'll never see RTS games the same way again.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

43 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars OMG, August 22, 2008

By 

James Raia (Denver, Co) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Shattered Suns (DVD-ROM)

I played Homeworld a long time ago. After that there was Homeworld: Cataclysm and Homeworld 2. All three of them were great games and provided tons of three dimensional fleet battles. Other games came after that as well. They were clones and IMO were not as great, but each of them tried to improve upon the concept of three dimensional space conflict. One game that I remember specifically was O.R.B. (Offworld Resource Base) It was a little bit of a step up but I remember that it got a lot of flack because it did not do enough to surpass it's Homeworld counterpart at that time. It was still kinda fun but it was a 'too little too late kind of thing'.

Shattered Suns... is a game that does not improve upon any concept in use today. In fact, it goes so far as to backdate graphics, camera control, playability and compatibility about TEN YEARS. Thats right. This game sucks so incredibly bad that the first ten minutes I was honestly wondering what the back story for the games development was. Who would honestly sit down and say to themselves 'Okay, the game does not have ANY of the advantages or playability features that EVERY SINGLE 3D space RTS game IN HISTORY has had. Lets just ship it for twenty dollars less and a little note that says we'll fix your game later when we have the time."

I tried so hard to find the good points of this game. I really did. There was a hope that the 'Ship Customization' portion of this game would go one step further then all of it's predecessors by allowing players to make their own ships. If that was true, it would be the only part of this game which equaled or surpassed every similar game in the past ten years.

Unfortunately the ship customization feature consisted of (Shields + or -) and (Armor + or -) You see... you customize the ship by spending resources on this ship. Customizing is as easy as clicking on the plus icon or the minus icon. But even that is a pain as they make you click on armor first and then on the plus button. Additionally, if the unit does not have the correct research to accomplish this, it doesn't even tell you. It just highlights in red and sits there. Nothing about this game is intuitive. Docking a ship with a moon requires that you select the ship, click the follow button, click on the moon and then unclick the follow button so that the ship actually docks with the moon when it gets close enough instead of just following the moon around.

That is a direct quote from the tutorial!!!!

Seriously guys. In the words of PCGamer, Avoid Like The Plague.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars SHATTERED INDEED..., August 27, 2008

By 

NeuroSplicer (Freeside, in geosynchronous orbit) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

= Fun:2.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Shattered Suns (DVD-ROM)

This summer PC Gaming was one disappointment after another. Unfortunately SHATTERED SUNS is no exception.

The graphics of this game are so dated and simplistic that I had to go back to the original Empire Earth to find something to compare them with! Homeworld 2 and even Homeworld: Cataclysm (a decade old game mind you!) had much better surfaces, shadows and afterburners. Not to mention gameplay...

SHATTERED SUNS interface feels clumsy and counterintuitive. One needs to micromanage everything as the AI (if existent) has flatlined. The camera will leave you seasick. And the advertised "ship customization" is nowhere near the Galactic Civilizations 2 standards: you can simply add defense or attack points to your predesigned ships, that's it! Lucky us they did not decide to name them "hit points" and "THACO" and hype it as a space cRPG...

On a final note, the relative speeds of planets and ships is a joke - but this game has much bigger problems than...relativistic inconsistencies. No amount of patching can fix this one.

My advice: go with Sins of a Solar Empire instead, or, even better, replay the Homeworld series.

15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Shattered Suns, Shattered Game, August 18, 2008

By 

Anne P. Williams - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Shattered Suns (DVD-ROM)

This game has been way overhyped. This game claims to be a great RTS, but it is really a horrible cross between a windows 95 game[with the graphics to match] and a text message RPG. The camera is impossible to control, they have no tech support on their home page, and the game has severe technical glitches. It crashed 10 minutes in. Unbelieveable! This game is nothing short of a rip-off. I AVOID AT ALL COSTS!