The April edition of PC Gamer has arrived and besides a preview of Red Alert 3 and Spore, there's a full 3 page review of Sins of a Solar Empire! Their conclusion: 91% and an Editor's Choice award!

And as a reminder, tonight is Friday night Sinning where Stardock and Ironclad members will be on-line playing the game, helping show new players how to play, and just hanging out. Starts at 6pm EST and lasts until whenever!

The April 2008 edition of PC Gamer has a very thorough review of Sins of a Solar Empire. 91% and Editor's Choice!

Lots of stuff going on at the office. We meant to get Beta 5 out this week, there's a ton of changes to Twilight that we're working through.

Unfortunately, I have the flu which is slowing me down. But on a brighter note Scott (boogiebac) and his wife just had their first baby but that means he's been out this week.

One of the new features we've put in is that players can choose to have the AI design ships for them. While most players choose to design their own ships, this gives new players the option to focus on other things.

I'd write more but I feel like death.

With all the talk about Apple's really thin notebook and the upcoming ThinkPad X300, I can't help but wish that both would take a book out of the lightest, most usable notebook ever made: The ThinkPad X40.

Here are some notable features about the X40 that I miss in newer laptops:

1. It weighs only 2.7 pounds
2. It doesn't add weight with a touch pad but instead only has the trackpoint which makes it smaller and lighter.
3. No DVD drive. I rarely find the need for a DVD drive and if I do, a USB one works just fine.
4. Its 12 inch screen is more than enough for my needs when using a sub-laptop.
5. It has a wonderful full-sized keyboard.

The Thinkpad X300 weighs more than the ThinkPad X40 which is a real shame. The super thin Mac is a non-starter for me personally because I cannot stand the touchpads on Mac laptops. That's just a personal preference I adimit.

MyColors Theme Manager in action.

The new MyColors Theme Manager is much nicer than anything we've done in the past in this area. Here's why:

1. We can update themes and MyColors will automatically update them for you.
2. We can update the underlying software and MyColors will automatically update.
3. If you move to a new machine or whatever, you just type in your serial # for the theme and it will download it all within MyColors.

These 3 things just make it so much better for users (and for tech support).  For instance, I noticed that my Sins of a Solar Empire theme has my user name in the Start menu too far over. Oops. Glitch. No problem though because the theme can be fixed and once updated, users in MyColors will add that an update is available and download it right within the program.

We're in week 2 since the release of Sins of a Solar Empire and it's been quite an adventure. We've got a lot going on, here's some highlights...

• In the first week or so, it sold more copies than Galactic Civilizations II sold in its first month which is saying a lot.  I don't know its relative sales ranking but it's in the top 3 best sellers at Gamestop, EB Games, Best Buy, and Amazon.com. I know it's doing well at Walmart and Target since they've gone through their entire initial stockings entirely a couple of times.
  
  
• We're working on v1.03. We want to get it out sooner rather than later and then focus on v1.04 which will be a bit more in-depth of an update. 1.03 will have AI updates, AI replacing dropped players in multplayer, smart AI surrendering, some updates to Ironclad Online and a number of other tweaks. We're going to start putting it through QA tomorrow but we don't have a definitive release date other than hopefully in the next week or two.
  
  
• We're having a Game Night this Friday starting at 6pm EST on Ironclad Online. There will be Stardock people and Ironclad people playing online that night. We'll be helping show people how to play the game, give tips, help people work through any connection issues and of course, playing.
  
  
• I saw an article at IGN about how PC developers are blaming piracy as the reason some high profile games aren't selling in the quantities they should.  As some of you know, Stardock's "main" business is in the PC software realm so we have a bit different outlook on market dynamics.  Here's the deal: Piracy is a problem, no doubt about it. It does cost sales. But it isn't the driving reason for lost sales, it's the size of the market.  Sins of a Solar Empire is outselling some higher profile games not just because it's a "great game" but because it runs on a vastly larger number of PCs. 
  
  For console advocates out there, ask yourself how well a given game would sell if it required players to run out and buy a $300 upgrade to their console to play the game?  That's essentially what a lot of high profile PC game developers expect.  When Ironclad and Stardock were working on Sins, we made a conscious decision that the game would not require potential gamers to upgrade their systems.  That meant we couldn't have things like moving turrets or whatever but it means that the size of the market was much larger.  No matter how good your game is, if people can't play it, you will always be limited.  The number of people willing to upgrade PCs for games is not that large.  If you want to sell lots of copies of your PC game, make sure it runs on a lot of machines. 
  
  
• And lastly, the Sins of a Solar Empire MyColors theme is now available. If you bought the Collector's Edition (which is the only version we sell direct digitally or box-wise) then you get the MyColors theme for free. Click on the update game button to get it (it's one of the reasons why the direct download version is $5 more than the retail).  To learn more, see this post.

That's all for now! Cheers!

For those of you who purchased Sins of a Solar Empire Collector's Edition (which is what you automatically get when you purchase directly from Stardock either digitally or the CE box) you get the Sins of a Solar Empire MyColors theme. Just type in your CE serial # (visit here to have Stardock email your serial #) into MyColors. If you have the CE version, you should be able to see it from the update page within Sins of a Solar Empire.

MyColors is Stardock's latest desktop customization technology that allows users to completely personalize the Windows experience (32-bit Windows XP or Windows Vista).  The technology behind it has been used by Microsoft, nVidia, ATI, Blizzard, Nintendo, and countless others.

If you don't have the Collector's Edition of Sins of a Solar Empire, you can purchase MyColors Sins of a Solar Empire at half the price that most MyColors themes are.  You can also try out MyColors for yourself to see how it works for you.

Visit: MyColors - Sins of a Solar Empire

Visit: MyColors Home Page

This Friday we're thinking of having an official Game Night starting 6pm EST and going on until, well, whenever.

There would be Stardock people there and we'll be giving out random prizes to players we observe helping other players and just plain randomly as well. 

But mostly, we just want to have a night of fun playing Sins. 

Who's interested?

CursorFX 2.0.008 has been released! CursorFX is a program that brings the Windows mouse cursor into the 21st century with fluid animation support, alpha blending, motion smoothing, cursor sizing, effects for different amount events and more.

CursorFX was designed to replace CursorXP. The initial roll-out of CursorFX was a little bumpy, demonstrating the challenges of developing a brand new desktop enhancement in a world divided between Windows XP and Windows Vista users.

Here's what's new in CursorFX:

- Fix for Powerpoint issue
- Fixes for slow/choppy cursor.
- Fixes for process priority.
- Fixes to solve crash on loading Control panel with some old cursors.
- Improved Control panel load time.
- Fix for CursorFX cursors disappearing on IconPackager apply.
- Fixed compatibility with some games and applications.
- Seamless support for CursorXP cursors.

Screenshots:

If you have CursorFx Plus use Stardock Central to download the latest version now.

Download Free version: www.cursorfx.com.