Sword of the Stars Demo

If you're a fan of the conquer-the-universe genre of strategy games, you might download this demo and give it a spin when you have a free hour or two. It comes closer to a computerized version of the old Imperial Starfire boardgame than anything else to date.

For a nice change, the game is heavy on fleet building and combat, but very light on the boring spreadsheet management routines that so many other contenders in this genre seem to hold up as a feature. Someone finally figured out that I don't give a damn how many Cosmic Duo-Node Megainverter Transflux Tachyon Nanocapacitance Widgets are being produced by Planet P544329X in one turn--and I'm certainly not interested in micromanaging the production lines. That's entirely too similar to what I get paid to do in the real world.

When I'm playing a computer game to relax, I just want to blow up the invading space fleets of the Evil Hegemonizing Alien Horde--and in less than two hours, if you please. I still have to get up and drive in to the widget factory tomorrow morning.

Click here to download the demo.