Crying Suns: Death is merely an inconvenience

The universe is neither hostile, nor friendly to the mankind. It is indifferent to our suffering and "Crying Suns" portrays it perfectly.

Sci-fi tactical rogue-lite "Crying Suns" will put you in the shoes of space fleet commander Admiral Ellys Idaho as you search the vast galaxy with a mission to restore the galactic empire.

Idaho wakes up in a secret cloning facility on planet Gehenna, hidden deep inside the outer rim. The artificial intelligence Caliban – who woke Idaho up from slumber – tells him that something ominous has happened. 

The AI network OMNI – that kept the intergalactic human civilisation functioning for 700 years – has shut down without any warning or explanation. The human society has descended into chaos, people are dying by the billions and five factions have carved up the empire into five sectors.

Fast travel to the heart of the empire in Elysium is impossible without the AI network, and no one has heard from the emperor for the past twenty years. 

Caliban is the last of its kind, and he is only functioning because the cloning facility is isolated from the AI network. Commander Idaho – a decorated war hero – is long dead, and his clone is the contingency plan the empire put in place in case things go south.

With resources dwindling, Idaho, his crew of cloned officers and crew leaves Gehenna on a battleship to venture the depths of the galaxy in a bid to uncover the reason behind the AI shutdown. 

Roll the dice, face the consequences

Your imperial battleship is a massive vessel capable of jumping from one star system to the next. The ship is outfitted with devastating offensive and defensive weapons to take on murderous factions roaming across the galaxy.

You will make your way across five sectors, encountering enemies, and salvaging for tech scraps and Neo-N fuel. Shops in various systems will offer new squadrons to deploy, and more commandos to run your ground missions. 

You will constantly be hunted by the enemies of the empire, so you will not be able to take your time and explore each sector. Balancing risk and reward, you will have to decide which sectors to explore and which ones to avoid. 

You will frequently be running into other ships during your journey. 

When interacting with a ship, you can choose to help them if you have the resources, or ignore them if you want to save fuel and tech scraps. Some will attack you outright. With every choice, your ship, and the lives of your officers and crew will hang in balance. 

Decide to help everyone, and you might lose the resources to prepare properly for the battles ahead. Decide to ignore everyone, and your ship might lack the necessary equipment, officers, squadrons and weapons to destroy an enemy dreadnought.

In the "Crying Suns" universe, most of the decisions are morally grey. 

Commanding an imperial battleship

At the heart of the "Crying Suns" is real-time strategy warfare. When two battleships meet, combat commences on a hexagonal playing field. 

Battleships are comprised of three major components, the hull, the weapons, and the docks that deploy fighters, drones, cruisers and frigates. All of these components can be upgraded with scrap. 

You can increase your hull strength, or get an extra slot to mount a battleship weapon. 

The weapons come in with all sorts of benefits, restrictions and recharge times. Battleships can also deploy all sorts of support squadrons, from fighters to frigates. Each ship has strengths and weaknesses against other types. 

Drones do bonus damage versus frigates, frigates are good versus fighters, and fighters kill drones very well. So deploying the right ship to counter your enemy's tactics becomes an important part of the battle. 

If you die in the heat of battle, you lose all your officers, weapons, upgrades and scrap. Death will sent you back to square one, and another of your clone will take over the journey with his own officers and crew. 

Death is not the end, only an inconvenience. The story is masterfully crafted, the art and music are all on point, and the presentation ties it all together beautifully. 

"Crying Suns" is available on the Microsoft Windows.