I've posted here before saying that I really hate previews because what they represent rarely come to fruition. But since I've played the first two demos, and just watched a cool movie on the third, I'll break my vow of preview silence.

Startopia vs. Tropico: After playing the obviously limited demos, I would say that Startopia looks about a billion times more fun. Tropico is so tired it isn't even funny. I think rollercoaster tycoon has more "fun" built into it than this game. I just don't get it. Unless you can really get involved in some sort of tactical combat (fighting a guerilla army in the hills would be interesting), then I don't see what would keep you glued to this. The reviewer at Stategygamingonline.com raved about Tropico, but I don't get it. I generally think they do a great job of reviewing games, and I've bought a number on their recommendation, but Tropico appears to have no real strategy element at all except, "where do I build my tenemant? how can I get the most money in my swiss bank account (who cares????)? etc." Some reviews have mentioned the comedy and the music. Maybe I'm too pc, but I just don't find parody's of Latin America all that funny anymore. I mean, Bananas was great 30 years ago, but it just doesn't do it for me anymore. And the music??? Huh? If I want to enjoy latin music I'll pop in my Buena Vista Social Club cd in the drive before I bother with Tropico.

*rant off*

Startopia looks really neat. Not exactly engrossing, but at least it looks pretty fresh (give me the 3d baby!), and the environment is so cool. On the demo, run the biodeck level and move the camera outside the window. Boom! The background music stops and you are in Outer Space. Hover around and check out the entire station. Cool! The biodeck, and most of the alien interaction, really reminds me a lot of Black and White (fun while it lasted). The game reminds me of a cross between DS9 (not a fan) and Farscape (huge fan). I don't know how much I'll really play it, but they might get my money (I have no problem supporting the industry in an economic capacity when they work hard for me).

Sigma: great gamespot video (thanks 1/4-2-3 for pointing it out to me- and thank you brand new cable modem). The creature creation looks clean and fun. I can imagine playing mix and match for the first solid hour after firing it up. The fast rts pacing is ok, but the graphics look sweet, the camera control looks excellent (GroundControlesque), and the scale looks fun. I'm not sold on the creature animations though, they looked a little fake. I realize this is an E3 build which probably means nothing. Nothing at all. But if it does come close to the released game then I'm hot to trot for it.

-Rob

"I'm not sold on the creature animations though, they looked a little fake. I realize this is an E3 build which probably means nothing."

The guy demoing the game did mention that all the animations are not in yet.

Sigma could be a great game or it could be one of those fun-for-the-first-few-hours games.