If you are familiar with the acclaimed 4x strategy game Sins of a Solar Empire (SoaSE) you will know of the huge scale of the space battles and the intricacies of spreading your empire. If not then it is about building huge fleets of space ships and sending them to fight other huge fleets of space ships and the winner of the two opposing huge fleets of ships in space gets control of what ever planet happens to be below the aforementioned space ship fleets (That are Huge).
Sins of the Prophets (SotP) is a great Halo based mod for SoaSE Entrenchment (with a planned released for Rebellion at a later date) that brings something that the Halo games have never full shown or developed, the epic space battles from the Halo books. The space battles are a prime part of the books and the Halo canon but it is only slightly glossed over in the Halo games.
SotP places you in command of the entire UNSC/ Covenant/ Forerunner empire and pits you against all those that stand in the way of your empire's supremacy. The UNSC is the only playable faction at the moment, released in a public beta on moddb.com. The Covenant are being worked on and released at a later date. When the Covenant are done SotP will be transferred over to SoaSE Rebellion and the Forerunners will then be released.
SotP seeks to stay as close to the canon of the Halo books as possible. The UNSC require at least 3 to 1 odds to win against Covenant ships with thousands of opposing ships engaging each other across a universe of planets and stars. Super Mass Acceleration Cannons (SMACs, from Halo 2 and Halo: The Fall of Reach) really do put rounds clean through Covenant capital ships. But with the Covenant not released yet the mod is currently based in 2543, 9 years before the first Halo installation is found. The UNSC is still in heated battle with Insurrectionist forces, whom have acquired the means to combat the UNSC in space.
The battling in SotP is quite distinct from that of SoaSE. Most battles are fast paced and dominating the various solar systems requires you to stay on your toes and plan ahead.
If you like Halo, the Halo books and/or the following: strategy games, SoaSE, watching things explode, awesomeness then check out SotP.
Here are some relevant links:
SotP Moddb page: Here you can find the UNSC public beta download and many renders and screenshots of all ships that have been finished including Covenant and Forerunner.
Link to Sins of the Prophets Beta Download
Officail SotP Website: Here you can find exclusive news on SotP, directly contact the developers, see what is coming up for SotP and help create SotP with your suggestions and ideas.
SotP Facebook: Like their page and let them know you support them.
I will now finish this with the current SotP promotional video and backgrounds and some gameplay screenshots.
For those interested, SotP promotional backgrounds:
New Capital Ship and Frigate factories added:
Fleet Combat
YSS-1000 (Sabre)
GA-TL1 Longsword-class
Halcyon-class light cruiser (Regular and Refit)
They used the Halo CE Pillar for the Regular and The Halo: Reach Pillar as the Refit
Marathon-class heavy cruiser
Paris-class heavy frigates entering Slip-Space
Here, just to wet the beak:
Covenant Assault Carrier
First Forerunner Structure added ingame. It is a portal similar to that found on Earth and it allows instant travel around the universe:
All of those models and textures are SotP original work, none of them are edited. I realize there are a lot of photos but name one that isn't awesome. I was also nice and put them in spoiler tags. That is just a small selection of the 100% completed UNSC fleet.
That is all you get for now.
Link to the Sins of the Prophets screenshot section.
Credit to the SotP community on SotP.com for the pictures.