We apologize for the inconvenience. January 1 was set as a placeholder release date for Entrenchment after the initial release was pushed back, but due to the server failures over the holiday we were unable to push the date further forward until after it had already popped up "for sale" for a short while.

If you mistakenly purchased it during the time it was showing as live on Impulse and do not wish to preorder/beta Entrenchment, please inquire with sales@stardock.com about a refund.

Since it was installed with Impulse, Impulse uninstalls it. You can easily play the original Sins without Entrenchment beta.

Ah I see, so I am merely victim of coincidence - bad timing and not bad practice. Apology accepted Meester Kryo, ta.

Orodum - I don't want to be a BETA tester or d/l a beta and never did. The product was sold as complete without the word BETA being anywhere in purchase process until you actually run it. I found it to be an unexpectently ugly practice given Stardock rep, but Meester Kryo has clarified it was an accident with refund available so I am happy with that response. It is the principal of the thing - knowing they are not intentionally being deceptive fixes everything. Mistakes are not good, but given all factors of timing, these things can happen so that's life.

Thanks amnatar, I was unaware impulse was required to uninstall the game. As it happens, mine's a complete mess cos I let windows try uninstall the bETA and windows has wrecked the original too. I like it better when games including xpacs all have an uninstall tab so there is no confusion as to process but mebbe that is a BETA quirk.

Ta all. Moving on...

I completely agree with AU_Armageddon.  I did the same exact thing he did not even knowing it was beta.  I'm such a fan of Sins though I was like whatever that's cool.  But unfortunately a great game I'm in won't load anymore.  Been playing it for a couple days and now I'm bummed I can't finish it.

Very cool though that kryo responded with an explaination, apology, and an offer of refund.  I like Stardock.

Looking forward to the final (stabile) release.

There's some good feedback here, actually. Impulse should NOT show a release date on something if the release date isn't known. Don't put in placeholder dates, especially ones that are obviously wrong. "Release Date: Unknown (currently in beta)" would have prevented this misunderstanding.

I understand if AU's "attack" on Stardock is upsetting, but the issue has been resolved. Please avoid personal insults.

Ok i'm sorry for saying that i'm jsut angry that peopel are attacking stardock. I don't think peopel should attack a company when it's just trying to stay up. I'd say they are doing great. When i meant check the forums or at least check this site i meant to find out if this is beta. I'm sorry for being insulting and i was just angry. Besides if you wait a month or 2 the real game will be out i don't know that is so bad. A month wait. I've waited quite a while.

So I say goddam I got tricked by stardock into being a BETA TESTER and even paying for the privelage. Very well done, kudos to you business types but leaves pissed off customer whose experience is no so keen as when I entered into this relationship.

Worse, I think it is time we broke up cos I thought fine - wasted my money, I'll just uninstall the BETA I paid for but Sins doesn't have uninstall in launcher or start. So I use windows remove prgrams to remove Entrenchment but guess what now Sins dont even work. I got lots of files and a big mess and two games I paid for, well one game and one beta, and nothing works.

I have to say is this attacking really. Stardock tricked him into it. This sounds more like a rant than a complain. I would have liked it if it was more fact based than opinion. I agree that teh issue is resolved with his complaint about not knowing it was a beta and i have to agree taht would be fustrating.

Paying for the privelage of being a beta tester is also very plausible. Would you want to create a game going into a million dollars in debt just to wait until the game came out to make money. I think it provides income and if it was free to join it's just like giving you the game free.

It doesn't say beta test. It says "pre-order" in one easy to miss spot on the page, except during the time Kryo mentioned where it didn't.

They admitted there was a problem there, which is good customer service.

Agreed and sorry.

rabid fanboy defense of Stardock

Us rabid fanboy's also have to have something to do.

People are now expected to go check the forums in order to verify that products the store are properly labelled?

Did i even imply that. I didn't say that. He's also on the forums now. He must have been angry if he didn't check the forums before to know it was beta that he created an account JUST to insult stardock.

The way it sounded to me is that he jumped into the game without thinking about looking around. Do you buy something without at least checking a little bit about it. I've done that and its a win lose scenario. It may be great it may not. Entrenchment is in early beta testing. Thing is he complained about how poorly the game is. Its not just him insulting how stardock does it's selling and marketting and everything but he's also targetting ironclad about the game. The game is beta. He must have learned it was beta at the loading screen and then relized "oh no" a quick post about not knowing it was beta would be fine.

This WAS an insult to how stardock does things. I'm sorry but if you or armageddon could run starddock better or are even qualified to please let me know. I know i'm not.

Also you pretty much attacked me. 99% of what i said is up there being picked apart. I'm sorry if i'm defending someone with a little bit of anger. I do agree with you no insults were needed but the post was poorly thought out. He could have stated taht he didn't know and he'd like a refund. Small post no longer than a few lines. He CONTINUED on to attack the game and say how horrible it was. IT'S A BETA.

FORMAL APPOLOGY HERE. Sorry for attacking armageddon about this post. I wrote it on a bad day. I appoligize scencerily but i still am angry that you did just as much attacking unto me as you accused me of. I'm sorry if this post sounded angry at peopel it's just meant to help peopel relize that not everythign is perfect and we can't expect that of stardock. (Nothing is perfect.)(Expecially my previous post.)

touche' sorry i didn't see that reply lol i must have skipped it (BIG OVERSIGHT) i did read teh whole post and i got down a few before i wrote my own. I red teh first 3 literally then skipped like 2 then kept reading at teh 2starbucks coffies and a newspaper. Seriouslly i did. WOW i feel um... stupid... ya

I remember when I bought/pre-ordered Entrenchment it clearly states you have access to the beta version till the official release, I would check this up to confirm on impluse but I am at work. 

I see a lot of things here I agree with. I too "purchased" the beta without the realization that it was in fact a beta. Better announcement of the prodcut would be appreciated. The fact that it's not listed as a beta anywhere on the product  page, directly accesible from the "Top Sellers" list, made it seem like a late Christmas present. Since it's been removed fromt the "Top Sellers" list I'm assuming that there are more people like me who made the same mistake. The fact that my listed price in the confirmation email was $0.00 made me realize I haven't paid for anything yet.

The beta, as it stands right now, is a mess. The starbases don't work, meaning the upgrades don't do anything, and I had all sorts of resource malfunctions buying ships, upgrades, tech and so on. Credits/Minerals being mysteriously added then removed, being able to purchase items on "credit" or going negative was kind of a let down. My experience was that the client never got "chunky". But my buddy and I didn't want to finish out game because of the game play issues..which leads me on to my next gripe.

Stardock...please don't go the way of the dodo by becoming a crappy game company. I dislike the idea of having to download a client specifically to ensnare me into Impulse..unless I missed something that was the only way to get the most recent release...if I'm mistaken I'd love to be corrected. Secondly, after uninstalling entrenchment the correct way I soon realized that it didn't peel back to the previous version of the Sins client. Instead I had to redownload and reinstall the client. Once again, if I'm mistaken I do appologize. Long story short, my joyfull "Entrenchment is here!" call to the rest of the clan quickly became "It's not entrenchment, it's a wannabe beta that will make you vomit and then force you to completely start over with your sins client!"

In my opinion, and I've been playing games for longer than I care to consider, it's hard for a developer to make a great game like SOASE is, truly amazing in fact. It's very easy for a game developer to fall from grace simply because they want to make things cooler. EA almost lost my business with EA link and Northern Strike, I have friends who still aren't able to redownload NS after reinstall of 2142 without paying for it a second time for a "fresh copy". We aren't rocket scientists but we're not blathering idiots, true gamers don't need a flashy program or easy access. If it's a great game that comes wrap in poop, we'll still install it and then wash our hands.

I have to agree with Orodum.

I bought the game as a beta just like i did with SINS and i enjoy trying out the beta's and get a real impression of the game and the effort the compay puts into listening what beta testers say.

PS i looked at the time stamps and did anyone else notice Kryo posted in under 10 mins offering a refund? Now that is some service. I dont care if he was surfing or whatever and just happened to see the thread it still shows a lot about the company.

At least in my experience with other betas, I expected quite a few less show stoppers for the game... eg, its basically unplayable for me in anything but single player.  I was more thinking I'd get to see how the devs balanced the game and worked with our feedback to make the experience better... and now all I care about is getting a bug fix so there are no longer desyncs... I was probably playing 2-3 sins games a week before the beta rolled out.  I haven't touched the game now in over 3 weeks.  How about some sort of hotfix, or are the desyncs all tied to the rediculous amount of mines later in the game?

Most companies' betas are little more than prerelease demos. Ours are not. The only reason there haven't been any updates yet has been because of the holiday break.