Sins of a Galactic Empire Joins Chokepoint Games news

Today, the teams behind Sins of the Prophets, Sins of a Galactic Empire, Operation: HOMEFRONT, and Evolutions: Real Time Strategy Evolved — renowned mods for Sins of a Solar Empire, Homeworld, and Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars respectively — are proud to announce that they are joining forces to create Chokepoint Games, a fan development studio to pool their collective knowledge, talent, and skill.

Previously, each mod team operated under different fan studio names: Slugfest Studios, Broken Line Studios, and 363 Productions; however, the overlap of staffing between these projects was extremely high and each team’s leadership worked in concert with one another throughout the development process for each project (going so far as to deconflict release schedules). The reality is that these teams shared so much manpower and planning that they were essentially one large group and the separation was largely due to precedent and modding norms.

The sharing of resources and manpower became more pronounced last year as several members from each team began working together on a new modding project for Arma 3. The line between who worked where became much fuzzier after that point. Discussion about the appropriate home for this new project started to cement and it was decided that Slugfest would “own” the new mod. Credit and attribution is important in modding because these projects are often centerpiece items on portfolios for aspiring game developers, so these types of discussions are natural when enough people are involved. Though, we’re not quite ready to talk about this project yet.

With the understanding that Slugfest was about to become more public facing, we realized that Slugfest’s studio name should change due to legal concerns with younger, but more official, entities with that name. As we continued to work on our respective projects and shared resources for the joint project it became clearer that it would benefit us all to become a unified studio, share a digital workspace, and formalize our unified planning. So, the decision was made among the studio heads that we would form one studio under the name Chokepoint Games. Each mod still has a coherent development team within Chokepoint, but with a unified workspace the flow of information and assistance between these projects is more fluid.

Now what does this mean for SoGE and the future of this mod? I need not mention that mod has been without update for years, and certain aspects of it are either entirely broken (non-Random maps) or missing (Minor Factions). The last news post is from over a year ago, saying I was neck deep in RL. Fortunately, by May, this should clear up some, allowing me to formally resume SoGE. Further, with the collective staff of Chokepoint Games now formally being of assistance, I will have more help for working on the mod, in particular with areas of which I lack skills such as art and music. There are some aspects I can guarantee will be included, such as fixed maps, Minor Factions support, multiple new art assets, and new missile weapon particles to reduce lag during combat. There are other bits I hope, but cannot ensure, will be done such as UI overhaul and improvement.

The tunnel has been long and dark, but the light at the end is growing ever brighter. We’re all working together, to varying degrees, to bring you the finest mods we can muster. And maybe someday more.

Thank you for your continued support and patience,

Lavo
SoGE Project Lead, Chokepoint Games

Unikraken
Studio Head, Chokepoint Games