Stardock CEO Brad Wardell has revealed on Gamastura that Sins of a Solar Empire has now sold 500,000 units with 400,000 sold at retail and 100,000 sold via digital distribution. This is a great success for a relatively low-key game which has been able to generate a strong following over the months since it was released.

Wardell feels that the success of the game can be put down in part to the low system requirements that Sins has.

“Sins of a Solar Empire was explicitly designed to work on a wide variety of machines, It will run on a four-year-old video card, and it looks great.”

“You make those kinds of design decisions, and you greatly increase the number of people who can play your game. You lose out on some piddly super-mega effect, but you get those units. The results come in sales.”

Wardell was talking about the decision that was made to stop ship turrets moving in-game. In a world where games like Crysis are demanding the latest in computer technology to play well it is a delight to see Sins playable on older hardware. A smart design decision by Stardock and Ironclad Games.