It’s a holiday weekend, and normally that means more time for gaming. So, what are you going to play? If you’re not sure, or you’re looking for something new, Stardock has a sale going on right now that is definitely worth a look.

If you’re not familiar with Stardock’s digital distribution platform, Impulse, this would be a good time to give it a look. After all, they’re offering some great deals, like Call of Duty 4 for just $34.99 and Sins of a Solar Empire with its expansion for just $29.99.

The sale also includes titles like the complete Unreal series, Prototype, Red Faction Guerilla, and more. You can get your copy of Impulse and check out all the deals at ImpulseDriven.com

You can also see the full list of games on sale, along with their prices, after the break.

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Kalypso Media (Sins of a Solar Empire) have announced their next title Ceville an action packed romp full of point and click adventure that is coming out December 31 for the PC.

Currently in development from Boxed Dream, Ceville is was a tyrant who ruled the fairy-tale realm of Faeryanis. The land is in danger because the peasants and citizens revolted against his authoritarian regime and consequently drove him out of the realm. The kindhearted Queen Gwendolyn now reigns over the kingdom with a council of noble and wise counselors to assist her.

But the peace is not long-lasting, the treacherous Basilius – counselor of Gwendolyn and of Ceville before her plans to murder queen Gwendolyn, take the crown and subdue the realm with the help of murderous beasts he summons from the planes of eternal darkness. All seems lost! But hope resides with the one most unlikely person imaginable to save the kingdom and restore peace to the realm: Ceville, the realm’s former despotic ruler…

Choose to play Ceville himself or alternatively select, Ambrosius, the pompous and self-important knight or Lilly, a quirky, but kind and gentle girl.

For more screens, etc hit this link for the FileFront page featuring the rest of the new screens.

Stardock CEO Brad Wardell recently talked about his company’s goal to avoid the congested holiday rush and release a game during the first quarter every year. While they’ve already got Demigod set for release in February, they’ll be adding another game to their 2009 release list, as Sins of a Solar Empire Entrenchment has been delayed.

Originally scheduled for release on November 18, the game will now make its way out sometime next year. The exact date hasn’t been determined, but according to a post on the official Sins forums “it will largely depend on beta feedback.” Those who can’t wait that long for some new Sins action will be able to participate in the beta by preordering the game.

Considering what Wardell said, I can’t help but think they wanted to wait until after the holidays to release the game. Opening up a beta is a nice gesture towards diehard fans who will no doubt be disappointed with the news.

Publishers traditionally aim many of the big, triple-A releases for the fall, holiday rush period — this year being no exception, as this week and the past few have demonstrated. It’s hell on the wallets of gamers and on their schedules. With that in mind, Stardock has a very novel idea that CEO Brad Wardell hopes they can manage: Avoid the the holiday rush and release a game early in the year.

“What we try to do is we want to release a title every first quarter of every year,” Wardell told Gamasutra. “For as far out as our schedule goes — that’s five or six years — there’s a game coming out.”

Sins of a Solar Empire did exactly that earlier this year when it was released in February. Next up for Stardock is Demigod which is slated for February 2009. Beyond that, there’s no indication of what Stardock is planning on releasing, though the 2011 release is already locked in. Wardell claims the company has more games in development and that “we’re in the process of building a second games team.”

Future releases from Stardock will continue to be a combination of internally and externally developed games, with the latter coming from companies like Ironclad and Gas Powered Games, provided “they still like us,” Wardell said.

It’s an interesting proposition. After all, many people find themselves with some cash, gift cards, and things to return in the weeks following the Christmas period, and having a big PC release waiting for gamers around that time when the market isn’t quite so saturated with new releases sounds like a pretty solid strategy.

Kalypso Media (Sins of a Solar Empire) have announced their next title Ceville an action packed romp full of point and click adventure that is coming out sometime this Winter for the PC.

Currently in development from Boxed Dream, Ceville is was a tyrant who ruled the fairy-tale realm of Faeryanis. The land is in danger because the peasants and citizens revolted against his authoritarian regime and consequently drove him out of the realm. The kindhearted Queen Gwendolyn now reigns over the kingdom with a council of noble and wise counselors to assist her.

But the peace is not long-lasting, the treacherous Basilius – counselor of Gwendolyn and of Ceville before her plans to murder queen Gwendolyn, take the crown and subdue the realm with the help of murderous beasts he summons from the planes of eternal darkness. All seems lost! But hope resides with the one most unlikely person imaginable to save the kingdom and restore peace to the realm: Ceville, the realm’s former despotic ruler…

Choose to play Ceville himself or alternatively select, Ambrosius, the pompous and self-important knight or Lilly, a quirky, but kind and gentle girl.

For more screens, etc hit the link. Ceville is expected to hit shelves on December 31.

Alongside the news of the new Gamer’s Bill of Rights, Stardock has announced that a trio of smaller-scale expansion packs are in development for Sins of a Solar Empire. The first of these expansions, Entrenchment, will be released later this year for $9.95. Developer Ironclad Games is also at work at two further micro-expansions, one of which will add new diplomacy features, and the other, new technologies and ships.

Entrenchment will add “a Starbase defense platform for each race (extremely powerful and armored bases housing a variety of weapons and other upgrades capable of defending an entire planet), turret upgrades for each race to make them more powerful (not only stronger than the current versions, but also upgradable with long-range weapons), mine fields and a Subspace Inhibitor platform that will slow enemy ships within its range.” I’m all about huge, Death Star-like battlestations, so I’m sold on the addition of the Starbase alone.

Stardock CEO Brad Wardell explained the reasoning behind doing micro-expansions as a way to provide players with more choice than the traditional expansion pack presents. “We’re excited about being able to deliver expansion packs in a more modular way than traditionally. Now players can pick and choose what features they want rather than paying a higher price for a larger expansion pack which may have features they aren’t interested in,” said Wardell.

It’ll be hard to complain with that logic, since the $10 price point isn’t asking too much if this is simply one third of an expansion pack. Plus, fans can get new content more quickly this way rather than waiting for an entire expansion to be completed. Stay tuned to 1UP for more details on Entrenchment.

Features and fixes are abound for Stardock’s digital distribution platform. Phase two of Impulse has been released today, bringing with it several new 2K Games to the service, albeit none that are new by any measure other than their release date on Impulse. Civilization III, Sid Meier’s Railroads!, Sid Meier’s Pirates! and Shattered Union comprise the almost-exclusively Sid Meier lovefest.

The new games are far from the focus, though. We reported last week on a preview of Phase 2 that Stardock CEO Brad Wardell had posted on his blog. Technical fixes, faster loading and download times, are among the changes that the update brings. Wardell also promised that we’d be seeing Achievements, the affiliates program, and the big v1.1 update to Sins of a Solar Empire soon after Phase 2’s release, so look for that (hopefully) in the next few weeks.

Stardock’s next major goal is Phase 3, but that’s much further out. It’s scheduled to release next February which, in the meantime, will leave Stardock to flesh out its third-party partners. Those who are using Impulse purely as a platform for gaming will expect to see far more than its current offering, particularly with something like Grand Theft Auto IV on the horizon. Going forward, that’s absolutely going to have to be a priority for Impulse, as it doesn’t have enough differentiating features to set it apart from Steam — yet.

Stardock’s digital distribution platform, Impulse, has been available for two months now, and it’s about time for the first major update. Dubbed “Phase 2,” this update had been previously promised to include Achievement and game rankings support, as well as a slate of other features and new software and support from publishers. Capcom added its first games to Impulse earlier this month, perhaps signaling the beginning of Phase 2’s release which has been planned for a late August release.

Brad Wardell, Stardock’s CEO, has posted a preview of the new features and technical issues Phase 2 will address. Four issues — which Wardell claims account for 99% of technical complaints — are going to be fixed. Faster load times, downloads and updates encompass the majority of what to expect on that front.

As for features, the biggest addition will be the new community features and the addition of matchmaking. The Political Machine 2008 will be the first to employ matchmaking. Hardcore PC gamers have previously expressed their disdain of matchmaking compared to the usual server browser, but this should make things much easier for newcomers — which a game like Political Machine is catered to bringing in.

In addition, support will be added for smart queing, which will make it easy to install multiple programs; mod libraries/galleries, where you can view mods for a particular game within Impulse; freeware support, which will allow you to install and update third-party freeware through Impulse, making it easier to reinstall your software en masse on a new computer.

The much-hyped ImpulseReactor and MyImpulse will start showing up, too. While MyImpulse won’t be released to the public until Phase 3 (currently scheduled for February 2009), a private beta will begin with Phase 2’s release. This will allow publishers and developers to more easily and quickly release their content on Impulse.

ImpulseReactor includes a slew of features (some of which are already in Impulse and others that we’ve been waiting for) that developers will be able to use in their games without requiring gamers to actually install Impulse, such as Achievements, matchmaking, NAT negotiation, and more. Don’t expect to see all of this right off the bat, though — this will just enable developers to start implementing the features in their games.

A number of those features, as well as other things, will be releasing soon after Phase 2 rolls out. Those include rankings, Achievements, the v1.1 update to Sins of a Solar Empire, and the affiliates program. While it might not have the support Steam does from third-party game publishers (yet), Stardock seems to be making great strides with Impulse.

Stardock has sent word that the latest version of Sins of a Solar Empire Version 1.1 is available as an optional beta. The real-time strategy game will look and perform better than ever with the latest patch in place.

Sins v. 1.1 introduces a new multiplayer system called “Alloy” which eliminates the need for configuring routers or changing port numbers. Players will also find a new graphics engine update for an outstanding upgrade on visuals and new damage animations.

This huge patch is only available as a download through Stardock’s new digital distribution platform, Impulse. Check out the Sins of a Solar Empire website for the latest information.

I’ve always appreciated Stardock’s approach to copyright protection. There’s no DRM to deal with. If you own the game, you get the updates for free. If you enjoy RTS and space faring combat, this is definitely a game you should check out.

Gas Powered Games has unveiled the first official trailer for their upcoming RTS/RPG hybrid, Demigod. The game will have you taking control of one giant unit (a “demigod”) who can then create other units for various tasks. The game will also feature some RPG elements as your main unit’s abilities can be upgraded, not to mention all the visuals look amazing. Considering this is being developed by the same studio behind Supreme Commander and being published by the same company behind Sins of a Solar Empire, this is definitely a game for RTS fans to keep an eye on.