Sins of a Solar Empire contradicts a lot of conventional wisdom. It’s a game for the PC, which obviously no one uses for games any more except World of Warcraft. It’s a real-time strategy game that mixes in a lot of elements of 4X games like Civilization and is fairly complex as a result, which goes against the trend of such games simplifying their gameplay to appeal to wider audiences (hello, SimCity Societies and Civilization Revolution). Like all Stardock games, it has absolutely no copy protection, which means no one will buy it because it’s so easy to steal.

All of the above means sales should be dismal. No one plays complicated games on a PC that they can swipe without even using a crack. And yet Sins of a Solar Empire beat Call of Duty 4 to take top spot on the PC sales charts last week. The game has sold over 100,000 copies in 23 days, a not-insignificant sum for an indie publisher like Stardock and an indie developer like the Vancouver-based Ironclad. In addition to besting Call of Duty 4 last week, Sins has outperformed highly anticipated PC games like Crysis and Unreal Tournament 3.

I bought a copy for myself based solely on a Joystiq preview a couple of days before release, and it’s the best impulse game purchase I’ve made in a very long time. I just didn’t realize so many people agreed with me.