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Description
An unexpected Shivan invasion has opened a second front deep behind our lines. We don't have the resources to fight them off. This could spell the end of the war and our species...
Storyline: 
The underlying storyline of The Aeos Affair isn't particularly spectacular, dealing with a Shivan invasion from the far edge of Terran - Vasudan space. However, into this fairly basic premise some nice touches are added, such as an artificial jump corridor and the standard of Command briefings and briefings is high throughout. There are a couple of minor spelling errors, but they don't detract from the storyline to any great degree. The storyline is also told from two different viewpoints: the first the GTVA and the second a narrator. This is fairly effective, though I felt that the campaign could have done with one more command briefing near to the end. The standard of messages in the missions is good, and they announce all the important events, though there are a few spelling errors. I would have liked to see some more chatter in mission though. There are now no spelling errors in the missions, and the new Command briefings and briefings that have been added with new and revised missions now flesh the story out a great deal more and give more reasoning to why the Shivans lose. There's even some extra chatter in the missions, some of which is general banter, and some which means something in the mission.
Balance: 
No bones about it, this campaign is tough. It really is, as the author says designed for expert players only, and I had some difficulty with a couple of the missions. Despite being tough, you never feel frustrated by the difficulty of the campaign. The extremely generous loadouts give you the opportunity of making the missions easier or harder on yourself. Bearing in mind the difficulty of the campaign these loadouts are justified though it would've been nice to see the player forced to take something other than an Ares with dual Kaysers or a similarly powerful bomber. The author also added several shortcuts in missions, which will aid a player, though they'll have to pay close attention to the briefings for hints. The missions are nice and varied, offering escort, strike, defence and other missions in fighters and in bombers. However, in some cases I felt that the goals were rather strict – in one mission I destroyed almost everything, with only one vessel escaping and was forced to replay the mission. The campaign is still tough, and still only for expert players. I still had difficulty with a couple of missions, having to play them through several times, but it was more challenging than frustrating. The loadouts have been tightened up – indeed, in some of the new missions the best weapon you can have is a Prometheus S, and the Ares isn't even available in most missions. The inclusion of the new missions adds two more types into the mix – dogfight and chase, so the campaign is brimming over with wildly varied missions. As for the strict goals, they're still to be found. However, the author has included more messages and briefing text to make the goals clearer.
Design:
Design in Aeos is generally very good. There are, however, some small design errors which add up to slightly reduce the design score. Capital ships suffer from some pretty bag 'jitterbug' effects due to the lack of waypoints for them sometimes, and yet at other times they are fully waypoint pathed. The artificial subspace portal is innovative, but the mini explosive devices aren't radar shielded in the second from last mission. There are also a couple of illogical debriefings. In previous versions there were a bunch of errors, some of which halted progressing though the campaign but thankfully due to the author's dedication there have been regular updates. Design isn't necessarily as clean as it could've been – send-message-list s-exps come to mind, though some good combined s-exps have been used. However, most of this is minor stuff that won't affect gameplay. Design has been improved considerably, with better waypoint paths preventing the 'jitterbug' effect on all but one occasion, and small errors like the visible explosion devices removed. The author has also tightened up the general design of the missions, including send-message-lists and so on where appropriate. The debriefings also now make sense, thankfully, and some of the ship placement in the revised missions (the final one in particular) is excellent. The only major problem I noticed was a timing error or two in the second mission, with pirates revealing themselves before the message appeared.
Gameplay:
Aeos is great fun throughout the whole of the campaign. This is probably because of the variety of mission objectives and locations, which range from a planet's rings to a hostile nebula. The missions remain fun despite the difficulty as well, which is quite an achievement. The missions did suffer from 'Battle of Endor Syndrome', where capital ships do all the fighting and the pilot has little effect on the outcome a couple of times, but these usually didn't last too long. This was most apparent during the final couple of missions in the campaign, though the player has a lot to do in the final mission anyway. A Sathanas is pretty tough already, but this one has three of four extra BFRed super cannons... The missions are still as fun as they were before, as IÂ’ve said. What's more, the new missions are also great. Two of them are shorter than the other missions if you play them right, and provide a bit of relief from long hauls. The Third, 'Dieppe', is a tense, fun mission and without a doubt my favourite of the new missions. However, that isnÂ’t all that's changed. The final mission has been re-jigged and is now an excellent escort, assault and defence all rolled into one. It's also the best way of dealing with a Sathanas I've seen yet. Speaking of the Medusa, it's also less well armed, but still slightly modified. All of the changes add up to less Endor, too...
Other Thoughts:
Definitely the best campaign I've seen released. Boomerang pales by comparison (no offence Peter). This one's a keeper. The campaign also has good play length simply because of the time required to complete each mission! Still the best campaign out there, but now even more so. The campaign is a good length too. Also, a big thank you to PickleHead, the author of the campaign, for unceasingly updating his campaign, despite my nit-picking... :-)
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