The synthesis and characterization of the thieno[3,2-b]thiophene and dithieno[3,2-b:2'3'-d]thiophene containing platinum(II) poly-ynes and their molecular precursors is described and the electronic structure is established by absorption, luminescence and photoinduced absorption measurements. A comparison of the electronic structure of the fused and the nonfused oligothiophenes, thieno[3,2-b]thiophene, dithieno[3,2-b:2',3'-d]thiophene, 2,2'-bithiophene, and 2,2':5',2 ''-terthiophene incorporated in platinum(II) poly-ynes is reported. We find the singlet Si and triplet, T, and T. excited states to be at higher energy in thin films made from the fused systems than from the nonfused systems. For ligands with the same number of rings, we attribute this to the decreased number of double bonds in the fused system and to the presence of an additional sulfur atom in spacers with the same number of double bonds.