ÆON Community

Ok so me and my mate Alick (aka. Steel) have been smashing into DoWII (Dawn of War 2) whenever I have a free night.

Anyone that knows me will know that I care very little for strategy games…but there’s just something about this game that makes me go back everytime. Even with the crappy lag, even with GWFL and even with the frustrating AI I still go back and tear up some Xenos whenever I can.

Yes I know I’m making a post about a game that was out ages ago…I dont care, its awesome.

Maybe its the sound…because everytime I hear an Ork scream “BACK UP LIVELY!!!!” or “IM GETT’N OUT OF ‘ERE” I laugh as I fly my Assault squads to land in front of them and force them to stay and die. Everytime I hear my Space marines scream “COME! Show me the fury of your misbegotten kind!” I get all wet and sticky. Those only account for a very VERY small portion of the vocals that you are treated to, I especially love the Narrator for the Eldar and his: “Exarch, prepare to lead your warriors!”.

Perhaps its just the insane battles and skirmishes that you manage to crawl your way into unsuspectingly. Each time a squad of Hormagaunts is deep striked on top of my units to create chaos amoungst my heavy weapons squads I get excited as I need to formulate a plot to tear them asunder lest I lose very expensive units (Seriously…Space marines are so goddamn expensive in that game)

Perhaps its the single player? I know that it really lacks replayability…but for the initial part I was so stuck on finishing it. You only control 4 squads at any given time and you have 6 to choose from and even then each squad has completely customisable armour, weapons and items making it part of the whole game strategy to kit our your troops according to your enemy.

Perhaps its just the awesome and well desinged units that you can control…anything from tadpoles with spikey arms all the way through to tanks, giant walkers with swords and even the Flaming Avatar of the God Khaine. In between is a massive amount of units that you can choose to help change the outcome of your battle…too many tanks? Get rockets. Too many units? Get some Banshee’s or Heavy melee soldiers. Too many GODDAMN Carnifexes? Try 3 squads of Assault Terminators

Perhaps its just my inner 40k Fanboyism coming out…who knows.

Personally I think its just the ability to play either the Pious Commander who is deadset on victory regardless of the cost of lives to the enemy or play as a Horde General who leads amassed forces to overrun and destroy the pious and well organised armies.

I really do enjoy this RTS over any I have played so far and often I quote it but not many people understand the references…I think it shines in comparison to the original DOW games and I really hope they do what they did for the first set of games, and release new packs with new races. I would love to play the Dark Eldar, Tau, Imperial Guard and Chaos in this game…but I think they should first work on a campaign mode for the Eldar and get people excited about using them. Else everyone will just pick the Adeptus Astartes Space Marines.

EDIT: Heres the trailer for those that dont know about the game: