Warhammer 40.000: Dawn of War II

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II is a real-time strategy video game developed by Relic Entertainment and published by THQ for Microsoft Windows.

Gameplay
Playable armies at the initial release of the game include the Space Marines, Orks, Eldar, and Tyranids.[4]

The gameplay of Dawn of War II is markedly different from that of Dawn of War and its expansions. Jonny Ebbert, the game's lead designer, describes the feel of the game by saying that it "takes everything that was great about the original and combines it with the best that Company of Heroes had to offer."[5] There is a heavier focus on cover, which gives more substantial defensive bonuses. Accordingly, there is also new emphasis on methods of dealing with units in cover. Some weapons, such as grenades and other explosives, can destroy cover, while others, such as flamers, ignore cover bonuses completely. Other differences between Dawn of War II and its predecessors include improved unit AI (squads under fire seek cover, for example), more realistically sized vehicles, and an improved physics engine.
As a Games for Windows - Live game, the game is one of the few PC games to use the Achievements system from the Xbox 360, and is the first widely released, PC-exclusive game to use them.

Campaign

Dawn of War II features a non-linear interplanetary campaign, playable as the Space Marines. The campaign can be played either as single-player or cooperatively with another player through an online connection.

The game's campaign departs from those of its predecessors in several key features. One of the most notable departures is that there are no base-building elements, unlike in previous Dawn of War titles. Relatedly, the player chooses the units to be used prior to beginning a mission, cannot build new units once the mission begins, and only has limited reinforcement options.

A major part of the campaign lies in choosing which battles and even planets to fight in, and there are consequences regarding which missions are chosen. There may be multiple distress calls to answer, for example, each available for only a limited duration. Once a mission is chosen, the player may still have to choose between various objectives, having to decide between saving civilians or obtaining a powerful piece of wargear, for example.

Once a warzone and mission is selected, the player chooses only four squads to take part in the coming battle. However, each squad is highly unique in its combat specialty, personality, and even the voice acting of its squad leader or sergeant. There is a strong narrative focus on the sergeants of these squads who can increase in experience and skills as the campaign progresses, and cannot ultimately be killed. Rather than dying in a mission, squad leaders are "knocked out" and can be revived either by a friendly unit in close proximity or upon completing the mission.

The campaign includes many elements traditionally associated with RPG-style games. Squad leaders and commander units can be equipped with the wargear which is gathered from battlefields and slain enemies and by accomplishing objectives during missions. Throughout the campaign, as a Space Marine kills enemies and achieves objectives, he gains experience, "levels up," learns new abilities, and gains bonuses.

Skirmish

Dawn of War II includes a skirmish game as well, playable either as single-player or multiplayer, and uses the Games for Windows - Live online gaming service for multiplayer games and matchmaking.

Prior to a match, a player chooses a faction and one of the chosen faction's three commanders. The various commanders are used to complement different strategies. For example, a player who chooses the Space Marine army can choose among the offense-oriented Force Commander, the support-oriented Apothecary, and the defense-oriented Techmarine.

Unlike most contemporary real-time strategy games, including Dawn of War, most of the unit and research production in Dawn of War II is done from an army's headquarters building, and unit upgrades are researched on the field of battle itself. The focus in the game is on frontline combat and unit-based tactics rather than the more traditional base-building style popularized in titles like StarCraft and the Age of Empires series.

There are only two game modes in the skirmish game thus far. There is the standard annihilation mode, where players attempt to completely destroy their opponents' units and structures, and the Control Point Victory mode, where the key to winning is controlling the critical victory points on the map until your opponent's victory points run down to zero. In both modes, players fight to control requisition and power nodes which supply factions with required resources.