8 Realms is a browser based real-time strategy game from Jagex Game Studios, which is free to play. Anyone familiar with The Settlers or Civilisation games will know what to expect, and players are tasked with building their empires from the humble Ancient age through to the high tech Future age. So is it worth spending your time on, when there are already so many other well-established games in the genre?

You begin the game by planting the foundations of your civilisation in a colourful glade with help from the wonderfully named Gary, who is basically your guide on how to play the game. Gary helps you navigate the menus, and makes suggestions on what you should do next. The menu system is clean and easy to use, and is very user friendly, which will help new players feel immediatly at home. The game world is viewed from an isometric viewpoint which works well, and lets you see the whole of your empire without any need to change camera angles etc. The graphics are functional, with a pleasant cartoony look to them. When you build your structures on the squares available, the area is animated with your townsfolk working away on the scene. Each ‘square’ is a self-contained part of the society, and you don’t need to worry about road systems to connect the various amenities together. The main aim of the game consists of constructing and researching to gain culture to help you progress to the next age. To reach the next age you need to reach 100% culture, and then build a Wonder to cement your empire. The 8 Realms of the title signifies the 8 different ages that you progress through. Ancient is obviously the first age, and as you progress you pass through the Classical, Feudal, Renaissance, Imperial, Industrial, Modern and finally Future ages.

Our mate Gary! Your number two.

As is the norm in these games, resource management is key to creating an all-conquering empire. You start the game with three resources: food, wood and stone. To earn these resources you need to build farms, lumber mills and quarries on the relevant squares where these resources are available. Unfortunately these buildings can take a very long time to build in real time, which slows down the gameplay. You can get gems which help speed up the process – but you need real money. These buildings are upgradeable, and you can add extra structures if you need more of a certain resource. The other main resource is Gold, which you gain by taxing your local population. This can be adjusted if you need extra finance, but don’t expect the local population to be too happy, as our own coalition government recently found out! You do have the option to appease the populous by building things to keep them happy. Building a library is an important aspect to your gameplan (take note Clegg and Cameron), as with it you can research new technology (um…), which gives you access to new building structures, classes of people and other bonuses. Research is laid out in a tree-like structure, where you need to research certain things to enable you to branch out into other areas.

Your kingdom is quite compact and bijou.

Once you have sustained your main city, you can then expand out into the wider world, where there are pockets of hostile barbarians who defend much needed resources. Once you have built up your army, through research and resources, you can raid or capture these outposts, and build your own trade outpost. Be warned though barbarians can attack these captured outposts, so you need to ensure that you have adequate defences to repel them. Unfortunately all the battles in 8 Realms are carried out automatically, and you don’t get to see any of the battles that ensue. It’s just a case of waiting to see if your troops triumph or are sent home in disgrace, with a Battle Report that gives you the details of what transpired.

You can expand your realm to the wider world.

8 Realms is a good introduction to the RTS genre for casual players, but we’re not sure more battle weary players will be intoxicated by its charms. The initial bit of land that you get to create your kingdom is small, which limits you somewhat; although its compact nature means it’s easy to keep an eye on what is happening in your glorious empire. The slow building process really hampers play, as some structures can take between one to four hours to build in real time! The gems help speed the building process up, but they are costly at £5 for 85 gems, which we can’t imagine many people forking out for. This means you spend a lot of time letting the game play itself, rather than you playing the game. However the basis is there for a decent game, which could well capture the casual crowd.

• Format: Xbox 360 (version reviewed), PS3, PC
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Ubisoft
• Developer: Eugen Systems
• Players: 2 – 4
• Site: ruse.uk.ubi.com/

Real-time strategy games are an intriguing genre, as the bare bones of their mechanics have been tested by children trying to better each other in the playground for years. Rock, paper, scissors is the classic example of when one force can cripple a second one, but is highly susceptible to yet another. R.U.S.E. shares some essential elements with everyone’s favourite ‘best out of three’ decision maker – except you can lie about how big your rock is, where your scissors are running off to and why your paper doesn’t seem to exist.

The big difference in this RTS is plastered across the front of the box. A ruse or “crafty stratagem” is a deceptive manoeuvre used to throw your opponent off guard. One of the game’s loading screens puts it nicely as “Make a sound in the east, then strike in the west”.

There is a wide selection of different ruses that can broadly be put into four categories. There are your information gathering ruses that can identify enemy units and their orders, there are concealment ruses that hide your units and movements, ruses for altering unit behaviour, and then there are decoy ruses that make your enemies brown their trousers over a large but fake offensive. You get a steady supply of ruse cards that are topped up periodically over the course of a game, letting you deploy them at regular intervals.

Tanks have never moved subtly to begin with, but that is idiot proof

A good ruse can be a real game changer, especially if your opponent has sent a massive task force to take out what he will soon discover to be a fleet of masking tape and sticky back plastic claiming to be tanks. Sticking real units in with the fakes can also be particularly devastating.

Another parallel that the game shares with rock, paper, scissors is that the large, slower children who believe the rock is unbeatable tend to be the ones who lose. You are going to have to broaden your tactical preferences a lot to succeed in R.U.S.E. as there is no “I win” unit to speak of. There are bigger, more capable versions of standard units, but they still have a very vulnerable Achilles rear panel that the right opponent won’t hesitate to exploit.

For example, infantry get pasted like flies on a tank’s bumper when out in the open. Hide them in the woods however, and they are as good as invisible to basic units. If a tank edges close enough to an infantry squad holed up in a cluster of trees, it can be turned into scrap by short range anti-tank weapons. A more classic example is that planes dominate and rain hell down on tanks, infantry and buildings, but stick some AA guns up and the skies become as accessible as a glory hole with a bear trap mounted on the front.

Fire in the midst of combat can only lead to complications

The campaign does a very good job at slowly easing you into these concepts. You will slowly learn to use each ruse, unit and counter unit, as well as how to overcome them when the guns are turned on you. Realism takes a slight hit when you get to resource collection and base building stages, but it all feels instantly familiar if you have played an RTS before.

Multiplayer comes in typical versus flavour, with team battles and deathmatches included. It adds a nice longevity to the game, as after a while AI ruses can be spotted and dismissed as such. Since people are unpredictable animals, prone to chaos and random excitability, online games will provide a long playing time for any console RTS enthusiast. There are multiple factions including the British, US, Italy and Germany, each with different units and research trees.

Visually, the game has some brilliant concepts. Close to the ground you have units rolling through some beautifully detailed towns and fields, engaging each other in what looks like your typical RTS. Zoom out far enough and you get a tactical overview, very similar to what you can do in Supreme Commander. The fantastic touch they have added to this tactical view however, is that the battlefield becomes a representation of the battle on a table in a war room, complete with ambient office noises. Every unit becomes a coloured counter, slowly dancing to your orders.

So that's how generals sleep at night; war as a board game

You will probably find that most of the time your view will stay somewhere between these two extremes. Close enough to see the layout, but distant enough so that your unit clusters are represented by easy to select tokens. The close up view might be where the action is, but it offers no realistic control. The camera has a habit of jerking towards the action when close to units which can make it hard to do anything in the precise nature that an RTS can sometimes demand.

Controls are always the sticky issue with console RTS games, but R.U.S.E. has done well. It is easy enough to pick up and manipulate large groups of units. Having said this, it is very hard not to feel that controls would be far quicker and more accurate with a mouse in one hand and a drink in the other. Considering this is a technical challenge that the genre has and will always face on consoles however, it is very easy to overlook as once you are accustomed to ordering units around with a pad, it becomes second nature as any game does.

R.U.S.E. can be a lot to take in at first. It seems very daunting for those new to the genre, but a gentle learning curve executed brilliantly in the campaign mode sees you eased in. This does mean that the game seems slow to begin with, but the pace and challenge do start to pick up gradually without overwhelming the player. A lengthy campaign and decent multiplayer options mean that there is plenty to enjoy in a trip back to World War II that doesn’t feel old and done to death.

8/10

Real time strategy behemoth Starcraft II has sold 3 million copies worldwide in its first month of release. That’s a lot of zerg rushes.

Blizzard claims that the game is the bestselling PC game of 2010 and the fastest selling RTS of all time. With 3 million sales and plenty of rave reviews; it’s hard to dispute that.

“We appreciate all the enthusiasm that players around the world have shown for StarCraft II,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “It was important to us to deliver an overall gameplay experience that was accessible, balanced, and fun, and it’s been gratifying to see how strongly the global community has already embraced the game.”

Still sitting on the fence about whether or not to give it a go? Check out our review of it here and see what we thought.

Take the familiar formula of a real-time strategy game. Take the ingredients from any massively multi-player RPG. Now put them in a locked, dark closet for a couple hours.

Well, if they were people, you’d have a baby nine months later. In the world of game development, however, it’s been 5 years. 5 years, Trion has spent developing this enticing marriage of strategy MMO. 5 years, Trion has been developing their in-house engine, Glyphx.

Unlike many RTS’, or MMO’s, End of Nations (EoN) is attempting to be streamlined and easily accessible to almost everyone, but at the same time trying hard to develop a game that might still appeal to the traditional, core audience. It seems to be quick, responsive, and doesn’t bog the user down with menus.

The player is given a base of operations which can never be attacked. For some people, defence is fun, but everyone likes high scoring games more. In EoN, the user is always on the attack. If you’re performing quest missions, you’ll often find yourself attacking bases with ground forces, troops and air strikes, sure. In player vs. player though, you’ll find yourself merely attacking other players and their armies. The users bases will always be out of reach. Well, they are there, they just don’t take damage.

Another interesting tidbit is that any player can jump in and out of skirmishes. It is an MMO of course, but it is also a RTS, and the idea is a little far out there.

Like an MMO, the user can customize his army, which is acting in place of one single character, and this military can be upgraded just the same. When you defeat an enemy’s war effort, you can reverse engineer his technology, and then develop it for yourself. Naturally, your military also levels up, so to speak. Though instead of gaining +5 speed, however, you gain more blueprints or research points which can also be used to upgrade your rolling death machine. These upgrades can be applied at the beginning of every play; you can customize weapon load outs, colours and decals. To put it simply, it’s an in-depth element that looks very interesting and easy to use.

As you would also expect with an MMO, these maps are huge. As of E3 2010, Trion has admitted that their largest map would be able to accommodate 50-60 individual armies. That is, for lack of a better term, enormous. At the starting point, there will be a place to receive quests, but most will boil down to “kill that guy.” And they should, because it’s fun.

The world that Trion has crafted is a beautiful one, and what really sets it apart from other games is the attention to detail. Sure, everyone makes fire and flame effects look good now, but how many games allow you to zoom in closely to a triage unit and let you see your players get worked on by medical professionals? Look closely and you’ll even see some of your men puking from exhaustion or fear. Trion is really, really trying to create life on the battlefield.

Not scheduled for release until 2011, Trion is already off to a great start. The demo they had running looked like a beta-phase product, meaning that if it looks this good already, next year will be amazing.

One thing not really touched on was whether or not there would be a subscription fee (which there is), coupled with the ability to pay real world money for, I don’t know, opalescent tank colours. It is more than a year away from release, however, so this is a problem easily overlooked.

Format: PC

Imagine what would happen if Warcraft 3 and a tower defence game had a child together. It comes into the world fresh as anything and full of life, before getting abused all through its childhood, being locked in a cage and constantly prodded. Now the child has finally grown up and been released as Heroes of Newerth, but it is an angry, bitter game that will chew your fingers off if you try to play with it.

Saying that Heroes of Newerth has been built for a hardcore audience is a bit of an understatement. The game itself was in open beta for quite some time and it has built on the roots of a Warcraft 3 scenario called Defence of the Ancients. It means that a lot of the players know the ins, outs, ups and downs on everything there is to do with the game. It also means that they know that they are better than Joe Newbie and won’t hesitate to call you out on it. They won’t hesitate a lot.

The worst thing about Heroes of Newerth is the ridiculously volatile player base. There is so much noob hating it is unreal. If you thought Modern Warfare was bad on the new guy, you’ve seen nothing yet. It makes all of the ‘n00b tube’ haters in the world seem like a basket of kittens and bakery fresh muffins. You will get told you are playing the game wrong, and if you are not thick skinned, you will end up crying yourself to sleep before complying with the nasty men on the server and uninstall the game.

Magical orgies are a common occurence and often lead to medical complications

It isn’t helped that there is no singleplayer element and the tutorial only informs you of the basic mechanics, rather than the essential strategies to winning. It means that when you think you have learned the game and jump into matchmaking, you are in for a very rude awakening. You need to accept that your first 20 or so matches are going to be utter disasters that will bring you more hate and abuse than someone who inadvertently introduced flesh eating bacteria to your town’s water supply.

The game itself sees two teams of up to five players picking a hero from the mammoth range of 65, before jumping into a game and trying to destroy the opposing team’s base. Both sides are assisted by NPC ‘creeps’ that run down preset lanes before meeting in the middle and beating the arms off of each other. It is the player’s responsibility to initially provide support and harass the enemy heroes, before eventually overpowering the other team’s defences and destroying their base. It sounds deceptively simple.

Complexities start to arise when you realise you actually need to stay out of combat. Despite what the tutorial tells you, engaging anything in fisty, or even magical-cuffs will probably result in your head getting smashed into your shoulders and everyone on your team yelling at you. You need to hang back, just in sight of the battle to gain experience, but never drawing the aggro or feeding the other team free kills.

If you give the other team a bloodlust, expect yelling

Being in a game and not attacking enemies, especially when your chosen hero has a default desire to auto attack everything just seems frustrating. It’s like you are the captain of a football team, but placed in the role of a cheerleader, providing emotional support for the anonymous NPCs getting killed ten metres in front of you. The encouraged participation in battle is to master the art of ‘last hitting’, basically kill stealing from the NPCs to net you more gold and experience points.

Of course later in each match you’ll be levelled up, with each hero having four powerful magic abilities that can increase in power, as well as stat boosts and a huge array of items to give you an edge, meaning that the creeps are no longer a hassle, and that taking down other Heroes becomes sport. It’s just that getting there can be challenging, especially for the new guy.

Knowing your hero is half the battle in Heroes of Newerth. A match can be won or lost at the hero selection screen as team synergy is very important. Some special abilities stun enemies very briefly, meaning they can’t run from your bigger, axe wielding friends, and some lower certain resistances, making targeted enemies weaker against some of your team mates. Working together is the way to victory.

Don't run! The Kraken just wants to be your friend

Learning the intricacies of each character, whether it is how to play as them or what sort of things they can do to you are very important but a huge feat of devotion to undertake. As previously mentioned there are 65 in total, each one quite drastically unique; and whilst there are not necessarily any bad choices, some are harder to master than others. Of course there is no way of knowing this unless you try it for yourself, or find one of the thirteen helpful players out there.

There are some very nice out of game features that Heroes of Newerth has to its credit, such as tracking those who have a reputation for rage quitting games, making some servers inaccessible to them. Random disconnections are no longer a huge headache either, as the player has a window of time in which they can rejoin, which is really handy should you blue screen or if your router has a brain fart.

Heroes of Newerth is a game for those who are good at micromanagement. You need to keep an eye on where you are and what you are doing at all times. It is a huge shame that the community is so hostile to newcomers as it makes the game about as accessible as a wheelchair ramp made out of bees. If you can persevere through the taunting and constant defeat, there is an interesting RTS under it all. Otherwise it might be best to leave the pr0s to themselves and find something else.

5/10

Starcraft II will melt your brain sometime in 2010.

It’s been over a decade since Blizzard released Starcraft, which has since been championed as one of the best—if not the best—Real-Time-Strategy Games of all time. Starcraft II is now just months away from its 2010 release, and Blizzard (wanting to make sure that their game is as close to perfect as possible) is pumping out an increasing number of Beta Invites for the multiplayer component of the game. I received my invite three weeks ago.

For those of you who haven’t had a chance to play or see much of the Beta, let me get this out of the way: Blizzard’s done good. Real good. The game is still Starcraft, both in its appearance and design. If you played the original, you’ll be able to jump straight into Starcraft II. The three tightly-balanced races of the original (Terran, Protoss, and Zerg) are all back, and the core mechanics for gathering minerals, building units, and attacking are consistent with the first game. Most of Blizzard’s tinkering seems aimed at streamlining that core experience of the game and adding new military units.

In their reinvention of the game, Blizzard decided to keep a large number of core units from the first title. Marines, Zerglings, and Zealots (the first available military unit for Terran, Zerg, and Protoss, respectively) all make a strong comeback, more or less identical to their last iteration. The highest-tiered units remain largely untouched, too: Battlecruisers, Carriers, and Ultralisks still deal terrible, terrible damage. Rather than altering these fundamental early-and-end-game units , Blizzard seemed to focus most of their attention on revamping every unit in between.

Some of the new kids on the block

Let’s start with Terran players: Firebats, an early ground unit, have been replaced by Marauders and Reapers. Marauders (which look like marines in mechanical fat-suits) are strong ground units, which launch concussive grenades to stagger their enemies. Reapers, on the other hand, offer a fresh approach to early-game offense for Terran players. Their jetpacks allow them to scale cliffs with ease, allowing for quick offensives or retreats, and their mortar-like pistols can deal some serious damage, especially against an unsuspecting group of mineral collectors. However, Reapers are incredibly soft, and it only takes a shot or two before their jetpack explodes, tearing them to shreds in a fiery burst of carnage.

Protoss players might be disappointed to see the Dragoon, a spider-like tank, replaced with the considerably weaker Stalker, which is more like a laser gun with legs than a military vehicle. Still, players can upgrade their ground armour and attack three times (as can the other two races), and Stalkers have a special “Blink” ability, which allows them to warp a short distance, making for devastating advances or game-saving retreats. Making up for this slight nerfing, Blizzard has added the Sentry, a light spell-caster available early game. The sentry can cast Hallucination (which creates “copies” of the unit that can take from enemies), Guardian Shield (a protective bubble that can shield several units), and Force Field (a small, indestructible barrier that can cut off advancing ground units).

Meet the Roach, a new unit for Zerg in Starcraft II.

The Zerg’s new early-game unit, known as a Roach, might be my favorite new unit yet. The roach is something of a cross between a Zergling and a Hydralisk; they can be massed fairly quickly, they have both ranged and melee attacks, and they’re tough little buggers. What makes them fun to play, though, is the use of Burrow (the Zerg ability that allows certain units to hide underground). Roaches regenerate life while burrowed (not incredibly fast, but fast enough to make your opponent tear his heart out if played correctly), and can even move underground with an upgrade. I’ve won several matches by massing Roaches early on, moving them into my opponents base, and playing “Pop-Goes-The-Weasel”… The only difference is that, in my version, if you fail to pop the weasel, the weasel then reduces your army into a smouldering pile of acidic goo.

Pretty lights and colours

I’ve made a couple of colourful references to the animations so far, namely a “fiery burst of carnage,” and a “smouldering pile of acidic goo.” I want to be clear: These are not embellishments in the least. Starcraft II is packing some very detailed animations this time around, which vary based on defending and attacking units. I’ve seen Terran ground units sliced clean in half by a Zealot’s energy sword; Zerg buildings explode in a fountain of blood; and Battlecruisers light their enemies into writhing, shrieking blazes. Beyond gory death animations (sorry, too morbid?), Blizzard has added a slew of other graphical details that really set the game apart from its predecessor. Whether its birds circling above the action, or rain and lightning lashing down on a map, the feel of the game is fresh and contemporary… which is actually pretty astounding, considering the art design is nearly identical to that of the original. Sure, many of the buildings have been redesigned, and the animations are undoubtedly better; but the colour palate and style remain intact.

Starcraft II still feels like Starcraft.

When zoomed in (users can manipulate the camera via the mouse wheel), the game looks strikingly similar to World of Warcraft: The characters are blocky, but well animated. Like World of Warcraft, Starcraft II will be able to run on an array of computer types, including lower-end machines. I’ve played the beta on a friend’s PC (which is no gaming PC by any means), and I can safely report that the game functions just fine. Some higher-level textures and decals are missing, as are many of the awesome death animations (marines simply explode into fireballs on his computer), but the game functions well enough to play online.

Bring your friends

The new Battle.net probably deserves its own preview, but I’ll do what I can here. Blizzard has redesigned their classic game portal from the ground up. Battle.net is set to support more than just online matches of Starcraft II and the upcoming Diablo III—it will be the nexus for the entire community of both games.

The new Battle.net boasts a range of features, from your standard friends lists to match history (of up to 1,000 games) to your achievement collection, etc. etc.. In addition to these features, Battle.net sports what its creators consider one of the most advanced matching systems in the gaming world. I can’t verify that in hard terms, but I have come to the scientific conclusion that Battle.net’s matchmaking kicks ass. One of the most impressive things I’ve found is that, for 2v2 matches, the game ranks me higher or lower depending on who’s on my team. So while my room-mate and I are ranked seventh in the Silver League, I’m ranked third in Platinum league when I play with another friend.

The beta features 1v1, 2v2, and FFA gametypes.

I want it and I want it now!

There’s more to say, but not room to say it. I doubt that Starcraft II will be perfect upon its release, but I don’t doubt that it will come damn close. I read another preview of this game, and the writer suggested that Starcraft II’s beta is more polished than many finished titles these days; while I don’t want to steal his insight, it’s undeniably true.

Starcraft II delivers on everything that made the first such a huge success. The tightly-balanced design, the focus on micro-managing units, the depth and solidity of the lore, all of it comes back full force in Starcraft II. And hell, that’s just speaking for the multiplayer beta.

If you’re getting this game, let me make up your mind for you. Do it. It will, most likely, be everything you’re hoping for in a Starcraft sequel. Plus, word on the streets is that if you pre-order now, you get an automatic beta invite. I could always use a few noobs to tear through on my weekend mornings…

• Format: Mac (version reviewed), PC
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Ubisoft
• Developer: Blue Byte Software
• Players: 1 (+Online Multiplayer)
• Site: http://thesettlers.us.ubi.com/the-settlers-7/

The Settlers series of games have been around since the age of the Amiga in 1993. The strategy saga was conceived by Blue Byte Software, and was a technical marvel at the time. Is this new game King of the genre, or is it more akin to a humble serf?

The basic premise of the game is the building up of your small village to that of an all powerful kingdom. This includes mining for gold and coal to build your economy, foresting for timber to build structures, fishing to feed your people etc. You then start to build an army to aid you in your expansion. There are three general routes you can take in the game: Military, Trade and Science. The military route obviously sees you building your army to crush the enemy. Trade sees you building the best trade routes on the map, and building your economy more rapidly. Finally Science makes you focus on increasing your technological capacity. All three paths have different units to utilise, and you collect Victory points throughout the game in order to beat your opponent. You collect these by amassing the most coins, biggest army etc. Players battle for these points on a sliding scale, which ebbs and flows as the game continues, until a player reaches the points target.

Settlers 7 is thankfully quite easy to get into, and the game gradually eases you in, without bamboozling you with hundreds of options, which would put off any fresh faced players. Options are added gradually so you learn how things function as the game goes on, which works extremely well. Graphics are of a slightly cartoony style and are stunning to behold as you can zoom right in, and watch your Settlers go about their daily chores. The game is set in the early Renaissance period, and the houses and castles all have a really quaint appearance. It’s akin to the fairytale world of the film Shrek, which is enhanced by the storybook style plot; and the slow pace of the game means you can sit back and enjoy what’s happening in your own little fantasy world.

The story uses 'Shrek' style cutscenes to further the plot.

Once you get your village up and running, you can start to build an army by going down to the local boozer, and recruiting and training the drunken locals in the way of armed combat. We wonder if the MOD are taking notes?! These soldiers are under the command of generals, and later in the game you can send out different platoons to catch the enemy unawares. Once you have amassed enough men, you can go and start conquering the world around you. You start by taking over neutral settlements which can give you, say, a meat source or a mine of coal or gold, to kick start your economy. These battles are non-interactive, as you just click to where you want your army to attack, and that is it. It’s only when you come across fortified enemies that actually attack you, that things get a little bit harder and more interesting. For these fights you need to employ the correct faction of soldier, or your battle could be in vain.

One thing to watch is your use of resources. At one point we had built up a whole battalion of soldiers, but in our haste, we failed to notice that we needed musketeers to attack an enemy fort; and then noticed that we had emptied the gold mine, and so couldn’t afford to recruit the musketeers. So we had to start again from scratch, which was a bit of a pain considering how well we had advanced our settlement. We think the megalomaniac in us was taking over, and we got a bit carried away creating an all conquering army. You also have to be careful where you build structures, as things can get pretty messy – and your budding kingdom can sometimes resemble an African shanty town if you’re not careful. This can lead to you missing vital resources, and eventually your civilisation grinds to a halt, which can also be slightly frustrating when you can’t figure out where your supply chain has broken down.

Things can get a bit messy if you're not careful about placing your structures.

There are some online modes to the game as well as single player, with ladder and unranked games available to take on budding Caesars. There aren’t a great deal of maps on offer, but you can adjust them slightly to keep things fresh. These games can take a fair while to finish, and requires both players to have the patience and time to finish the game. We did struggle to find a game though, and we’re sure this game won’t be as popular online as, say, the COD series. If you have a friend with a copy of the game though we’re sure you’ll have an absolute blast, as it does play well online if/when you can find a game. For those that prefer to take on the computer there is the skirmish mode, which does offer a good challenge as the computer does a grand job at adapting to your strategic moves.

Now, there has been a lot of press about Ubisoft’s decision to use an online DRM system in this game. The whole idea is that you need to have internet access, and an Ubisoft ID (which is much the same as PSN or Xbox Live IDs) to be able to play the game. For anyone who lives in remote areas and can’t get broadband, then I’m afraid you’ll not be able to play this game full stop. For those that do have broadband, the DRM is not a major problem, and doesn’t take anything away from the game at all.

If you’ve never tried a Settlers game before, we urge you to give this a go. It’s a welcome change to the deluge of first person shooters out there, and is very addictive once you get to grips with it. It’s easy to get into, and there is enough depth to keep seasoned players happy as well. This is one settlement that we’ll keep coming back to.

8/10

• Format: PC
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: THQ
• Developer: Relic Entertainment
• Players: 1 – 6
• Site: www.dawnofwar2.com

Big burly men wearing the equivalent of an ocean liner’s metal content in their armour, bludgeoning the poo out of each other with hammers sparking with lightening is actually quite a common theme in the Warhammer 40k universe. It probably comes as quite a delight to fans then that the tradition is lovingly carried through into Chaos Rising, the expansion to last year’s critically successful RTS Dawn of War II.

It’s nice to see a fairly meaty expansion pack that fleshes out the original game, in an age where DLC is now charging us through the spinal column for little, fairly insignificant bolt-ons. Looking at it in a blunt listed format, the goodies we get are a new 15 mission campaign, new units for existing races in multiplayer, and the Chaos Space Marines as a playable race online.

The bulk of this package is the new campaign which continues the Blood Raven Space Marine’s organ soaked, bullet riddled, heavy impact, interplanetary adventure, this time introducing a memorable enemy in their arch nemesis, the Chaos Space Marines. Think of them as a twin brother going through the gothy teenage phase with loads of piercings, spikes, demonic interests and severed body parts adorning their apparel.

If negotiation fails, turning thine enemy into a mist of blood will secure victory

Various mission structures really make the new campaign something special, and show a nice improvement over the original’s. The constant defence missions that plagued Dawn of War II, causing the player to regularly redo previous levels have disappeared which keeps each environment nice and refreshing. It doesn’t however do the game’s longevity any favours, meaning that you can only do up to a maximum of 15 missions. This also makes it very difficult, if not impossible, to max all of your squads up to the new level cap of 30.

Speaking of your squads, all of the familiar faces return and are pretty much accessible from the start, meaning you can go in all guns blazing with a heavy weapon devastator squad, tactical marines and a dreadnought, or be slightly more ambush centric with infiltrating scouts and jump pack toting assault marines. Adding a bit more flavour to the mix this time round, Relic have added a Librarian, Jonah Orion, who acts as the magic spewing and squad buffing class. The squad handling mechanics remain unchanged, with cover hugging still being integral to victory.

An interesting twist to the formula this time around comes in very nicely with the introduction to the forces of Chaos. At several points during missions, you will face decisions that can grant you new, powerful war gear, or perhaps make the path ahead easier, at the cost of doing something really naughty and corrupting your squads, inching their way towards becoming no better than their spiky nemesis. This could be ransacking a tomb of a fallen brother for his armour, or destroying a gate instead of fighting your way to the controls that open it, therefore leaving a city undefended from future attacks.

With that much padding he will outlast you in combat and tickle fights

Gaining corruption grants you powerful new abilities and allows access to some really nice new toys to play with, but it comes at a cost which will affect the outcome of the game. We won’t spoil anything but being a pure goody two-shoes will net you the best ending; but where’s the fun in playing nice? This system is a good way of testing the player’s in-game moral compass and seeing if they can resist the dark temptation and stay loyal to the Imperium of man. It also means you can have two run-throughs with slightly different experiences, giving greater replayability than the original.

Not to say that everything is a rosy 100% improvement. Most of the levels still seem to end with a rather cheap boss fight which is usually a big enemy champion or tank with the health and resistance of a mountain range that you need to slowly chip away at. After all of the enhancements in mission structure, these feel like quite the let down showing very little innovation on the finale to each deployment. The encounters can be frustrating and all feel very similar.

Multiplayer gets some nice upgrades. As with the release of Chaos Rising, all players of Dawn of War II received new units for the four standard armies, whether they own the new expansion or not. As well as a few tweaks on older units, everybody gets the Space Marine Librarian, Eldar Wraithguard, Ork Weird Boy and the Tyranid Tyrant Guard and Gene Stealers.

My kingdom for a horse piloted by a daemon wielding a fire sword

It’s nice that everyone gets these, but there is no need for those who paid for the premium experience to feel cheated, as Chaos Rising players get to use the Chaos Space Marines in battle. They offer some very nice armour with decent ranged and melee damage to boot. Although lacking in numbers, they do have some very powerful units, including a very nasty endgame Greater Daemon.

The Last Stand, a team based king of the hill survival mode that was added to the game last October, also gets enhanced for those who own the expansion – giving us the Hive Tyrant and Chaos Sorcerer as playable heroes. They each fill a new niche with the Hive Tyrant being capable of summoning up to three different minion squads and the Sorcerer being able to create clones of enemy squads to turn against them. They complement the existing heroes, fitting in with the drop in and quick play mentality brilliantly.

The RTS/RPG hybrid experience that Dawn of War II started, Chaos Rising upgrades nicely. Granted, it is more of the same, but you can see that Relic has been back to address some of the criticisms from the first time around. We get a slightly more varied campaign with a nice twist towards the end that reflects player choices, a new (albeit familiar) multiplayer faction, and a few more additions here and there. It fills the role of an expansion excellently and so fans of the original should definitely stick their bloodlusting noses into this.

8/10

Leaked footage of Starcraft II’s story mode beta has appeared on Youtube today. The footage shows nearly five minutes of scenes from various sections of the campaign and one thing really stands out: the visuals.

The tiny little army men and aliens of RTS games don’t usually lend themselves to appealing graphics, but Blizzard seems to have really nailed the art design here. The environments are extremely colorful and the units animate quite well.

It might be a while before we find out if it’s got the gameplay to match. Starcraft II has a huge following to live up to, but what’s shown in this video is certainly promising.

• Format: PS3 (version reviewed), 360
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: EA
• Developer: Doublefine
• Players: 1 (offline), 2 – 8 (online)
• Site: www.doublefine.com

To be sung (badly) to the tune of ‘Paranoid’ by Black Sabbath

(Intro)

Brutal Legend, here it is. First

In the courts now

In the shops.

Your avatar is Eddie Riggs

A roadie with great

Mutton chops.

(Musical break)

Sucked into a heavy metal

World that’s full of

Evil foes,

You’ll meet friends along the way but

All the women

Look like hos.

Can you help Riggs

Fight off all these fiends?

Hell yeah.

(Musical break)

It’s a bit like GTA cos

You’re free to roam

As you please.

You even get cars and bikes to

Drive around in

Are you pleased?

(Guitar solo)

(Musical break)

Slash with axe and shoot with guitar

Combat’s simple

And yet fun.

RTS bits by the end though,

Spoil it all for

Everyone.

(Musical break)

An excellent script for Jack Black

Who plays Eddie

Perfectly.

Not even Schafer however

Can hide the flaws

Completely.

(Outro)

Brutal Legend would like to thank:

Metal gods such as Ozzy Osbourne and Lemmy for agreeing to perform in – game cameos; all the awesome metal bands who lent their music to the game; and of course Jack Black for giving an unbeatable performance as Eddie Riggs (decapitatiiiooonn!!).

Tim Schafer, for the list of musical styles, fashion styles, and bands he dislikes which informed enemy design and attacks; also for translating the prosaic duties of the roadie and band crew into colourful characters and enemy flattening moves; plus of course for the original concept and predictably sharp script. Special thanks to Tim too for steering Brutal Legend away from the fully fledged RTS it started out as.

The awesome heavy metal album cover style art design, for drawing attention away from, and sometimes masking altogether, minor technical problems with the graphics. Big shout to EA too, for rescuing Brutal Legend from publication purgatory after it was dropped by Activision.

EA also get a celebratory riff in their direction for ensuring the playable demo included every major element of the game – except the RTS battles, which have proven unpopular with many reviewers and fans. You guys rock!

The Doublefine website for providing a detailed description of, and outline of tactics for, the aforementioned RTS battles. Hey, who said that should’ve been in the manual or tutorials?!!?

Most of all, a huge two fingered rock salute to the fans. R.I.P. Psychonauts!!

Memoirs of a roadie

We’ve been on tour promoting the album, and almost every single gig goes like this:

It starts off well. It always starts off well. An awesome comedy rock anthem, then we get the audience to sing along. Even if they haven’t heard anything off the setlist before, it’s simple stuff they’re familiar with from other bands. Everybody’s having a good time. The rest of the gig follows the same pattern; another comedy rock song everybody loves, another piece of rockin’ audience participation. Repeat until everyone involved is sweaty as hell and ten times as happy. At least, that’s the plan.

The problem is those damn Real Time Strategy solos.

Schafer originally wanted the whole show to be one long solo. Eight hours of indulgent RTS soloing, can you imagine it? It’s not even proper RTS chord progression! He changed his mind thank Osbourne, but he kept some solos in – and they just don’t fit in with what the rest of the show became, if you ask me.

He doesn’t start soloing till a few songs in, and to start off with, you know what? The solos are kinda cool. They’re not too long, and they keep with the style of what the rhythm guy’s playing. As the gig goes on though, the solos get longer and more complex, till they’re whole songs of their own; and you can just tell the hearts of the audience aren’t in it when they’re trying to scream along. Most of ‘em just want the solo to end so they can get back to the songs they bought the tickets to hear in the first place.

If you check Schafer’s site, you’ll see him say ‘the fans love it man, they f****in’ love those solos! Brutal Legend is all about the solos, and I should know dude, I am Brutal Legend!’. He’s half right; the band would be nothin’ without him, and he’s behind most parts of the gig that everybody loves. Guy should check the gig reviews, though. Every time we try to show him what people are writin’, he runs for his bike and rides off into the sunset. Or should I say he makes a Run For The Hills, heh heh.

Sure, some people love his solos. There’s always people in the audience that really dig ‘em, and they aren’t half as loud as they are during the other parts of the show. They’re easy to see by the time half the gig’s over though, because by then they’re the only people moshing to the solos with any energy. Everybody else looks like they wish Schafer would get his death metal outfit Grim Fandango back together; I see it in their eyes.

It’s very rare I see anybody that doesn’t look like they’ve had a good time at the end of the show; but it’s also very rare I see anybody who looks like they’re dyin’ to come back and do it all over again.

7/10