Supreme Commander 2

[Magic]

I've been asked my input on this and might as well post it on a thread for people to see. Arcalane might have a few other comments and views on the game if you ask.

Remember the game that defined insanity(lo-res) with what the frenzied orgy of hand bleeding micro and macromanagement?

Square-Enix came in on what GPG did and gave the game what essentially amounts to padding onto an existing formula. It seems they almost virtually preserved the old engine, but gave the rendering a revamp to make it run seemingly smoother. They also seem to have given consideration to how much the UI takes up the screen and have reduced it's size. Added the research system which takes over the old T1-T2-T3-Experimental progression of units via engineers/upgrades to the ACU and gave lower tier units a fighting chance at conducting a successful rush and recolored all the units and factions with brighter and less steel/gray colors.

The research system is interesting. There are three ways of going about it.
1) Pouring resources into building research stations with speed up natural/acquired research growth
2) Attacking, which gives you research points depending on how much damage you deal
3) Balance the two

The research system also expands the unit variety, as well as improving existing units and structures. Most notably is the progression of a basic UEF Rock Head tank from an average anti-land land vehicle to a shielded, anti-air, anti-land triple barreled tank that has good amount of health and regeneration. This new feature essentially guarantees a rusher can be rewarded simply by attacking first and fast, more on that later.

The campaign makes one crucial change. All the different campaigns now tie into each other rather than going off on different canons (First Game) or changing details on a single campaign (Forged Alliance). No spoilers, of course, but here's a tidbit of information that is obvious and is for free:

Gauge is totally fabulous and loves nukes so hard.

For all of the changes however, I can't help but feel I'm playing the old game, only the campaign is a lot shorter and there's a lot less unit variety. Maybe I'm easily amused, I mean, I enjoyed the 50 ft tall UEF mech with railguns for hands, tactical missile launchers, turrets all over and a ton of armor. It was glorious in so many levels.

But by cutting down on unit cap sizes, unit variety and streamlining the game, it plays a lot more like contemporary RTSes (tactics/semi-strategy based gameplay) rather than a grand strategy game (logistics/strategy based gameplay). It opens up to rushers and strategies one might find in a game of Starcraft only it has the option to take on a hell of a lot more units. (Though they're a bit more restrictive on unit cap than the first game. Probably for good reason.) If that's what you're looking for, you're good, but if you're looking for a more insane/complicated challenge in strategy barring playing chess with bloody grandmaster I suggest looking towards Napoleon: Total War or wait for R.U.S.E. to come out.

I know this concern has been voiced by various critics/reviews too: but I'd really like to confirm and repeat it. If you are a hardcore fan of grand strategy games, and loved the first game? Try the demo first then see if you want to buy it. It really is made for a more casual audience now.

[ShadesFox]

I know this concern has been voiced by various critics/reviews too: but I'd really like to confirm and repeat it. If you are a hardcore fan of grand strategy games, and loved the first game? Try the demo first then see if you want to buy it. It really is made for a more casual audience now.

That may actually be rather nice for me, my big problem with SC1 was that I could never get enough game time to really work out the mechanics.  Maybe in a few months I'll have that kind of free time again.  Though I am rather looking forwards to R.U.S.E.  I would love to try playing multiplayer on that some time (though I refuse to play against random 'net trolls).

Also, that assault bot of yours looks suspiciously like a WH40K titan...