Recent reviews by Dr. Hugh Jorgan

It's like everything I ever wished they put in the original and with modern graphics. Bugs are still being worked out here and there, but it's the real deal and definitely fully fleshed out. I love it, also they definitely took notes from recent competitor titles.

TL:DR It's definitely my favorite game of all time :D

After spending hours on Warlords Battlecry 3 and the old total wars as a wee yungin, TW:WH2 is what I always wanted. It's an rpg grand strategy game, combining the personal investment of having a hero with levels and stats, alongside managing an empire. CA supports it incredibly well with loads of content updates both free and paid allowing the game to develop, and incentivizing the publisher to continue developing it.

This game is amazing and I love it. From a warhammer perspective and from a total war perspective it is an absolute homerun. People appear to chiefly criticize the lack of teams and day 1 dlc. I completely disagree. If you have ever played a previous total war, you get about 10-15 teams and you will only ever play one or two tops. Each team in this game is so perfectly unique and well balanced that I find that I need to play every single one multiple times. The game is a masterpiece of balancing (probably courtesy of table top warhammer), design and just all around coolness. It is what the Total War engine was born to do. Criticizing the creative assembly for "$19 DLC" is silly. Each new race they release comes with their own fully developed campaign and then are fully integrated into the Grand campaign map, harkening back to the days of cd expansions for games. And more importantly, each one of these expansion's provides a breath of fresh air for the game should you choose to purchase it. (I highly recommend waiting on those purchases a while since there is so much content in the original standalone). The revived concept of the expansion is a great add-on to the series, but they also give out a load of free content with every DLC release, very similar to the way Crusader Kings 2 handles their updates and expansions. This game is awesome, and by buying it, people get access to a miniature world that has been crafted by artists over a few decades and built into one of the coolest franchises ever developed. The same franchise that a few early Blizzard employees ripped off when they made Warcraft 1 in the 90s. I love everything about this game. You probably will too. Buy it. Play it. Blood god. Khorne. CHILDREN OF THE KHORNE. Also, if anyone finds Krell, please let me know.

Here's the short version of my review: This game came out well after the groundbreaking RTS Warcraft III: reign of Chaos, but it represents an independent creator's attempt at perfecting his craft and coming up with some brilliant mechanics along the way. This is in my opinion one of the all time greats for real time strategy because of its bold hybrid nature, original soundtrack and voice acting, and ahead of its time mechanics. This is the very definition of a cult classic video game.

Here's the long version: This game has an incredible number of stream lined RTS features that put it WAY beyond its time in terms of utility and functionality. Resource gathering is a little similar to that found in a Relic RTS (CoH or dawn of war) in that resources are based on "territory" capture (I put in quotes because the resource buildings must be captured by either your hero or one of his generals). Buildings had the ability to set continuous production on any pattern of units or upgrades you wanted. Each unit can be set to behave according to a huge number of AI scripts including scout/rampage (useful in the age-old RTS conundrum of when your opponent is hiding one villager somewhere on the map with a secret little building and you dont want to have to search endlessly).

Above all else is the ability to make a persistent hero with his own posse of regular ole soldiers who rise above the ranks and stick with you above and beyond battles. This concept is what got me into this game in the first place and its something that saddens me to not have found its way into any other RTS's (that I know of).

The heroes are many and their abilities are interesting but one of the things I was not a big fan of when I first played the game was the plot driven campaign (I always liked Warlords Battlecry II's Total War style campaign map). I did warm up to this later on and I now view it as an improvement.

Whats further incredible about this game is the sheer number of sides with very unique mechanics for each one. There is a side for everyone to take up and enjoy. (Undead take little wimpy skelemen and turn them into apocalyptic harbingers of death... dark dwarves can use their engineers to build massive siege buildings... There's an entire race of fairy people that were extremely broken but seriously who would stoop so low as to play as a giant race of pixies?) Most of all, each side has a unique feel that is spot on.

There are a ton of other features that I often miss when I play other RTS's as well but I only wanted to highlight my favorites.

In conclusion this niche classic is a fantastic time killer and quite a bit of fun. Whenever I look at spending money on a game I ask myself how many subway sandwiches is this thing worth? Is Warlords Battlecry 3 worth two subway sandwiches? Absolutely. I mean seriously. I eat subway sandwiches and then poop them out. This gave me hours of entertainment just now. I started writing this. Played like 6 missions in the campaign and enjoyed it a great deal. Easily worth 10 bucks. Buy the game. Maybe they'll make WBC IV someday. Maybe.