[News]

Hi all,

We have just published a hands-on with the *Dawn of War 2 multiplayer
beta*. If you could post a link on your site that would be very much
appreciated.

*Link:*
http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/2009/01/27/dawn-of-war-2-beta-preview/1


*Picture:*
http://images.bit-tech.net/content_images/2009/01/dawn-of-war-2-beta-preview/fp_img.jpg


*Quote:
*/What I'm trying to say here is that Dawn of War 2's multiplayer beta
is, at the moment, very, very inaccessible for the uninitiated. While
the full game's single player campaign will no doubt familiarise you
with the myriad array of abilities you can wield and expect to have
wielded against you (and their appropriate counters) going in cold
without any real tutorial is more likely to turn players off than get
them interested in the full game. Getting whupped by more skilled
players over and over again is not a good advertisement. /
/
The use of four armies so different from each other provides yet another
obstacle for the uninitiated, and just when you think you know
everything that the Tyranids might throw at you, you play a match
against the Orks and are faced by a completely new set of units and
challenges.

While we know this sort of knowledge, especially in an RTS, can come
only with experience and time, the Dawn of War 2 Multiplayer beta
doesn't so much throw you in at the deep end as strap a heavy boulder to
your back, tie a Tyranid swarm to your leg and then throw you into the
middle of the ocean. Without a single player campaign or decent tutorial
to first familiarise yourself with all the game play elements it soon
becomes an exercise in confused frustration. /

/But we're not worried. Oh no. It's clear from our time with the beta
that there's an enormous amount of potential here, and what now appears
confusing and intimidating could, given more experience with both the
single player and multiplayer aspects (and a swift boot up the arse of
GFWL to sort out the match making system), become a very entertaining
multiplayer RTS with a remarkably varied set of units allowing for a
large number of branching strategies.

The ability to add a number of different upgrades to each unit within
each race is, while daunting right now, a very exciting prospect, and we
haven't even mentioned the blindingly high level of polish and
production values that's been applied to the game by Relic. Whether
you're willing to slog through the multiplayer and learn from your
mistakes now, or wait for the full game to get some experience from the
single player campaign before heading online, //Dawn of War 2 might just
be worth that four year wait after all.// /
*

*Cheers guys!

Tim Smalley
www.bit-tech.net