Company of Heroes 2 & Ardennes Assault

[Brinko]

Wait, a AAA RTS game that you have to pay $60 for comes with a cash shop? Cancelling my pre-order then.

Don't you remember that steam preorder shit with the commisar chest? That had a good amount of free ingame currency to I guess buy new doctrines or unlocks that they shoved into the game in a misguided effort. The online is going to be a fucking slog due to all the horseshit that you can unlock like 15% faster veterancy, 10% reload speed, and 10% movement speed and other ridiculous shit. And you can grind out XP like crazy by playing the germans on bot matches where you make the enemy normal difficulty and have all 4 slots open and your team is you and 2 hard bots. I jumped 10 levels grinding for a good 4 hours.

 

[Undead Phoenix]

Very much Company of Heroes 1.5, rather than Company of Heroes 2.0.

 

[fizzelopeguss]

I just don't think these games make for good multiplayers, too random.

 

[Dr Tomo]

Just to elaborate what Brinko basically covered the unit selection is not pitiful it has been gutted as the game imo felt like playing a dumb down version of Opposing Fronts. Also besides anti-tank guns that are wheeled by a crew is not freezing to death, I also lol on how the open topped vehicles in the game are not affected as well. Also I am unsure how multiplayer is going to work out as they have incorporated a Shogun 2 multiplayer system where you can level your units.

Reason why I state this is it is on your profile the three levels with the other units that you have to unlock through challenges like killing X amount of units with a Panzer and etc. Also could not change the gfx setting during a match and only could at the start screen which I am unsure if it is because it is a demo or U.I design. In a nutshell Relic dropped the ball and basically re-skinned the game in a fresh look. All the concepts they were trying to get people hyped about seems to be poorly implemented or just plain crap.

Edit* Wanted to point out that I only played 2 games and stopped as it was becoming to painful to continue and I apologize. Consider what Brinko said and the piece I added as a hands on impression.

 

[DemonKing]

I've only played a few times and it's not terrible - to call it a reskin is a bit much as there are definitely some changes to the original if only in the fact that the insane amount of Russian manpower makes it much harder to take out their support weapons (they tend to have very large crews which means snipers aren't as effective as in COH).

I'm not a big fan of the fact that the control points have gone from zones to circles, although I do like that you can cap while fighting now. I'm also a bit conflicted on the blizzards as they tend to get in the way of the action a bit too much for my liking.

Still a day one purchase for me even though I'm not sure if it will ever hold the special place in my heart that the original does.

 

[Infinitron]

RPS review: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/06/21/wot-i-think-company-of-heroes-2-single-player/

 

[Corporate_Jew_Master]

It's not worth it for it's price, not at all.

But I might buy it on poverty sale next year if I feel like playing mediocre rts.

 

[Kane]

It really does have a rubbish menu screen though.

That was my initial thought aswell. Also, where is the goddamn chat? Another Battle.net 2.0.

And first comment on RPS is hurf blurfing about how CoH isn't DoW2, console RTS extraordinaire. We need some commissar blam.

DoW2 was CoH reskin without the base building, the games used the same freaking engine and had the same freaking skills just renamed and reskinned. Anyone who thinks DoW 2 was something radically different from CoH is missing a few braincells. They took CoH and reskinned it and got DoW 2.

 

[Spectacle]

DoW2 was CoH reskin without the base building, the games used the same freaking engine and had the same freaking skills just renamed and reskinned. Anyone who thinks DoW 2 was something radically different from CoH is missing a few braincells. They took CoH and reskinned it and got DoW 2.

I assume this fellow is talking about multiplayer? In single player the games are only superficially similar...

 

[Kane]

It isn't even true for MP. Even little nuances can lead to a vastly different gameplay, see SupCom and TA for example (personally I find SupCom is a TA sequel but don't go around TA people and tell them that)

 

[Ulminati]

So it's been out for a while. Anyone got it? Is it good or shit? How's the SP campaign?

 

[KoolNoodles]

So it's been out for a while. Anyone got it? Is it good or shit? How's the SP campaign?

Shit, and boring. It's CoH 1.5 with added grinding, DLC, and less complexity. Homing grenades, simpler Commander trees, barely noticeable graphical update with much higher system requirements, yada yada. Save your simoleons or sail the seven seas.

 

[DemonKing]

So it's been out for a while. Anyone got it? Is it good or shit? How's the SP campaign?

Good: It's more CoH goodness - they didn't mess with the formula too much.

Bad: It's more of the same - they didn't mess with the formula enough.

Take your pick depending on whether you're a glass half full or half- empty kind of guy.

Single Player is moderately enjoyable so far - it's kind of nice being able to demolish Stalingrad block by block with rockets.

Most graphical advances are incremental but nice. It's kind of fun when your little guys occupy a building and smash the windows out so they can fire freely or get set on fire and run around screaming while they burn.

 

[Infinitron]

Sega sues THQ's corpse for Company of Heroes 2 pre-order cash: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/07/10/sega-sue-thq-for-a-million-bucks-which-seems-odd/

The reason I’m not a financial advisor, an accountant, nor even allowed access to RPS’s bank accounts, is because my understanding of money is thus: “Ooh, look at the pretty colours! I like the blue ones best! I’ll swap you my pinks for your blues?” So it is that I look at Eurogamer’s news that Sega is suing the not-existing-any-more THQ for £630,000 with only bemusement. It seems they want the Company Of Heroes pre-order cash from Steam.

Sega bought the rights to Company Of Heroes, along with the developer Relic, for over $26m. Now they’re asking the courts to give them $941,710.93 back, since a good chunk of this was paid to THQ by Valve after they’d filed for bankruptcy. Which, er, I guess is a thing.

While the machinations of bankruptcy law, where you can buy something from a company that’s gone kaput, and then sue the kaput company for things that only happened because of the circumstances that led up to your being able to buy things in the first place, are beyond me, there are a couple of interesting things to come out of this.

First is some tidy confirmation of the 30% cut everyone already knew Valve were taking from sales. The megacorp online store owners are very shy about this figure, and make it clear to developers that they’re not allowed to reveal it. Sinister! But this case, in which a total of $1,345,301.29 was placed in pre-orders, but only $940,000 given to THQ, demonstrates that 30% figure rather precisely (to five decimal places). (30% is pretty standard for online stores, although some like Humble take a good deal less.)

It also gives some solid figures on just how significant pre-order sales are. $1.35m between September 12 and Jan 13 gives you an idea of why publishers are so keen to push their pre-order bonuses to twist customers into paying for games before they’re complete/before reviews are out there. Which obviously no one should do, to destroy this ridiculous business model that shouldn’t be there in the first place. Amen.

How successful Sega will be, having bought their way in to joining the gang trying to claim back $200m from THQ’s bankruptcy mice, remains to be seen.

 

[Kane]

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articl...arly-USD1m-from-company-of-heroes-2-preorders

sega made lots of money

clarification: this is an expanded article improving upon infinitrons premature & shitty article

 

[Ulminati]

Well, I managed to borrow a friends computer and try out the single player campaign. Units sure love rushing away from campfires during a blizzard to attack a random enemy, then subsequently freeze to death.

would not pirate.

 

[DakaSha]

Apart from the to-be-expected edgyness here, is this worth getting if i dont own Coh1?

I pirated tales of valor and after getting used to the twitchy ass RTS gameplay, i really enjoy it. I may some day want to play multiplayer so ToV will prob not cut it due to declining player population.

From my understanding the new one is basically: Same game with less content (wtf), more clunky unit control and crap graphics optimization.. not to mention day 1 DLC.

Despite all of that is it worth getting for multiplayer?

 

[DemonKing]

I pirated tales of valor and after getting used to the twitchy ass RTS gameplay, i really enjoy it. I may some day want to play multiplayer so ToV will prob not cut it due to declining player population.

You can buy the Original COH + all expansions cheap as dirt this day via Steam (even cheaper during a sale) and the game is still supported (they recently converted it to fully integrate with Steam after the original servers were shut down by a third party) with a decent player base still. I'd say go for it.

Despite all of that is it worth getting for multiplayer?

I'm enjoying it, even though I'm struggling to master the Russian faction. A few people are complaining that it is disappointing in comparison to the original but you are talking about a seven year old game patched to death with two expansions and over 50 maps compared to a title that's been out less than a month with only a fraction of the maps to play on. Given that Sega sold almost 400,000 boxed copies in the last few days of June after release I'd say there's likely to be a good chance that CoH2 will be eventually as well supported with patches/expansions as the original.

 

[Rellin]

Apart from the to-be-expected edgyness here, is this worth getting if i dont own Coh1?

I pirated tales of valor and after getting used to the twitchy ass RTS gameplay, i really enjoy it. I may some day want to play multiplayer so ToV will prob not cut it due to declining player population.

From my understanding the new one is basically: Same game with less content (wtf), more clunky unit control and crap graphics optimization.. not to mention day 1 DLC.

Despite all of that is it worth getting for multiplayer?

Absolutely not. CoH1 is much better. Do not buy.

 

[DakaSha]

Absolutely not. CoH1 is much better. Do not buy.

Man dat real convincing

I'm enjoying it, even though I'm struggling to master the Russian faction. A few people are complaining that it is disappointing in comparison to the original but you are talking about a seven year old game patched to death with two expansions and over 50 maps compared to a title that's been out less than a month with only a fraction of the maps to play on. Given that Sega sold almost 400,000 boxed copies in the last few days of June after release I'd say there's likely to be a good chance that CoH2 will be eventually as well supported with patches/expansions as the original.

I ended up biting the bullet and getting CoH2.
So far I'm not regretting it. Of course I have very very little experience with coh1 so i cant compare/bitch.
I'm especially impressed with how tense the matches vs the AI are.. its actually quite good (as far as AI's go). Prob cheats like a dipshit but at least it flanks, etc.

My only hope is that they actually support this shit.. how is sega in this regard? Last thing i think about when i think sega is fucking pc rts

 

[DemonKing]

My only hope is that they actually support this shit.. how is sega in this regard? Last thing i think about when i think sega is fucking pc rts

If Sega's recent history with regards to The Total War franchise goes they will certainly be supporting this title with paid DLC...if Relic is allowed to carry on as they did under THQ then we can also expect to see plenty of post-release patches, free maps etc.

 

[Kane]

My only hope is that they actually support this shit.. how is sega in this regard? Last thing i think about when i think sega is fucking pc rts

SEGA as a publisher believes in strong and independent women developers. Pretty much everything is in Relic's hands, including marketing. Relic obviously wants to give this game long-term support, that's what the DLC are for.

 

[DakaSha]

My only hope is that they actually support this shit.. how is sega in this regard? Last thing i think about when i think sega is fucking pc rts

SEGA as a publisher believes in strong and independent women developers. Pretty much everything is in Relic's hands, including marketing. Relic obviously wants to give this game long-term support, that's what the DLC are for.

 

[Kane]

I was paraphrasing a dev.

 

[DakaSha]

meh

 

[Trash]

It's CoH with a reskin and some added features. Gameplay is pretty much the same. If you enjoyed CoH and suddenly find you loathing CoH 2 you're either a shitcock hypocrite or suffering from alzheimers.