Slitherine

Some short background info about me: I'm a long time fan of Warhammer 40k, from the table top games to the video games. I've never played the Panzer Corps/Generals games but I'm familiar with the concept. I'm generally a fan of most strategy/management games and let me also say ahead of time that I tried to play this game with an open mind and was not expecting anything in particular or expecting it to be like the table top game. Also, this review is just one guys opinion, don't take it too seriously.

GRAPHICS:
So...let's be honest, they aren't the prettiest, but I'd seen screenshots of the Panzer games prior to playing so I knew about what to expect coming in, I'm also no stranger to indie games and low end graphics in general so I'm not saying this as a spoiled AAA gamer, but more could have been done to make it "pop" visually, I realize 40k is a very drab/dreary universe but the game is a little on the muddy side color wise and It's just not very fun to look at, with very little joy to be experienced as you move your units about the map due to the lack of animation. On the plus side, most of the units look rather good and are faithful to the source material, the maps are detailed and also look appropriate to the setting. I can give the game a pass on it's technical shortcomings, heck the simplicity could have even been charming as it is in some other games but I feel like the game can't decide what scale it wants to create, whether these are pieces on a board or an actual depiction of events from overhead. The detailed and realistic maps/units sometimes clash with the simplicity of movement animations and while the shooting exchanges are a nice visual treat they also seem to lack scale, ie. if that squad of Steel Legion is 20 men strong why only one laser beam? Now I realize most of these complaints are minor, prolly due to technical limitations, and ultimately not the point of the game. I do give Slitherine a lot of credit for the detail of each model and all the work that went into them, and that the color palette for any 40k game was going to be a little drab.

2/5

SOUND:
Wow...so actually, I really liked everything about the sound in the game, the music was suitably dramatic and brooding, the unit noises were superb; really the only sense of immersion in an otherwise dry experience. Personally I never got tired of hearing my Sentinels clanking about as they flanked some target of interest or the heavy boot falls of Imperial Infantry marching in to storm an Ork held city. The shooting effects were similarly excellent and captured what I imagined most of the guns should sound like, Orks were suitably...Orky, and the voice acting during the story bits was maybe not the best but certainly not terrible. The audio was one of the strongest aspects of the game.

4/5

GAMEPLAY:
Ahh, the core of any proper game... I'll start off by saying I had a mostly good time with this game personally, (I'm also a 40k fan since like the 90's so that may be biased lol.) Especially during the first Act when the game was more about Infantry formations supported by tanks, the balance seemed tighter and the scale seemed more reasonable, but eventually the balance starts to go downhill as your Requisition points which are used to buy units start to pile up and the real limiting factor becomes the available slots in which to field units, since a Super Heavy tank or Titan costs the same 1 slot as that 20 man infantry squad, it soon becomes a moot point to field infantry except to take an objective here and there. Now I know I'm going to get accusations of "This isn't Table Top! Rarrrgh!" but for me this wasn't at all what I was expecting, the game description made it sound as if I'd be controlling large scale armies during the battle of Armageddon. Instead the game is actually more about fielding a dozen large tanks against a dozen or so large Ork vehicles, I don't know if you guys have ever seen any pictures or descriptions of the battle for Armageddon but there were literally millions upon millions of Guardsmen. I sort of expected to be commanding swarms and swarms of Infantry on top of tank regiments, on top of Super Heavy tanks, with some Titans added on top of all that. Now I know some have argued that despite the 20 "Hearts" a Steel Legion squad has it may represent more actual men then that...Now I'll give you that but it doesn't change the fact that Infantry quickly become a useless unit whom you drag along because none of the good units can cap a point. Even the much vaunted Space Marines (Who seem to dominate the trailer for this game despite being more of a sub-faction.) can't remedy this as they still can't really compete in effectiveness when compared against a Titan or Tank. Problems with Scale aside (It's my main problem with the game honestly.) The actual game is rather fun if your a Strategy fan, mechanics are not explained well though, and the A.I. despite being aggressive and intelligent most of the time often decides to sit about for fear of attacking your larger units, which seems decidedly un-Orky. So to sum it up I'd say the game play has some solid mechanics but with scale/balance issues in the mid-late game.

3/5

REPLAY VALUE:
Campaign is suitably long, and even on the lower difficulties you'll have to re-try some of the earlier missions. It's also possible to play the scenarios as the Orks if that's your thing, several difficulty settings are available as well, and a mission editor would seem to add a lot of longevity to the game but at the moment it's not quite working. Supposedly it'll be fixed soon in a patch and we'll start to see player made content hopefully.

4/5

TECHNICAL ISSUES:
A few bugs here and there, certainly not "Bethesda" level but noticeable at times, especially when re-trying a mission. Units suddenly "vanishing" after I had moved them, presumably destroyed by an enemy but with no shooting animation or sounds it's impossible to say whether they glitched out of existence or the game just failed to load the sounds/animations for the shooting exchange. Some weird lag when units fire or sounds play as well as problems with an unlimited frame rate on the menu screens affecting some cards and possibly over heating them are other notable issues at this time. I'm sure work is being done to fix these bugs but I'm still gonna take some points off because my personal experience with this game was a little wonky at times.

3/5

CONCLUSIONS:
A well meaning attempt to recreate the 2nd battle for Armageddon on a dated engine better suited to recreating pure tank on tank battles. This game didn't really deliver the sense of epic scale I wanted from a game depicting one of 40k's largest and bloodiest battles, and in the end I mostly felt like I was playing a Tank battle sim with 40k art and perhaps in the Developers defense, that's what they set out to make? I can't be sure but ultimately It wasn't what I or a lot of others were looking for. Still, it is a decent game in it's own right and if you've ever lusted to command dozens of Tanks and Titans against other Tanks/Titans then you won't be disappointed. Overall I think with some tweaking and patches or perhaps a mod or two this could be a amazing game, as it stands now it's simply alright.

FINAL SCORE: 3/5 (Seriously guys I'd make that a 3.5 if you just added Storm Troopers! Ratlings but no Storm Troopers? REALLY?!)

nice thread and plenty for the developers to read and give feedback to, so thanks for that

can honesty say that's a great first post anyway

It is!

zakblood_slith wrote:nice thread and plenty for the developers to read and give feedback to, so thanks for that

can honesty say that's a great first post anyway

Aekar wrote:It is!

Thanks guys!

This is the second very well thought opinion about this game where they stated that infantry becomes next to useless after the first 1/3rd of the game. I am waiting for the patch before I start playing the campaign, but that is a bit disheartening to hear.

I hope the developers take this feedback into consideration and work on game balance, so requisition is not so high that infantry becomes useless. Perhaps unit cost needs to be tweaked, so you can't always buy the biggest tanks and titans. Infantry needs to remain useful throughout the campaign.

Great summary, HatesYourFace!

Couldn't post images at first maybe it'll work now, some examples of what I'm talking about when I say "the scale of Armageddon".




See all those tiny little dots? Those are infantry, like squillions of them. You can see how this doesn't mesh with the games handful of 20 man Guardsman squads you'll bring to each mission. Everything else in these pictures is represented correctly, couple or Gargants/Titans, Super Heavies, Tanks, Artillery etc... Perhaps this is an odd thing to get hung up on but it's like modeling the Civil war as small scale battles between 10 man squads when in actuality they were enormous exchanges between armies that consisted of thousands and thousands of infantry troops.

Also, STORM TROOPERS!

I read somewhere that GW no longer uses stormtroopers as it infringed on the copyright of the Star Wars Franchise.

I also liked your review btw. But can you tell us what difficulty level you played on? On the higher difficulties you get less requisition, so maybe that would somewhat offset the army of super heavies and titans?

JimmyC wrote:I read somewhere that GW no longer uses stormtroopers as it infringed on the copyright of the Star Wars Franchise.

I also liked your review btw. But can you tell us what difficulty level you played on? On the higher difficulties you get less requisition, so maybe that would somewhat offset the army of super heavies and titans?

Lol I suppose I can see how Storm Troopers are more well known from being from Star Wars, But if that's the case you can just use the Cadian "Karskin" squads which are the exact same thing with slightly different lore. I don't think a simple name change is what was holding Storm Troopers back from being included in the game. I played on Normal difficulty which I assume is the intended difficulty setting for the average player, I've read forum posts by players playing at higher difficulties that claim the same holds true on those settings. I'm glad you liked the review, hopefully some tweaks are forthcoming in patches to sort out the balancing issues!

FroBodine wrote:This is the second very well thought opinion about this game where they stated that infantry becomes next to useless after the first 1/3rd of the game. I am waiting for the patch before I start playing the campaign, but that is a bit disheartening to hear.

I hope the developers take this feedback into consideration and work on game balance, so requisition is not so high that infantry becomes useless. Perhaps unit cost needs to be tweaked, so you can't always buy the biggest tanks and titans. Infantry needs to remain useful throughout the campaign.

Great summary, HatesYourFace!

Thanks man! Don't let my review turn you off playing the campaign, it' still a pretty fun game, and hopefully some upcoming patches will make it better.

In DoW they had Karskin squads, which seemed to be elite Imperial Guard troops.

I am playing on challenging setting, which gives you less requistion and am enjoying it. But i'm still on Act 1. At least on Act 1 the reduced requisition seems to come into play fairly often for me.

The unit roster keep changing and we can only create those that are currently on their list. Storm Troopers is not a unit I've heard of so suspect they are removed and as a result we are not allowed to create them.

there is no more storm trooper on war 40k: they have been retconned and now they are called Tempestus Scions: they have the same role but have a new a appeareance and background. http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Tempestus_Scions But i have no idea if tempestus scions have fight on armageddon second war.

Grigdusher wrote:there is no more storm trooper on war 40k: they have been retconned and now they are called Tempestus Scions: they have the same role but have a new a appeareance and background. http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Tempestus_Scions But i have no idea if tempestus scions have fight on armageddon second war.

According to the link you posted:
Tempestus Scions, also known as Storm Troopers in Low Gothic, are the elite shock assault troops of the Imperial Guard and the Militarum Tempestus.[1] They are trained to carry out special operations such as deep strike assaults, reconnaissance and infiltration beyond enemy lines. Storm Troopers are the very best soldiers the Guard can call upon, being trained to the peak of human perfection, their combat skills are unmatched.[2]

They are the same unit, so yes, the Tempestus Scions did serve in the second battle for armageddon.

They can use guardsmen in carapase. Or veterans. Or both.

Are they still in codex or also removed?

Scions ARE stormtroopers, they just changed the name. The old Guard codex even has Storm Trooper squads as one of Steel Legion's doctrines.

IainMcNeil wrote:The unit roster keep changing and we can only create those that are currently on their list. Storm Troopers is not a unit I've heard of so suspect they are removed and as a result we are not allowed to create them.

I understand that legal issues, behinds the scenes stuff, or time constraints might have conspired to keep Storm troopers/Karskins/Tempestus Scions out of the game, but I find it hard to believe that in researching the Imperial Guard for this game you never once came upon a reference to them? They are featured heavily in all the TT codexes, the lore, the books, the art, they are also an existing unit in the recent RTS games.

Here's the 40k Wikia entry: http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Storm_Troopers

Anyways, not a huge deal really...I've just seen some other players on the forum complaining about the lack of Storm Troopers (and Ogryn, but I never cared for them personally.) as well but in the end the game certainly isn't hurting for unit choices, and I don't think the Storm Troopers would fill much of a tactical role what with being somewhere between Guardsmen and Space Marines. Ie. Why waste a slot on Storm Troopers when you could just field a Tactical Marine squad.

The unit roster changes about 4 times during development

We managed to get some of the new units in but not all of them. Ogryns have been built but not approved yet by GW.

JimmyC wrote:I read somewhere that GW no longer uses stormtroopers as it infringed on the copyright of the Star Wars Franchise.

That's copyright gone mad if true! Stormtroopers were not invented by George Lucas: they've been around since at least the end of World War I: http://www.worldwar1.com/arm011.htm. And I expect that's where he got the name from. Perhaps the Bundeswehr should sue Disney, or perhaps GW can license the name directly from the Bundeswehr .

Dident commissar Yarrick have kasrkins bodyguards in one of the missions? or was i dreaming?

IainMcNeil wrote:The unit roster changes about 4 times during development

We managed to get some of the new units in but not all of them. Ogryns have been built but not approved yet by GW.

I totally understand, I really appreciate the response as well. Do you mean to say we might be getting Ogryns as a unit in game at some point in the future? Can I ask, is there any hope of seeing Storm Troopers added? Under the new name/lore as the Tempsestus Scions maybe? Love the new patch notes btw, I think the game is definitely being tweaked in the right direction and I'm super happy to see it being supported after launch!