Gaming: The 40k Reasons We Love Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising ...

KFD's review is here to take you from tabletop gaming to the video game post apocalypse.

Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising is a welcomed new expansion to the Dawn of War games; it brings back the Chaos race to the game after it missed the original Dawn of War II release.  In campaign mode, the story picks up where DoW II left off, but don't let that stop you because it's fairly easy to follow. The basic goal is to destroy all that's not part of the Imperium. They made this rendition a lot more fun than the last, which seemed to drone on and on until you got to the good stuff. Within the first few missions on DoW II: Chaos Rising, you have a nice selection of squads to choose from, including a Dreadnought which is a big bio-mech.

For those who have never played Dawn of War (DoW), it’s not like your normal war game, especially since it's not a first person shooter.  Picture the game Risk; now add aliens, orks, and other creatures all trying to get their slice of the pie.  You command squads of Space Marines that have different abilities and sizes to help win the map.  The developer limits campaign mode to four squads so you need to think a little to choose the right combination to be most effective.  As you progress through the campaign, you’ll acquire more squads and equipment that will make your squads faster, stronger, and even more badass.  This expansion has added something new too, Morality. Basically, depending on the missions that you choose, your squads can either walk the path of the Imperium or turn into Chaos.  Depending on the path that you choose, you get different abilities. My personal favorite is blood lust, which, just like it sounds, the more you kill the stronger you get.

Multiplayer is, by far, one of the best parts of the game! What’s better than gaming with friends, or that creepy guy on the other side of the internet… maybe not him, but you know what I mean.  Here you can play as the other races in the game aside from the Space Marines; such as Chaos, Eldar, Orks and Tyranids.  The game ships with a bunch of maps so you should be entertained for a while, and even if you don’t have enough people you can have the computer load up the slot.

Unlike some games where the computer is more of a shooting gallery to let you rack up the kills, this one can send you home crying to mommy; depending on the level of difficulty you set it at.  The maps are set up for a couple of different win scenarios, take and hold or annihilate. You can figure the rest out from there.  A neat feature that is carried over from DoW II is that you can place your squads in buildings and fire from there. Keep in mind the environment IS destructible so if your squads are in a building when it falls they go splat with it…yea, it happened to me.

There are a couple of bummers with the expansion, gone are the days when you built up your base and had giant armies. Although that could be a good thing since there is no more laggy screen, but I miss it from DoW. The most upsetting part of the new game, and I’m sure THQ did it because they know I’m counting the days until the next expansion is released, is while they show the Imperial Guard in the game, you cannot play them in multiplayer.  On a positive note though, they look good on campaign mode and all of their wonderful toys like Earth Shakers are there doing what they do best, shaking the ground and blowing stuff up.   

Overall I’d buy this expansion again. It has provided plenty of entertainment for me and best of all I bought it off Steam on one of their many deal days, for fifteen bucks.  If you were a fan of the first DoW II then you’ll love this one, if you weren’t, I’d say pass on this expansion. While they made a bunch of improvements, if you’re looking for this to be “just like” the original DoW, it’s not.  I personally like the new gameplay, even if I still find myself LANing on the weekend with the original DoW.  Now all I have to do is wait for the next expansion for the Imperial Guard and, at the risk of sounding greedy, maybe even the Necrons!

- DS -

~ Dan has been drafting everything from house plans to water mains with CADD for over ten years. Currently he drafting indoors, because it's hot outside. If you would like to reach Dan, please email him. ~