Game has been a $45 pre-order for weeks over at GreenManGaming, gives a Steam Key. I think the deal is still going on.
"The sort of stuff that Relic used to carefully balance is now in the
hands of players willing to grind away at bonuses. Not since Age of
Empires Online has a supposedly serious RTS been so thoroughly
undermined by pointless grinding. To the catasser go the spoils!"
I just threw up a little bit. I fear I may not be done.
It would be unwise to base your judgement of CoH 2 upon this mans opinion alone.
I've been playing CoH as part of its small but active competitive community for the last 4 years and I sadly agree with a lot of your points. I still enjoy the game, and I'm still optimistic about its future, but there are a whole ton of elements that I really do not like. The original is vastly superior to the sequel in its current state.
How much blizzard paid u ?
I played hundreds if not thousands of hours of Company of Heroes, both with and without expansions, and I find CoH2 much more satisfying than its predecessor. I appreciate both the snowy and warmer maps for the different tactical challenges they offer. The UI gives so much more useful information about your units, which is a very welcome upgrade. The game is incremental in that way, rather than revolutionary, full of small, but meaningful enhancements. Little things like the way capture points are different. Instead of straight manpower points, basic points give a little of everything, but can have a destroyable upgrade to give more of a choice of resource. A small thing, but still another new strategic choice.
I don't miss the old style of commander. Many of them had "correct" paths anyway that everyone used. Now you have to make some choices before the game of what sort of things you'll be able bring to the table.
It's not perfect. I'm not a fan of the grinding for cards, but I get that we've had things like this in one form or another since Age of Empires 3 and I can deal with it. Unit descriptions could be better, but this IS a very good RTS, and it shocks me to see you say it isn't when I've personally played games of C&C 3 with you. They're both good games and I don't see how you can call this bad when it gets right so much of what made CoH 1 a good game.
I'm not saying it's a five star game, but I'd probably give it a four, personally. Then again it wouldn't be the first time we've been in absolute disagreement about a game. :)
Uh oh ManSpider, you probably don't want to read Tom's opinion on Kane and Lynch 2...
Out of curiosity, what do you mean when you say "the UI gives so much more useful information about your units"? I found the exact opposite to be the case, but I'd love to know what I'm missing.
I used to have great respect for Mr. Chick's reviews, but after seemingly going out of his way to slam excellent games like Sleeping Dogs, Max Payne 3, The Last of Us, Halo 4 and now CoH2, I no longer trust or pay much attention to his reviews. It's a shame Metacritic doesn't throw out the highest and lowest reviews on their site to keep one completely out-of-line negative review from dragging down the score of good games.
The panel at the top right shows units by icon, to recognize the type, and then it shows what sort of cover effects (yellow shield, green shield, red shield with slash through), if they are idle (clock), if they are getting colder, warmer or freezing blue/red thermometer with arrows or skull), if they are suppressed or pinned (down pointing triangle with exclamation point in yellow or red), if they are in combat (crosshairs). It will also show vehicle damage indicators (engine, gunner, stunned, etc). It shows the veterancy of units as well (number of stars above icon). if they are healing (red cross)
In CoH 1 you had the shield icon you could hover over to slide out a list of all your units to access a small portion of that information and select units from there. CoH 2 it is all there at a glance once you know what you're looking for.
It's a ton of useful information to the point of being almost overwhelming at first when you try to process at all, but when you get used to it, it is incredibly useful.
It could be great to have even more data, like have some sort of flashing exclamation when you hear one of your units yell, "Grenade!!!" so you might have some hopes of moving them if you were quick on the draw, but even so, there's a ton of useful data at your disposal.
Example: (not my screenshot, just something I googled up)
http://webassets.thq.com/coh2/...
As a massive Company of Heroes fan who is quite disappointed by Company of Heroes 2 I have to say I agree with most of what you say. I dunno if 1 star is a good score but really who cares about the stars? It's all about what's right and wrong with the game and you are pretty much right about what is wrong.
kill yourself man, the world doesnt need your trollism bullshit on the internet..we have to many dropkicks who think there opinion wants to be heard..
the guy obviously isnt a gamer and uses his hate to justify being alive..someone offer him some rope so he can hang himself.. rid the world of this troll
Windows XP actually goes out of support by Microsoft in less than a year. I don't specifically know why CoH2 doesn't support it but it is time to sort of get with the program.
I've been playing the beta the last few days. I played the original, the followups and even the failed Company of Heroes online. So far I've been having a great time with this one. He complains about the cold mechanic but it actually does create some interesting decision making where you have to choose between trying to attack in the snow or saving your troops for attrition.
The irony of someone calling another person a troll in the same sentence he advocates the suicide of that person! It's just a game review. One person's opinion. You're allowed to disagree with it without escalating to war-in-the-middle-east levels of animosity.
I disagreed with it too, but I wrote out why instead of telling the reviewer to kill themself.
That site sounds -totally- legit.
Ive been playing the Beta for a while too, i also own TWO copies of the original with the exps and i played the failed COHO (which i think they took all the ideas of exp leveling and weapon accuracy and stuff) i found it fun in the COH original sense, but didnt find anything new, and i really hated what they did with the commanders. I mean seriously? ill have to wait for level 45 to get a tiger?! :( Also the buildings of the bases for russian and germans look really bad. They are like holes in the ground and thats it. Pretty dissapointing thou ill wait for more reviews...
Favouring Kane and Lynch over over CoH 2? Something tells me this guy has a personal grudge against the game.
It's a shame that Metacritic recognizes such shortsighted, barely grounded opinions from "official critics" like this.