Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War - Winter Assault (PC)

There are also new battlefields to play with in MP as well as the new environments from the SP game, set on frozen wastelands and extensive environments, the new levels are superbly done and atmospheric keeping to the original feel and introducing a whole new strategy with the IG missions.

There are a number of graphical improvements to the game, only minor ones and the addition from patch 1.4 of persistent scarring and bodies’ makes for a much grittier and much more visceral gameplay experience. You can mourn the loss of your unit as their corpses lay a hundred men deep in the blood soaked and burned ground.

Or relish the victory as the bodies of Orks and Chaos scum lay arrayed around your mighty war machine as you crush the last of their pathetic base buildings with the ultimate weapon: The Baneblade.

There are numerous additions and fixes included both in the patch 1.4 and Winter Assault itself, these can be found by reading the included documentation with the game or visiting the Relic Forums (fairly friendly community) home to a number of dedicated modders and teams already beavering away at the expansion pack and adding features.

Pay close attention to the DoW AI Project people who are continually improving the game and dedicating all their free time to making it even better. Its games like this and developers that support community modding that really gets my attention.

Talking about the AI of course, the vanilla AI from the 1.4 patch and the DoW main game for Skirmish has been improved a little, they could have done a lot more for the AI in general but I am satisfied enough with it and enjoy the game immensely. (Plus I have the AI project to keep an eye on).

I can also tell you that the animations for the new units and the Imperial Guard vehicles, especially the Basilisk are excellent (You have the whole load, fire and cover ears animation set along with aiming and raising the barrel, all done by the squad in command of the gun) and keep to the tradition set out in the first game. The Guard are full of personality and the way that they battle either ranged or in close combat is totally different to the other factions, watching them finish off an Ork with a blast from a pistol for example or running it through with a bayonet are just a couple of the many finisher animations that the game employs.

All in all with the additions of new units, maps, SP campaigns and features added since patch 1.4 the expansion is an excellent addition to a gold-star game in the first place providing new voice acting, new music and turning DoW into a much more complete game. Of course the gamer’s wishlist is a long as a piece of string in regards to this game, but mine has been fulfilled nicely and I cannot in all conscience score this less than the score I gave to DoW in the beginning.

Most expansion packs can be accused of padding or adding very little, you cannot accuse Winter Assault of this and I look forwards to further additions/expansions/packs from Relic for my #1 RTS game. I can’t find anything wrong with it either, there are no graphic glitches and no errors with my sound or frame-rate drops, even with everything cranked to full. The only niggles I could have are from a balancing/AI point of view and I have already kind of mentioned those, and they’re minor really.