Nice to look at, some good action tactics, BUT, too much repetition, too little choices, not a real DoW sequel. Me Sad.
Let me start a rant-a-lot about DoW1 and DoW2, since we were told this IS a sequel, it will help me to put things in perpective...
There where 2 thing that I didn't like of DoW1 as of Dark Crusade:
1) There was not a smart way to make you NOT take the totality of the map nor of the enemy beginning in a more "elegant" way, meaning that when enemy forces attacked, they just "erased" one of your bases, heck a simple scripted "bombardment" to destroy your base on the "entry point" and a quick deployment would had been a lot cooler and could be done with the same game engine.
2) I didn't like that no troops could be left behind to guard the bases, yes you could buy some def, but is not the right way, it would be a lot nicer if you could choose to let some of the troops you got during the battle in them, or by a good price deploy "any" normal unit or hero to stand guard (for a price of course) and charge you a fee each round according with the number and kind of units you left in a base, so that too many units let behind unnecessary, would end up with you going "bankrupt". If a Unique Hero is deployed to defend a base then it cant be used in the next battle and so on and so forth, you get my point... I hope. This also could have been done with the same game engine.
Now what I wanted DoW2 to be was a more involved DoW1, make the Strategical part really cool and the Tactical part really intense:
All units with a unique names, stats, and equipment (random gen for normal guys) and custom for Heroes, but of course some form of bulk management would be necessary. INSTEAD we got ONLY heroes, with preset names, preset capabilities and accompanied with some totally anonymous red shirts... sad.
When reinforcing a squad don't just make it just appear like if it teleported, Actually it would be a nice touch to have 2 ways to reinforce a squad: Teleportation for quick adding and pod fall that would take longer but will cause damage to the enemy. But in both cases you would have to first GET the soldier and THEN send him to reinforce. It would add a layer of "realism" and tactics (it doesn't have to be complicated) It can be still a single button click if you don't want a customized unit, but let say I want to send a couple of guys I have in the base to reinforce a squad, and I want to use pod-fall to crush a few enemy units... it would be so nice. INSTEAD we have to capture some random goodie that allow teleportation of units in the same lame way as in DoW1. As if Space marines didnt carry radios with them already.
More flexible squad formations, respecting the WH40K rules maybe. But why can't I have an Apothecary and a Commander fighting shoulder to shoulder with 4 marines? Or why can't I have a servitor in my squad specially assigned to keep that tank going at pick efficiency? The servitor is an easy target? OK, but I have the option and I can use it if I want to. An option to automatically keep squad with a constant configuration can make things run smooth and be a real money sink if not attended carefully in the long run ;p. I understand the necessity for a total unit number cap, but I don't understand why each individual type of unit has to have a it own cap too (balance? I hope someday game designers understand that perfect balance is not possible or is necessarily fun). If I want to make force of only a couple of dozen tau battle suits, then let me do it and pay the price for bad strategical thinking, or at least let the player establish them as rules for each play, divided in free play rules and WH40K rules for example. INSTEAD we got a super limited number of units, a super limited number of members for each squad and a super limited set of rules.
If I upgrade a tank in one mission, then allow me to downgrade it for a price so I can use a different upgrade for another mission. The same for all units, plus allow this both during missions and before deployment (Again each unit should be unique allowing persistence in their evolution) INSTEAD we got nothing, you can't have vehicles.
Persistent Bases and Upgrades: instead of doing the same upgrades again and again for all Units, in each freaking mission of a campaign, upgrades would be "individual" and choosing who or what is going to get it is what makes the difference in cost. If a soldier already has a heavy bolter in one battle why in the next he doesn't have it anymore? INSTEAD we got some weapons, armors and items you have to OMG, listen to this... LOOT from the field. Why so lame? Nice Unique weapons could be hidden here and there, "sometimes" or be send by the high command as rewards for your success, or they may be hidden inside some ancient reliquary that you have to bleed to recover, but the all mighty Blood Ravens, veterans of 10.000 years of war, get ALL their best weaponry from stuff left away in chests.
Again why can multiplayer games be structured either as a small quick skirmish or as a medium or large campaign? Not many options here... again.
Why always BloodRavens? Some good scripting and a good story can be told without a single proper name being said. Allow some Mayor Chapters to be used or even your own custom colors, even more, allow units hardened in single player mode, be used in multiplayer and vice versa. A division like this would be nice: MULTI PLAYER UNITS ONLY, SINGLE PLAYER UNITS ONLY (stats and equipment your units get in this will not remain after the game ends, but they don't DIE), FREE FOR ALL (units keep their stuff either for other multiplayer games or the campaign but they can also DIE) or something along those lines, with units dying for good or not as a general option too, for those not hardcore enough ;). Geez AT LEAST allow me to name MY heroes.
And I could go on and on...
Instead with DoW2 we got a pure RTT (Real Time Tactical Game) with a little RPG paint over... Was it so hard to give name and stats to individual squad members? An the only strategy left is choosing (very limited choice BTW) the next mission, the items your guys are going to carry and who is going on the mission (again very limited choice here).
The game mechanics are nice, the graphics are cool, but the mission design its too repetitive and in the end is NOT DoW, this a different game, it deserves the WH40K (sort of) but is not a real sequel of DoW, is a DOWINO (Dawn of War in Name Only).
This sounds not much as a review of what the game is, as much as a review of what the game is not, but I would still give it the same score if I had never played DoW1 before. Despite all the graphical niceness and the action packed battles, the truth is that after the third mission you have pretty much done everything you can do with this game in single mode. Is not the game engine that fails, but the way in which the game campaign in general was set. I am convinced that this very same engine can produce a much more deep and diverse experience, both in the single and multilayer mode. Maybe that's the problem, they wanted to fast track everything for multiplayer experience and forgot to give it that extra something necessary for singleplayer. Take StarCraft as an example, the single campaign for each race is just a super big tutorial, but DAMN IT if it wasn't a great tutorial, and the multiplayer was (is) amazing. I hope they make an expansion that fix most of the problems the game has, we have to wait and see.