Gameplay

Having heroes in RTS games isn’t a new concept, but Battlecry II pulls it off very well. Your hero isn’t only a badass on the battlefield, but he can build buildings, convert resource mines, and carry attributes that help your army. A hero’s “Merchant” skill allows you to buy buildings and units at a discount – one of the best attributes in the game. He can build on his skills as he gains experience from battles. You can also choose what type of hero you want to use – from a daemon slayer to just plain daemon. All the options you have in creating your hero and the abilities you can use in battle really add to the gameplay, making it more interesting than your average RTS. Along the same lines is the “Retinue” (how the hell do you pronounce that?). After every battle you can select the best surviving units and put them in your Retinue. Before the next battle you can choose these units as secondary heroes in your battles.

Nightly rain

Demon base at night

Victory

Battlecry II features twelve races. Each race is unique in its units, unit abilities, resource dependencies, and buildings. Some races are similar in on the surface, like High elves and Wood Elves, but they play very differently. In fact, there are so many different units that it takes a lot of playing time (or studying the documentation) to understand what units are strong and which are fodder. It can take 20+ hours before you even see some of the races.

AI

Battlecry II does a lot of little things very well. The pathfinding is excellent – something that makes or breaks a lot of RTS games. Units will find their way very quickly, without getting caught up in other units and without taking forever to make up their mind. Units are also very smart. For example, if your unit is attacking a building and an enemy unit approaches, your unit will stop attacking the building and start attacking the hostile. Finally, one of the best examples of good unit AI is the “attitude” function. This allows you to tell you units how to behave when you’re not around. Defensive attitude tells your units to attack enemies if they come near, chase them a little if they run, but return to their post when the enemies are retreating. Magic attacker tells your casting units to attack enemies and use magic spells when appropriate (much easier than micromanaging spells). Rampant attitude is handy when you’re cleaning up the end of a battle – your units will seek and destroy everything on the map.

He’s happy

Results

Recruits are important

Resource management dominates the gameplay. Gold, Metal, Stone, and Crystals are acquired when your heroes “convert” a mine to your side. Depending on the size of the mine, you’ll automatically receive resources per second. To increase resource intake, you have to convert more mines, add peons to the mines (max 8), or research mining upgrades. It’s good that there are several options to increase resource intake, allowing you to choose what type of game you want to play – fight for more resources, climb the tech tree, or pump units. This aspect of gameplay is very balanced, because if you spend your resources building units you won’t have enough to climb the tech tree, and vice versa. There’s a strict upper limit to resource intake as well, so there’s never a point when you can do both.

The campaign mode sets all twelve races spread across 65 maps, with the intent of one race taking over the world. As you conquer maps you get army, building, and hero bonuses (i.e. +1 view range for all units or improved conversion times). If you conquer the home map of a race, you can lead that race in battle. Gaining abilities and new races to play is a nice way to keep you interested, but after a while it gets repetitive.