Dawn of War II : Chaos Rising Review

Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising is an expansion set to the original Dawn of War II, featuring the treacherous Chaos faction and a new campaign that pits the Space Marines from the previous Dawn of War II into the new story. You can also start as a new game instead of importing from your previous Dawn of War 2 save game although it might be a lil challenging in terms of difficulty.

Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising is now available on retail for the PC and also on Steam. Are you brave enough to face the forces of Chaos and its daemons.

Story: 8.5/10
Multiplayer Gameplay: 7.5/10
Characters: 8/10
Music: 7.5/10
Visuals: 8/10
Seiyuu: 8/10
Re-playability: 8.5/10

“You cannot escape me…You belong to me !” – Chaos Lord

Story

Chaos Rising, the sequel to the original Dawn of War II. Its story set place about a year after the story of the original series, with the tryanid forces defeated and the rest of the enemies scattered. However, planet Aurelia, once a lush planet to the humans that was lost to the Warp storm have resurfaced, encased in ice. Its surface, bleak and deserted…or is it ?

As I have purchased the game not long ago, it is hard for me to give my personal rating to the game. The starting is pretty good and I hope it will stay on this way. It is an expansion set so I wont expect much from it.

Update:

Completed the campaign for Chaos Rising, as usual the ending tells a tale that the story will continue and in much more excitement to come. Overall, the campaign is pretty short but hey it is an expansion set. The treacherous Chaos forces were pretty well portrayed in the flow of the story although I wish there more in-depth details more on the Chaos. As for “side quests” in this expansion set, I was pretty disappointed that there wasn’t many.

PS: The librarian hero is good in the campaign, proper micro management could make a viable asset to your team. ^^

Chaos Rising units features

Gameplay

A massive patch was launched to existing Dawn of War II owners which allows them to play with Chaos Rising owners. With that said, it means all the balance changes and new units are synchronized  for both users. The only feature that is not accessible to Dawn of War II users is the Chaos Rising campaign, use of  Chaos Race in multiplayer and skirmish (you can still set AI as Chaos) and of course the Tyranid and Chaos hero in The Last Stand.

The RTS gameplay in Dawn of War II remains the same apart from the new units and balancing. Carnifex for Tyranid is now standardized as 1 unit which allows you to upgrade it to a melee heavyweight or a ranged monster. Chaos units have the advantage to get the blessing from one of the Chaos gods and its upgrade will apply accordingly. I am pretty much “in love” with Tzeentch since it gives the Chaos Predator tank the “pew pew” ability. ^^. In its entirety, multiplayer gameplay retains its originality but featuring an addition of Chaos faction and more balanced gameplay.

The campaign have also increased the level cap to 30 with new items and also the introduction to the “Corruption” System. Indeed, your very own space marines will face the possibility of being swayed to the forces of Chaos or stand firm with its moral and values for the Emperor. An action, weapon or even certain events will affect your Space Marines.

I am not sure if it is me but it seems like Chaos Rising is giving me an audio problem  (bursting static) that happens when I set the audio to Ultra and there lots of fighting going on. Also, vocals switch between center channel to L/R during campaign speech (i am using 5.1 here). Hope a fix will come soon.

Characters & Seiyuu

The original cast of Space Marines remains and I simply love how they portray what a Space Marine should. Introduction of Chaos gives our characters more flavor as they battle their tainted mortal brothers. I wont mention much of the characters since I have just started.

Voice Acting in Dawn of War II… “Your slavery to the False Emperor ends today”  -Awesome Chaos Lord ^^

Mission 1 Gameplay video

Music

The original soundtrack of Dawn of War II have been impressive and it remains as it is. There are a few new tracks in Chaos Rising. Nothing much of a big deal, unless there are new tracks later on in the campaign.

Visuals

Nothing new in Chaos Rising, everything remain as it is but the introduction of the icy planet of Aurelia does give a new blend of icy terrain. Not bad if I will say but not impressive.

Re-playability

Brand new wargear, multiple endings and different choices in-game definitely allows replayability.

You may want to remember to backup your save game too as it might come handy if you wipeout your hard disk and decide to import the save game to the next expansion set.