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[Warlok]

Review - PC

Real-Time Strategy, Science Fiction

6


Graphics – 8
Sound Effects – 7
Music – 7
Gameplay – 5
Length – 7
Difficulty – 8
Stability – 6
Post-Release Support/Expansion – 6

Supremely disappointing – Supreme Commander 2 fails on many levels. Even judged completely on its own merits, it is only mediocre.


Pros
Clean engine, sculpted 3D environments, very quick & friendly group movement system in zoomed-out mode, quick engage/attack command versus enemy targets, some nice unit design & attendant effects.

Cons
Buggier than s**t with exceptional achievements in the fields of troop transport and pathfinding, "experimental" class units nothing more than bigger tanks, eviscerated artillery mechanics, lack of Save function in Skirmish games, cliched story, terrible dialogue, the same voice actors from every other game.


Supreme Commander 2 is the new and improved incarnation of the SC series from Gas Powered Games. The original three factions – Illuminate/Aeon, Cybrans, and UEF – return to the field with revamped forces and re-balanced technologies.


The new "improved" Darkenoid sports incredible showers of plasma and rays of beam death. It looks better than it actually is.

A Recap
A sole battlefield commander 'bot' materializes/paints/constructs facilities on the battlefield, from which one generates armies of great size to throw at an enemy defence. Of course, foes do likewise.

Energy generated from dynamo structures and Mass produced by mines/refineries provides the game 'economy' by which to do this.

Of Campaigns...
Supreme Commander 2 offers you 3 campaigns in singleplayer play, one campaign for each of the three factions. Together, they offer a chronological story.

And what a story it is.


Together, we are going to slaughter every last civilian in that colony!

The initial bother that will strike a player is how the same voice actors from every other game project in history do the audio for the characters in Supreme Commander. Surely in a world of 5+ billion people we can find 1 or maybe 2 new talents to add to the cast? Professor Brackman is an acceptable scientific eccentric, but all others we have heard before.

Scenarios no longer unfold and 'expand' as they did in Supreme Commander 1. That feature of single player campaign play was innovative. In Sup Com 2 we simply get plopped into a static map, with objectives both mandatory and optional. The optionals have no bearing on the story outcome whatsoever, serving only as a means by which a player can challenge him or herself.

The script that excuses the play is fairly cliched, object-oriented and full of cautionary lessons about power, corruption, scientific zeal, and betrayal. Its sub-standard stuff to put it mildly.

The dialogue written for the participants is most of the time even worse. You will chortle and guffaw fairly early on at what can only be referred to as the tired old 'militaristic kook' antics of Colonel Alex Rodgers. Terrible stuff which at least elicits a laugh. Eye-rolling material. There are a few lines primarily from another eccentric Cybran commander that are intentionally & effectively amusing, but for the most part at best we are firmly in the camp only of Blizzard, not Shakespeare.

Of course this is an rts horder... of what import is a story, one might be tempted to ask. The problem is as it is with any production – weakest link logic applies. And when you have a supremely weak link, it tends to rain upon the rest of the experience, casting it all in a derogatory light. That Supreme Commander 2 is a lesser game compounds the effect.

New And Improved?
In the original Supreme Commander, Mass and Energy formed your budget. You accumulated resources up to your storage capacity – determined by storage structures. The real key to this budget was the *rate* of resource generation: keeping your expenditures of Mass & Energy below your rate of generation was the key and constant struggle.

In Supreme Commander 2, this has been abandoned.

Instead, we are greeted by a completely conventional resource accumulation. The innovative budget concept of the first game is gone.

Additionally Mass generation structures have been removed. Players MUST now sally forth and fight over mine points on the map. The only remedy for this is an Energy-to-Mass unlockable bit of Research. Naturally such a technology is a high priority.

The viewscreen is comprised of a wide-open space now, eliminating the narrow "visor slit" interface of the original; this full display is appreciated, although there can be a resultant corresponding hit to framerate now that more is being rendered at once.

If you zoom out to what is often referred to as the strategic level view, you behold group command icons which are automatically displayed. It is a simple thing to select combat units and direct them without having to CTRL Group them, though such may still be done. Definitely welcome – this enhances playability considerably.

Holding down the right Mouse button with units selected conjures an 'attack radius' zone, allowing a player to designate an entire mob of targets at a single click. Again, an inspired piece of interface design.


The right-click 'area attack' functionality makes it easy to designate multiple proximal targets.

Unit designs are sometimes fairly appealing, despite a difficult to articulate lack of grit – Supreme Commander 1 possessed that in spades. A peculiar serious sci-fi sensibility. Overall the engine presents you with more colour. What the game does not present you with may be alarming: no Aeon/Illuminate navy. None. This may in other game design circumstances be a decision meant to impart distinction to a faction, but here it serves only to anger Aeon/Illuminate players. The sum sentiment one comes away with is that the Aeon/Illuminate got screwed.


Cybran war machines jumping across a chasm.

Certain unlockable abilities are sensible and useful, while other aspects of the design are questionable. The Cybran ground forces can now Jump fairly broad distances, even across map gaps. Contrasted to that is the parallel UEF structure – a unit cannon – that allows the player to "shoot" units across the battlefield. The aforementioned grit disappears in the face of such... this seems more apt in the silly world of Red Alert than in Supreme Commander. Ditto for an Experimental unit dubbed the Pulinsmash, which surprisingly draws in enemy units and smashes them within some type of field. Feels like a gimmick.

Singleplayer Skirmish contests could be Saved in Sup Com 1. Not so in Sup Com 2. Everything or nothing.

Whence Goeth The Mighty
In the original Supreme Commander, you had to build the mighty Experimental units, such as the Aeon Colossus and the Cybran Spiderbot, on the field. This took exceptional time and resources to build. It did so because of the incredible combat power of even a single one – these units could literally take on ARMIES... and win.


Behold the experimental unit known as Cybranosaurus Rex. Big deal.


5 arguably goofy looking Aeon/Illuminate experimentals put the final hurt upon an enemy base. Thats right – 5.

In Supreme Commander 2 you simply unlock 'Experimentals' via Research and produce them at your corresponding factory building. Build time is minimal, combat effectiveness, despite a few pleasing fireworks, is mediocre and entirely conventional. The Darkenoid, for example, is the new Aeon/Illuminate Czar Flying Saucer, which, in the parlance of the instruction manual, can be veritably unstoppable in groups of 3 or more. 3 or more?!?...  They are nothing more than 'heavy tanks' in the Supreme Commander universe. 30 basic ground units can certainly defeat a mid-level SC 2 Experimental.

If that sounds completely lame in the elder shadow of Supreme Commander... it is. It doesn`t just sound like it. The successful completion of only a single Experimental unit used to be a game-changer, now they are insignificant. There is no longer anything special about these units.

Artillery
One thing the first game did so well was artillery fire. Firing ranges were enormous for a real-time strategy game, and burst radi combined with damage to make them some of the most critical and enjoyable assets to be found in the genre.


Somewhat pudgy Cybran naval ships shell the enemy in the distance. Despite promising fireworks, these ordnances impact with very little effect.


At this extreme zoom range, long range artillery shells appear as flying white dots on their way to a target. In this scenario there are *7* dedicated artillery structures lobbing shells into the enemy base, where they have little effect.

In Supreme Commander 2 we descend to the realm of feet. Most artillery may only shoot a few feet beyond ranges of direct-fire units: take a single step forward and POOF those pieces are now in range. Lurking within that same dull realm is the usual litany of performance statistics, stuff we all had our fill of in the initial heyday of Command & Conquer. Burst radi are almost non-existant, making shelling of almost any kind a pinpoint attack. The feature of a laser or particle weapon, not high explosive ordinance. And damage for these weapons is trivial to the point you are better served by producing equal numbers of conventional tank units; 3 shells later and a few vehicles in a group finally explode? Thats hardly the ground-shaking pedigree of Supreme Commander.

This is certainly the most disappointing facet of SC 2, without doubt.

Your Papers Are Not In Order
The Cosmos no longer seems to favour the concept of transporting troops along ferrying lines, via transports.

Again, this was something Supreme Commander #1 did superbly and painlessly: you set up ferry path-points for transports, then sent your units to the ferry pickup point. Automation did the rest, you sat back and beheld the execution. The key sum was that troop transportation in an rts game was both eminently possible and fun, for once.

In SC 2 you will be lucky to get a single initial group away before the transports stop doing what they are supposed to.

It is therefore also somewhat demoralizing to require the unlocking of a heavier transport type as a prerequisite to something more useful - you know... something that actually works.

Higher Detail Keystoning
The maps upon which conflicts occur in Supreme Commander 2 are more detailed owing to their 3-dimensionality. That is to say they are fully modelled in 3D – combat still takes place essentially on a two dimensional plane.


A good example of the increased artistry of the map design in Supreme Commander 2.

That dimension of mapcraft gives the game the opportunity to show off some lackluster pathfinding. Any aptitude for units bumping & k`nogging into each other is magnified by the cleverly designed maps. These maps look wonderful, but require more attention when it comes to navigating about them. As it is, larger hordes will frequently break up, get stuck on map edgings, block each other, etcetera etcetera.

Add to that a penchant for forgetting queued up orders and you have Supreme Aggravation.

Research
SC 2 introduces the Research concept to the universe. One accumulates research points in one of two ways: by engaging in combat, and over time. Research Facility structures increase the rate of accumulation over time. Even considering that, more active players will progress along the Research trees more quickly than inert participants. In regards to the encouragement of combat, the system works.

It does not work as well as one might hope however. The system is linear in progression, often requiring you to devote points to those things which you are not necessarily interested in using, thereby wasting them. In Supreme Commander #1, you had more direct control over what you did or did not avail yourself of – there was no waste. There is here.


The research screen, organized into various apt tab menus.

There is no doubt that a form of Research of suitably innovative nature could complement that which is Supreme Commander - handling what such provides from a fresh outside-of-the-box design perspective – but as is it seems a bit of an ill fit.

Experience
Units gain experience. They did in the original game as well, but there is more emphasis on it in this case. Experience ranks primarily bestow greater health/hits to a unit, increasing such by about a full 50% at the top tiers. In SupCom 1, experience rarely became more than a factor of ego involving the larger units & experimentals. In Supreme Commander 2 experience actually plays a lesser role, owing to the remarkably boosted fragility of those powerful units.

Ultimately, the Supreme Commander series is best as a horder of massive proportions. Trying to emphasize veterancies in such a world may not have been the best design direction to proceed in. Having said that, its impact is overall insignificant and therefore not really a cause for concern, whether you appreciate the gesture or not. Doesn`t hurt.

Structure veterancies are things that work decently in Supreme Commander 2. The more units produced by a factory, the faster that factory can produce them, and for cheaper. This manifests a natural accelerating pace of play as games progress.

A Note For XP Users
Bereft of Service Pack 3, XP users will experience an extremely frequent and harsh reboot of their system when initializing the main executable. It is absolutely essential therefore to apply the Service Pack 3 update for Supreme Commander 2. This is the remedy for the problem.

[Note: An early incarnation of this review accorded responsibility for this concern erroneously. The writ has since been updated - including the overall rating - with such in mind.]


Summation
Its not a mass of instability that marks Supreme Commander 2 as technically frustrating, its the few critical bugs that are dependably unreliable that do. The game engine otherwise seems solid.

Regrettably, all-in-all, the compiled list of things that Supreme Commander 2 does well is far shorter than that which it does poorly. The design decisions that make SC 2 what it is are of such disappointing magnitude that they eclipse anything it does right, making such mention almost pointless.

So for all the enthusiasm, Supreme Commander 2 proves itself most unworthy. Supreme Commander #1 is recommended.

(Special Note: Less the expansion pack Forged Alliance, referred to in some quarters as Fu**ed Alliance for how it soiled the original game in a way different from this sequel.)



Scott Hunter

[Spooky]

Warlok, as already mentioned on the Steam forum, the whole part about SecuROM is completely wrong. Supreme Commander 2 does not use SecuROM at all, it uses Steam as DRM. If you want to get to the bottom of your crashes, open up a new thread on one of the Supreme Commander 2 forums and post a dxdiag.

[Warlok]

Spooky, thanks for providing this information. I will make the necessary adjustments and updates once there is more information specific to the problem (dxdiag erratta going to the Steam thread concerned). A lightning storm is threatening here now however so I may have to do so later today.

Apologies for making an erroneous conclusion (though the problem is indeed present). Thanks for taking the time to correct me.

[Spooky]

No problem. I already found the cause of your problem btw.

Your system crashes because you still have only Service Pack 2 installed. You need to install Service Pack 3. You also need to install the latest GPU drivers.

[Warlok]

Thank you Sir Spooky. I`ll amend the review (including a boost to the score once I test anew) and include notes to that affect in the main post, to insure people are aware of the correction. Thanks again for your assistance and the links.

[Warlok]

Service Pack 3 goodness confirmed, review adjusted accordingly.

[Warlok]

Given that Post-Release Support/Expansion is an ongoing thing, I have adjusted that rating as well.