Company of Heroes 2’s upcoming multiplayer-only expansion adds British people, because honestly we’re everywhere, like a bad rash. We’re tough but limited in number, as the following video points out, with the ability to choose between two distinct tech paths focusing on defense or offense. This dev diary goes through the historical context for those design decisions.
Moving away from a solely defensive faction into one that’s flexible is an interesting decision. I’ve long held a bit of a love affair with being able to absorb lots of punishment on my characters. I play a tank in World of Warcraft, for example, but the design paradigms of these tropes have shifted quite significantly over the years. It can be boring, both for the player and his opponent, to just never die. It leads to stalemates, intensely long games and can be actively harmful to the diversity of strategies available.
Because of that, it’s all about shield slams and revenge attacks now, which I’m a fan of. Relic are doing the same thing it seems, but in such a way that you can still go ultro-defensive when you need to. More details on all that in Fraser’s preview. It’s a shame there’s no singleplayer component to this, as I suspect I’d be immediately routed were I to take a single step into the online sphere of a now two year old game.
It’s out on the 3rd of September for just £9 via Steam. Even if you don’t own Company of Heroes 2, you can buy it and be able to just playing the British in multiplayer.