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The gameplay demo for Company of Heroes 2

Unless you're intimately familiar with the first game, Company of Heroes 2 might surprise you because it doesn't seem that different. Yes, this game takes place on the Eastern Front of World War 2 and years before the events of the previous Company of Heroes titles, but the mechanics fans have come to love have mostly been preserved. Skirmishes in Company of Heroes 2 often come down to typical RTS factors like having the right rock for your opponent’s proverbial scissors, but also heavily involve other elements like terrain and morale. Knowing when and how to retreat is still important. Units are still often composed of small pre-made groups of men fighting in concert. Armored units have different armor densities based on how they were made in real life. Fights in Company of Heroes 2 ultimately come down to which commander analyzes a host of factors at a moment's notice, then respond to them in a way that maximizes the potential of their forces.Relic appears to have approached the sequel from a philosophy of refinement rather than reinvention. The ways that Company of Heroes 2 differs from what's come before – outside of the Eastern Front setting and the fact that it's 1941, instead of post-1944 – are subtle. First are the aforementioned animations. Soldiers now move in an even more realistic fashion, as do the numerous tanks on the battlefield. Relic really wants to get across the dominating presence armor had on a WW2 fight, and now tanks lurch to a stop, bounce more across difficult terrain, and plow through buildings and other man-made structures like the multi-ton monstrosities they are. Armor isn't just something that a commander responds to because they know the math and realize it’s a threat, but a sometimes genuinely shocking hulk that bursts onto the scene out of nowhere. Though soldiers aren’t necessarily defenseless against tanks, either. Flame throwers and other special attacks can now kill the crews of certain armored vehicles, allowing the other side to capture it. Key vehicles could even become points of contention, dynamically adding important multiplayer capture points, and forcing both sides to be a bit more careful with armor.Other RTSs let players field swarms of units at a time, but Company of Heroes 2 handles army size differently. From the spotter for a machinegun to the loader for a mortar team, every soldier in Company of Heroes 2 matters. In the hands of a capable leader, a team of 10 men can wreak havoc. You might have a three man machinegun team take position in a house, pouring on enemy fire and suppressing a much larger force against the other player's wishes. Then while they're pinned down, a mortar team and five man infantry unit moves in to clean them up or chase them while they retreat. Or, if a team is holed up in a home, why not send in a flame thrower team to burn them out? Previously the buildings “burnt,” dealing damage to the guys inside and then petering out. But in Company of Heroes 2 the buildings actually light on fire, slowing burning and eventually crumbling into ash. Scenarios like this just show how wars aren't won by masses, but by the acts of a few men doing exceptional deeds. A key grenade toss here, a perfectly timed rocket launcher ambush there, and your soldiers can go from Russian peasants to the stuff of legends.To further maximize the importance of every unit, and to make Company of Heroes 2 even more realistic, the sight system has been reworked. Company of Heroes used a system akin to every other RTS, where each unit had a radius around them that automatically unveiled the map around them despite whatever might otherwise obscure their view. In Company of Heroes 2, though, Relic's putting in what it calls True Sight, a system where your soldier or vehicle sees only what they can actually see within that radius. If a line of trees and a house are ahead of your unit then your sight will have little avenues of darkened space where your soldiers view is obstructed. This completely changes how you use the battlefield to gain a tactical advantage. Previously you could roll a squad of soldiers or a tank into a town and magically see around corners before you got to them, but now every cross street – every big bush for that matter – could be hiding a heavy emplacement or elite troop. Scouting looks to be vastly more important in Company of Heroes 2, and the amount of potential tactics players can come up with to use tanks or smoke to block sight is overwhelming to ponder.Another seemingly minor, but actually incredibly significant, change to Company of Heroes 2 comes in the form of units that can vault over cover. Sounds like a no-brainer, right? Soldiers do it in every movie and first-person shooter nowadays, but previously your troops had to find ways around or through (bombing a tiny fence? Hell yes.) even the shortest wall– it just became part of the strategy. But in Company of Heroes 2 your soldiers can be ordered to hop over a short wall, opening up many, many more avenues of attack, and making skirmishes feel more realistic. Seriously, anyone who's played a bit of Company of Heroes can realize that this changes everything.The setting also changes up otherwise familiar gameplay mechanics. The campaign follows Russian soldiers as they fight the German army in the Eastern Front in 1941. This means that snow will be a huge factor, bogging down tanks, slowing your troops, and making you easily trackable. The year of the conflict is also significant, since in 1941 key German technologies like the Panther or Tiger weren't invented, and Stalin had just introduced Order 270, which forced Russians to shoot their own troops if they retreated. How and if this will affect how the Russian army plays is still under wraps.In the pantheon of RTS developers, Relic has proved itself time and time again to be among the very best. Previous efforts in the Company of Heroes franchise showed us what it's like to play as the Germans, the British and America, but oddly the Russians were always absent. In 2013 Relic will finally show us a new side of WW2, where the bloodiest battles were fought, desperate measures were taken and new companies of heroes were born.