WARHAMMER 40K: DAWN OF WAR IV

King Art wants to bring back what made the first game special

- Fraser Brown

A horde of howling orks comes charging across the war-torn wasteland, straight towards the men and women of the Astra Militarum, waiting with guns primed, hiding behind walls, readying themselves for death.

Then angels fall from the heavens; heavily armoured saviours in drop pods that slam to the ground and annihilate any orks unlucky enough to be standing underneath them. The Blood Ravens are here. And they are going to fuck shit up.

Oh, boy. Dawn of War IV. Yes, it’s back. And I do really mean back. If, like me, you've been praying to the God Emperor that one day we'd get a true sequel to the original Dawn of War, then I've got good news: the horrible, desiccated, throne-bound corpse was listening.

OK, OK, I don't want to get too ahead of myself. I have played one skirmish map (multiple times) of a pre-alpha build that's full of placeholder assets and wonky performance. But even this early, there are reasons to be excited.

The Blood Ravens are back, joined by orks, Necrons and the boffins of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Each army will have its own dynamic story-driven campaign, too. A wargear system will also let you tailor units for different engagements. Expect different types of missions as well, but with returning features like proper base building, capture points and a basic cover system. Meanwhile, multiplayer modes - including Last Stand - will be available, but the singleplayer campaigns are the focus. And lastly, sync kills have been expanded, so troops fighting each other in melee will sync up to do more elaborate hand-to-hand duels.

So yeah! I am pumped for this. King Art feels like a really good fit. Iron Harvest is one of the best modern RTS romps, and it generated a lot of comparisons with not just Relic's design philosophy, but specific games like Company of Heroes and Dawn of War. If I was going to pick a new studio to take on Dawn of War, King Art would be at the top of the list.