It’s been a pretty great gamescom for Warhammer. A full showing of Space Marine 2 finally charged into the fray, Darktide got a long-awaited console release date, and Rogue Trader showed off its retinue of fantastic companion characters. But perhaps the most interesting Warhammer showing at the convention was Realms of Ruin, the strategy game set in Games Workshop’s lesser-explored Age of Sigmar fantasy universe. After an hour of hands-on time with its single-player, I’ve found myself excited by the prospect of a game that finally continues and potentially advances the legacy of the great Dawn of War cinematic campaigns.
Dawn of War was, of course, the touchpoint that we identified in our first preview of Realms of Ruin. The first of the two missions I played certainly felt like it owed a great debt to that series’ design, with my squads of tanky, hammer-swinging Stormcast Eternals marching from capture point to capture point. Once seized, I could build fortifications atop them to prevent my sneaky Orruk Kruleboyz enemies from reclaiming them and cutting off my resources. Fundamentally, this is Dawn of War’s Listening Post system in a fantasy skin – and I don’t say that as a complaint.
It was the second campaign mission I played that showed Realms of Ruin in a more interesting light. Here I was battling against the newly-revealed Nighthaunt, a faction of ghosts that fight in packs. Naturally that means there’s a certain amount of Zerg comparisons to be made, but unlike Starcraft’s horde army the Nighthaunt don’t aim to blanket an area with cheap expendable units. Realms of Ruin operates at a smaller scale, with a limited number of squads that can survive for longer durations than many RTS units. And so the gangs of Nighthaunt Chainrasps that descended on my Stormcast felt as if they were slowly suffocating me rather than completely overwhelming my forces.
It was important to escape those moments of suffocation, since this mission had a centrepiece tug-of-war mechanic that required constant attention. The Nighthaunt had bound a mysterious artefact in huge spectral chains that stretched across the land. To break the spell and claim the artefact, my Stormcast had to defend our resident wizard, Demechrios, as he cast a counter spell. To help him, I also had to capture and hold a trio of anchor points – holding them all simultaneously would deplete the chains’ power. Should the Nighthaunt reclaim an anchor, the spell would begin to build in strength again, and so maintaining control and dominance across all three of the three battlefield sectors was essential.
This long, attrition-like war for control highlighted the importance of each unit’s specialties. As with many RTS games, Realms of Ruin uses a rock-paper-scissors approach. Offensive units can smash defensive units with greater efficiency, but are weak against ranged units, who are weak versus defensive units. It creates a triangle that’s easy to understand and relatively simple to manage. But atop that are special abilities that allow a little more spark and personality; the angel-winged Prosecutors can soar across the battlefield and then hurl their hammers from up high, while the Stormcast’s heroic Lord-Celestant leader, Sigrun, can charge into squads and scatter them to the winds – ideal for knocking back Nighthaunt who are capturing one of the anchors.
In many ways, what I’ve described is true of so many RTS games, from Dawn of War to Ground Control to Command and Conquer. Realms of Ruin feels good from a strategic perspective, but perhaps not exactly groundbreaking. The real appeal, at least for me, is seeing the love and care developer Frontier has put into recreating the world of Age of Sigmar.
Games Workshop’s modern fantasy setting is extremely popular on the tabletop, but has largely been ignored in the video game world. It’s a genuine thrill, then, to see characters and armies that I’ve only ever seen in static plastic form come alive on screen. Each of the two sample missions were topped and tailed with extravagant cutscenes, and the visual effects of the characters’ attacks – particularly those of the spectral Nighthaunt, who glide across green mists – was a delight to watch. Maybe Realms of Ruin won’t break the mould for strategy games, but it certainly breaks the trend of Age of Sigmar being ignored on PC and console, and does so in high-budget fashion.
There is the potential for Realms of Ruin to push the genre forward in other ways, though. The roguelike-inspired Conquest mode has captured my attention. The system creates a series of randomly generated battles for you to try and overcome, with each built on challenges such as time limits and reduced vision or movement. It sounds like a fun and novel way to spice up classic skirmishes, espcially since each run will plot your high score. Conquest wasn’t available to play at gamescom, but it sounds like the kind of mode that could potentially give Realms of Ruin a much more interesting longtail for single-player focused fans with no interest in climbing the PvP ladder.
But for me, the story mode is still the biggest draw. Cinematic RTS campaigns feel something of an antiquity these days, but what I’ve played of Realms of Ruin transported me back to the good old days of lavish cutscenes, concept missions, and personality-filled battle barks. Even if it turns out to be something of a modern relic, Realms of Ruin will likely still be the Age of Sigmar game I’ve been hoping for.
Matt Purslow is IGN's UK News and Features Editor.
