Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #3405 in Video Games
- Size: Size 5
- Color: metallic
- Brand: Square Enix
- Model: 90915
- Released on: 2010-03-02
- ESRB Rating: Everyone 10+
- Platforms: Windows Vista, Windows 2000, Windows XP
- Format: DVD-ROM
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: .35 pounds
Features
- Take on the role of three enigmatic commanders; former friends from each of the unique factions -- The United Earth Federation (UEF), The Illuminate and the Cybran Nation -- who get dragged into a conflict of galactic consequences
- Explore a rich, character-driven single-player game which spans over 18 missions and delivers a new level of emotional connection to the RTS genre, or take the battle online for an exhilarating multi-player experience
- Fight action-packed battles on a massive scale, waging war with enormous land, air and naval units in visually spectacular environments, brought to life by all-new rendering technology and a true evolution of RTS controls on both platforms
- Upgrade and customize armies with new weapons and technology and deploy them instantly on the battlefield, turning a base-level tank into a high-powered, multi-barreled, anti-aircraft-sporting multipurpose battle unit
- Deploy experimental war machines that can change the balance of power at any given moment; experience a streamlined economy and redesigned UI putting the focus squarely on combat, battlefield tactics and high-level strategic decision making
Supreme Commander 2
Product Description
Set 25 years after the events of the original game, Supreme Commander 2 begins with the assassination of the newly elected president of the Colonial Defense Coalition. The CDC members – the United Earth Federation, the Order of the Illuminate, and the Cybran Nation – deny involvement, blame each other, and a galactic war ensues! Experience brutal battles on a massive scale! Players will wage war by creating enormous customizable armies and experimental war machines that can change the balance of power at any given moment. Take the role of one of the three enigmatic commanders, each representing a unique faction with a rich story that brings a new level of emotional connection to the RTS genre, or fight the battle online. Where do your loyalties lie?
Customer Reviews
Most helpful customer reviews
351 of 415 people found the following review helpful.
By PC Gaming Fan
WARNING: It has come to my attention that there is an organized campaign to manipulate the review scores for this game, with posters on the official forums attempting to recruit others to create multiple accounts and write 5 star reviews. Obviously it hasn't been very effective, but be aware that the review scores have been slightly increased by this shilling. I highly encourage you to download the demo and find out the truth.Supreme Commander 2 is the latest game in a disturbing trend gripping the gaming industry: more and more developers simply have no regard at all for the fans who put them on the map. If you enjoyed Supreme Commander and Forged Alliance for everything that made them unique, DO NOT BUY THIS GAME. It is complete and utter rubbish, in essence a parody of the masterful original. The game has been dumbed down to be almost unrecognizable, although some of the good elements like extreme map zooming and a good unit patrol interface remain. Those who prefer more micro-heavy games like Command and Conquer may still get some enjoyment out of it, but if you want a small scale RTS there are many of them better than Supreme Commander 2.The problems start with Tiers. In Supreme Commander 1, there were three tiers of units, plus experimental units. The first tier units were like little ants, useful for little other than early game harassment but incapable of dealing any real damage. Second tier units were capable fighters, and third tier units were pretty powerful. By the end of the game, you could have hundreds upon hundreds of units out, yet it was still possible for a single experimental unit to slice through your entire army and kill your commander. It was thrilling to devote your entire economy for a protracted period of time just to get that experimental out, and you would cheer for it as it completely shifted the battle. Supreme Commander 2 throws all of that away. The units now fall roughly along the lines of the dozens of C&C style RTS games, with experimental units being roughly as powerful as Mammoth Tanks. I saw an experimental unit get taken down by five gunships. FIVE. Now there is no longer any strategy in deciding what to build. Whereas before, you would need to make hard choices about whether to devote significant resources to tech up and devote a large portion of your economy to build single units or structures, now you can pump out experimental units in under 5 minutes from the start of a game. In other words, Supreme Commander 2 is now just your standard RTS, but with units far more generic than most. The macro has been scaled back dramatically, yet most units are still one-dimensional so there is little need for micromanagement since you won't affect the outcome of a skirmish.As for resources, the great system where you used mass to build things and power to, well, power them is gone. Structures and units no longer use up power by being in play. Instead, power is just like mass. When you build something, power is deducted from your cache and that's it. In other words, you can build shield generators and artillery all over the place with no consequence since it costs nothing to support them. This means even more incentive to turtle since a surgical strike on any one area of your base isn't going to damage anything you can't easily replace. In Supreme Commander 1, it was at least a possibility that your generators would be taken out, rendering you defenseless as the shields and turrets shut down. To make matters worse, the old system where resources were deducted as units and structures were built is GONE. Now resources are deducted immediately when you queue up unit production or structures, which means you can no longer queue up a massive base and then let an engineer do his thing. This was one of the two or three most important aspects of Supreme Commander and it is completely ruined.Now there is a third resource: research. Points are produced by buildings and can be spent in one of five overly convoluted tech trees. This is a terrible system that replaces the tiers from Supreme Commander. Unlocking the best units is too easy, and the pace of the game is killed by having to constantly open up the tech menu to unlock things. It also discourages adapting your tactics to the situation because there are so many minor upgrades that you'll need to choose between specializing in ground, air,or naval units since it will take a very long match to power up all three. It was just flat out stupid to have a menu-based system instead of tying upgrades to buildings. Some games like Battle for Middle Earth make it work because they don't have as many upgrades and don't require constantly accessing the menu, but it doesn't work here.Normally a sequel is supposed to be bigger, badder, and better in every way. Supreme Commander 2 takes a step back in almost every aspect. The graphics are scaled back. There are far less unit types and the unit cap is far lower. The maps are much smaller. They aren't small just in comparison to the original, they're actually some of the smallest maps I've seen in a RTS. The campaign is very short, with 18 missions that take around 10-30 minutes each. Normally a RTS with such a low mission number will at least have 1-2 hour missions. And as for the much vaunted "story" and "cinematic experience" that was supposedly added? It's terrible. The CG is just video of the normal in-game assets, so it actually looks worse than the gameplay if you have a decent computer. The characters are insufferable, the dialogue terrible, and the story paper thin. The only positive thing I can say is that the art design of the maps is improved.There is very little to recommend Supreme Commander 2. If you like the original, you're better off playing that, and if you didn't, there are many better RTS to spend your time and money on. To add insult to injury though, once you own this terrible game, you OWN it. That's right, Steam is required for this game, and it will be tied to your account forever. I look at this as a shrewd and cynical move by a developer that knows the market would otherwise be flooded with used copies because most who buy this game will not want to keep it.-------Addendum: If I could revise my score down to 0 stars after what I've seen of the online play after writing the original review, I would. Matches end one of two ways almost every time. In a 2 v 2 or larger match, multiple players will rush with their commanders at the start and kill one of the enemy commanders 2 on 1. Then repeat with the other players. Total match time is around 5 minutes. Otherwise, the match will end in a swarm of gunships due to the weak anti air options. There is no reason to build anything else because there aren't any units or structures in the game that, for the same resource cost, can kill a swarm of gunships faster than they can kill a commander. Also, to clarify something I said earlier, in SINGLE player it is very easy to unlock the best experimental units and pump them out in mass quantities. In online play however, they barely play any role at all. Anyone who tries to build them will probably lose because they are not as effective as normal units, dollar for dollar. There is no point in trying different strategies. Online play is ruled by basic units and whoever has the bigger blob of them wins.
67 of 82 people found the following review helpful.
By Informed Buyer
If you liked the intricate economy and extreme scale of Supreme Commander and Supreme Commander:Forged Alliance, you probably won't like this game.Years ago, I heard about Total Annihilation. It was similar to other RTS games, but on an absolutely massive scale. I loved carrying on coordinated assaults of multiple groups of hundreds of units each. It redefined how I looked at all RTS games.In 2007, I got Supreme Commander expecting more of the same. I couldn't have been more pleased. Incredibly huge maps, beautiful graphics, an unbelievable difference in the size and power of units - everything I could hope for in a large-scale RTS. Some maps were so big, that it could take slower units 10-15 minutes to cross it. Some units took so long to build that it could take an hour for a single low level engineer to complete them. After you completed this massive unit (they were called "Experimentals"), it was always a pleasure to watch it slowly plod across the map and take down hundreds of units and half of the enemy base. Economy and assault required substantial planning and coordination. These were all possible because the game had an excellent interface, and a lot of thought was put into streamlining economy and mobilizing assaults. All of this worked together to provide an extremely rewarding experience. I can say without hesitation that Supreme Commander provided you with the most satisfaction of any RTS when carrying out a successful assault.Supreme Commander:Forged Alliance was more of the same, but better. They added to the game, optimized and improved it.Chris Taylor (the creator of these games) had outdone himself each time, so it never even occurred to me that Supreme Commander 2 would be anything less than magnificent. I preordered it without hesitation. The best way to describe the changes from the last game is its been massively "dumbed down". Economic planning is less significant because you must have all of the required resources before you can begin building. Maps are positively tiny compared to the old game. Not nearly as many units to choose from (even if you ignore the lower tech levels in the previous games). Experimentals aren't nearly as powerful or daunting. They only take a couple of minutes to build, and they aren't nearly as satisfying to use. There's less variation in power and size of all units. Almost all of the sense of scale from the old games has been eliminated.The game feels like it was simplified in every way (graphics, concept, scale, complexity, and multiplayer), so that it could run on the Xbox 360.Gameplay aside, there are other problems with it - especially for people with poor internet connections. Chris Taylor has always been a proponent of LAN play. Both Supreme Commanders were LAN playable with one copy of the game. His previous RTS, Demigod, was also LAN playable with one copy, and the instruction manual even joked about it. Supreme Commander 2 has no LAN play.Steam (the digital distribution platform) was, unexpectedly, also a problem. Steam has its problems, but overall, I love it. I use Steam every day. But less than half of the game was actually included on the disk. The disk install was a little over than 2GB, and the "update" was more than the install. I'm sorry, but I don't consider a 2.5GB "update" on the day of release acceptable. I couldn't play it at all on release day. I had to wait till I went to another place with a good internet connection, download it, back it up on a USB drive, and restore the backup on my computer.Positives - Excellent game interface - slightly more refined than the previous games - Glassy smooth graphics on middle of the road hardware. - Good campaign (so far) - Not possible to bring your production speed to a haltNegatives - Overall lack of large scale - Substantially fewer units - Simplistic economy requires more maintenance - Steam can be a problem for some - No LAN playIf you haven't played Supreme Commander:Forged Alliance, I would recommend it over Supreme Commander 2. I will not be buying any more Supreme Commander games unless there are some MAJOR changes.This is a good RTS, but it just doesn't deserve the name "Supreme Commander".UPDATE 10-7-2010: Against every expectation, 7 months after release, they've addressed at least one of my major complaints about this game - the economy. Now, you can queue up as many units as you like in advance without worrying about having the resources at that moment. From the update description, it seems that it still deducts the full amount immediately upon the start of construction. The old games had a pay-as-it-was-built system. Between, the two, each has its positives and negatives, but this update is a MASSIVE improvement over what the game shipped with.. I'm going to have to play this game again.
33 of 41 people found the following review helpful.
By doktor merkwurdigliebe
i have never been more let down in a game than i was with supreme commander 2. most of what i feel about it has also been posted here, but i want to add just a few things.first off this game is not just a step backwards from supreme commander: it was also a step back from TA which came out well over 10 years ago now and is STILL a great game. supreme commander 2 has slightly better graphics than TA, but that is about it... in terms of game play, it lacks almost all of the things that made TA and supreme commander great and most importantly DIFFERENT than every other game.i wanted this game to be great. i wanted this game to be fun. i wanted this game to expand on the things that made supreme commander and TA before it the greatest games i had ever played.instead what I got is garbage... i got C&C without the high quality movies and plot. if you really want to play a game like this, play the latest command and conquer game. it may be the same thing as C&C 1, and red alert and generals and on and on and on. but at least because they had practice, they did a good job at it. supreme commander 2 tried to make C&C too but since they were abandoning what they were good at to copy something else what came out was crap.
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