| If you grew up in the eighties or any time since then it's very likely you'll remember the niche popularity of the Games Workshop family of table top war games. White Dwarf magazine tempted in the daydreaming schoolboy fantasists with visions of exquisitely painted armies of Space Marines, goblins and dwarves. The only problem, apart from having to go into the shops populated by scary bearded or be-zitted denizens dressed only in black, generally wearing heavy metal T-shirts, was you had to assemble and paint your force. This took months, had a steep learning curve, and never came close to the results displayed so smugly in the pages of the glossy bible. Then came the day when you proudly drew up your troops and prepared to do battle with a similarly dedicated friend. After a few hours dutifully measuring distances in inches and rolling oddly shaped dice, you were forced to come to an agreement: this was actually quite boring. Very boring in fact. The painting was, you were appalled to discover, the fun bit.Many years have passed since then and the advances in RTS gaming on PC have made the tabletop wargame look impossibly primitive. The undeniably imaginative worlds of Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 can now be enjoyed thanks to the dedicated boffins who effectively paint armies and devise rules for all of us to use. Games Workshop products have long been recreated in video games, one memorable early one being the splendid Space Hulk (also their best board game, not least because you only needed to paint about 10 figures to play it).Last year's Dawn of War was the culmination of this process, and was deservedly honoured with an RTS game of the year award. Now publishers THQ are re-releasing it to coincide with the arrival of the first expansion pack for the game, Winter Assault. The game is precisely what you would want and expect. Control chunky, beautifully rendered Space Marines, Eldar, Space Orks and Chaos Legions in a living world that looks like the pages of White Dwarf made real. If you never got your army painted, or were disappointed when you did, or don't care about Games Workshop at all but know good RTS when you see it, then give this a whirl. |
