For me, having so many factions with their own flavour of warfare is the reason that Total War: Warhammer 2 has stayed so replayable over the four years since launch. Four years of working with a detailed existing universe has let Creative Assembly create something akin to a gory Avengers, a star-studded cast of characters defined by their distinctive personalities and playstyles. The addition of so many new characters over the years – many of whom are beloved figures in existing Warhammer lore – has elevated TW:WH2 beyond the genre’s norm, more than the usual canvas to be painted in blood and borders. There’s now 15 races and 69 factions to choose from, almost all of them equipped with their own unique mechanics and ways to play. Every inch of the map is stuffed with life (bad choice of words, sorry Settra) and filled to the brim with big personalities, ranging from the odiously villainous to hilariously cowardly… and that’s just the Skaven. It’s the fact that, over the course of four years, the realm has been lovingly fleshed out and polished with heaps of playable factions. Honestly though, while the size and scope of Mortal Empires feels unparalleled, that’s not quite what plants it on top of the strategy pedestal. Like much of the game, four years of attentive chipping has turned Mortal Empires into a seamless colossus, which is surprising when you consider the sheer scale of the thing. It’s fair to say that it took a lot of tweaking and a couple of rougher phases to get so many moving parts working in tandem. The mode wasn’t always perfect – it used to take forever to pass your turn, and the AI could be a little bit hard to balance. Currently, Mortal Empires is two games-worth of content, though it stands to become even bigger with the addition of Total War: Warhammer 3 in 2022.
Greenskins were pitted against High Elves, Skaven against the realms of men. This fusion meant that every playable faction, from both games, could interact with each other in the same map. Mortal Empires was a whole new map, a massive combination of both worlds from the first and second game. One month after launch, the Mortal Empires campaign arrived and completely changed the scope of Total War. As it turned out though, I would never have to. While community feedback on the campaign was mixed, in time I would’ve likely come around to enjoy it more. While I still enjoyed it, it was kind of jarring to play in a much more conservative direction, as it wasn’t always a great idea to expand your empire too much. Instead of through vast and unchecked expansion, victory was achieved by gathering resources and conducting rituals across your empire. While the real-time strategy side of TW:WH2 was the same – you control thousands of units to rout and kill enemy forces – the wider, turn-based map was different.
The Vortex campaign took Total War in a slightly different direction to the usual sandbox style that fans expected. There were only four races available to play as, none of which resonated with me as much as those in the first game, and fan reception was a little lukewarm surrounding the Vortex campaign. On launch, four years ago today, it was a completely different story. Nor do I remember a magical turning point, where the fantasy strategy game became the beloved behemoth that it is now. I don’t actually remember making a conscious decision, or any moment, where Total War: Warhammer 2 suddenly became my favourite game. READ MORE: ‘Death Stranding Directors Cut’ Review: The best way to play a masterpiece.Instead I’ll stick with the violent and weird world of Warhammer, because for the last four years, there’s been no better place for a strategy fan to be. Earth would be a boring planet to travel anyway. For comparison, it’s also roughly 25 non-stop flights around the world, but I’ve got no interest in doing anything like that. Broken down, that’s 54 days – a month and a half – of uninterrupted warmongering. I‘ve played Total War: Warhammer 2 for 1,300 hours.
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