Company of Heroes 2 is a real-time strategy computer game developed by the Canadian studio Relic Entertainment. The worldwide publisher is SEGA. The localizer and distributor of Company of Heroes 2 in Russia is the company "1C-SoftClub". Release date: June 25, 2013. Platform: PC.
What is Company of Heroes 2? It is a sequel to the beloved "real-time" strategy that is entirely dedicated to the events of World War II. To the great disappointment of domestic fans of Relic Entertainment's work, neither Company of Heroes nor the subsequent add-ons (Opposing Fronts, Tales of Valor) contained a single episode where the events unfolded on the Eastern Front. Players could land with the Americans on Omaha Beach, parachute into France with the British, and even take control of German troops, but that was where it ended. Where was the Soviet Union? What happened to the Red Army - the strongest army in Europe, which ground down most of the German fascist divisions? Essentially, this was an injustice that needed to be rectified. And the representatives of Relic Entertainment rectified it by releasing Company of Heroes 2. However, players could only participate in the Battle of Stalingrad, defend Moscow from fascist hordes, and liberate Leningrad from blockade seven years after the release of the first part of Company of Heroes. Nevertheless, they received a game in which the theater of war was solely the Eastern Front, with Soviet troops serving as the main heroes.
So, what can the game authored by Relic Entertainment boast? First of all, it retained all the basic foundations laid down in the first part of CoH, which pleased conservative fans. Secondly, although the game's framework remained intact, it offered players numerous small and medium changes, additions, and reworkings, which, in turn, satisfied another part of the audience. Thirdly, Company of Heroes 2 introduced a new and quite exciting Theatre of War mode, which includes many single-player and cooperative missions. Fourthly, the multiplayer mode was improved, becoming even more interesting and diverse. Fifthly, within CoH 2, the developers implemented a largely unique system for pre-configuring the armies chosen by the player.
Given many factors, it can be confidently said that Relic Entertainment created a truly good RTS. But even in such an ideally conceived RTS, there was one blemish, and not just a blemish, but a big one - the campaign storyline, which included all the most terrible and horrific myths about the Soviet Union during the Great Patriotic War. Naturally, such a campaign provoked an extremely negative reaction from many Russian (and not just Russian) gamers, which somewhat spoiled the overall positive impression of Company of Heroes 2.