Both the RPG and RTS elements are of equal importance to the gameplay. The development of heroes provides the punch and support that a successful army needs and there are plenty of bits where armies aren't involved at all creating a very Dungeon Siege-like gameplay style. Phenomic has done an admirable job making the character building experience fun with both skill and visual options. By the end of the game you can have a group of heroes sent down similar paths originally that have much different specialties.
Controlling all of the heroes is very easy thanks to the Click & Fight system. Portraits of each of the heroes display in the upper right corner of the screen. When friendly units are selected, skills and spells that can affect friends will be highlighted and can be used with a click of the mouse on the ability icon. Should an enemy target be selected, skills and spells that can affect enemies will be listed for use. It sounds easy and it is. Having a list of all of the heroes with all of their spells is simple and effective for combat. There's much less worry about finding and selecting the right hero and then targeting an enemy in time to cast a spell. It's a good gameplay feature that does add to the enjoyment and plays well into the quick action the game provides.
Shaikan characters will comprise the main party including the main hero. The main character, created by the player, will do all of the talking, be the center of the story, and become more powerful than the followers. Should any of the followers be struck down in battle, it's possible to revive them thanks to the dragon blood. It just takes a little time. Should all the heroes croak, it's still possible to revive them via the Altar of Life.
Experience for heroes is gained through completing quests, which encourages players to travel down the less violent path and help some people out, or killing some of the larger monsters in the world. Quests range from fetch quests to hunting down and killing old enemies of new friends and more. The quests also range in how enjoyable they are. Some of the fetch quests can be dull but most of them will push the party out into dangerous territory for a little exploration. Thankfully, these types of quests will also be made easier with destination points on the mini-map so there isn't too much wandering around.
In fact, Phenomic has made it quite easy to get around the world to places that have already been visited. Once a dragonstone has been lit, players can simply click on its name in a map list to travel there, even if it's on a different island [map] that's already been visited. It makes completing quests phenomenally easy as long as you don't mind the occasional load time and is very much appreciated.
In almost every map players will have to turn their skills away from the micromanagement of heroes to the large scale management of camps and armies. For all intents and purposes, RTS conventions are pretty much fully intact. There are three different armies to try out, each with different abilities and advantages. The Realm has healers and strong archers, the Clan has some of the strongest units in the game, and the Pact has deadly shadow units that cause extra damage when able to attack undetected. There aren't any real differences in how units are created or how bases are constructed but unit abilities are different enough to allow players to adapt slightly different play styles.
Three different resources must be harvested by workers, buildings have to be constructed, and military units have to be trained. Eventually the enemy encampments will have to be taken out while various mission goals are taken care of along the way. For instance, one level challenges players to take out some worker undead that are transporting crystals before the enemy encampments can really be engaged. So there are some differences, but there aren't going to be any surprises for veteran RTS gamers here.
In fact, there are very few surprises in any aspect of the RTS portion of the game. The AI provides no differing challenge aside from the "build up a big army and then attack the player's base" routine. At least, if there are any other decisions made by the enemy AI, I certainly didn't notice them. It makes the RTS portion of the game pretty predictable and easy for the most part where most of the strategy is centered around building up a balanced mass army and sending it in to hit the enemy base.
What makes the game difficult, or frustrating at times, is the lack of features that have become pretty commonplace over the last few years. Things like armies that don't form up with melee units in front when moving around, don't match the slowest unit's pace, and don't allow for formations or facing of groups. All of these contribute to completely unorganized masses of units running across fields to attack equally unorganized masses of units. Also, sending groups of units across a map can lead to dangerous situations because of pathfinding routines that don't have formations to keep units from forming a really long line of vulnerable troops. It's interesting that all of these features that make combat more enjoyable aren't part of the game when Phenomic developed new ideas like the nifty worker training buttons so that workers pop out and automatically start harvesting whatever types of resources you want them to.
All of these small mistakes combine to create a pretty average RTS experience if left by itself. Thankfully the RPG elements definitely add another level of gameplay that can be pretty darn addicting even with the flaws. It's not as if the RPG elements are strong enough to stand on their own either. I guess it's a matter of two average to slightly above average components coming together to create something bigger. When all of the nice presentation touches are added in, it's a worthy package.
One thing this game has in spades is replayability. Those who do buy the game and enjoy it will have plenty to enjoy. Not only is the single player story campaign very long and involved but there's also a free-mode which amounts to a second campaign. There isn't as complete a story as in the normal campaign, but there are a lot of new quests across 31 maps and all of these maps can be played alone or with two friends along for the ride. The maps in free mode are also set up to provide a challenge for characters and parties of a certain level so should they want, friends could play this second campaign all the way through together. Combined, these campaigns comprise a huge amount of gameplay!
Players will also find skirmish in both single player and multiplayer mode. AI isn't spectacular here running fairly typical attack and defend routines, but it does provide even more to do. My main problem here is that several of the maps are relegated to team games completely. It's unclear why free-for-all isn't an option in some of these maps, but the choice should be there and it isn't. The other main problem with online play is that there aren't many people playing and even less English speaking players.
Either way, anyone that purchases SpellForce 2 certainly won't go wanting for gameplay, there's a ton of it here. It's one of those lovely moments where your money spent takes you a long, long way.
SpellForce 2's visuals offer nothing stylistically that's genuinely fresh, but what is there looks good [silly ass chainmail bikini clad dark elves withstanding]. Colors are bright and crisp, textures can be pretty detailed, and there's a ton of variety of armor and weapons types for the hero units. The attention paid to making the main characters look particularly impressive next to normal units is nice. Who doesn't love seeing their avatar get cooler looking as the game progresses?
The artists have created a pretty nice array of environments to play through including everything from swampy forests to mountainous terrain. While the game technically includes indoor environments as well, the effect suffers greatly from the lighting. Lighting is pretty decent throughout the game and includes a day/night cycle. Unfortunately since the indoor environs have no cover, the day/night cycle effects indoor lighting as well which is actually more distracting than I would have figured it could be.
Visually, the interface can be both pleasing and claustrophobic. Because there's so much on screen, including those nice skill boxes underneath each hero, there just tends to be a lot of UI on screen at the same time. So no matter how crisp you make these designs, it's hard not to wish you could just brush it all out of the way to get a better look at the game world. The other major visual UI difficulty is in the mini-map. It's just too damn dark so it can be pretty tough to see where on the map your party has already visited, which is a pretty important aspect of a game that encourages exploration.
Sound also is a generally good affair with some missteps here and there. Sound effects are pretty standard, sword clashing against armor and magic ripping through the air, which are absolutely decent with nothing particularly special to sing about. Voice-overs are actually much better than they were in SpellForce on average though there are some absolutely horrible voices on some of the many characters. The nice thing is that there are voice-overs through the single player campaign and free game mode for all of the chattable NPCs. Not only that, but full voice-over is included for both female and male characters, which is also a nice bonus.
Verdict
Players looking for the next best RTS or RPG won't find either here, but they will find a very entertaining mix of genres that have been around for a long time. It's really hard to blend genres as thoroughly as Phenomic has done here and come away successful at all so it's a testament to the developer's dedication to the cause. It's obvious that more focus on one of the other of the game's aspects could have created a more polished game in one of the aspects, but it's easy to appreciate the blend for what it is and have a bunch of fun along the long single player campaign and free play mode. Players looking for a little bit of each genres will find a lot to like here and will definitely get their money's worth in gameplay.