While exclusive, press-only sessions were held with members of the development team we’ve elected to spend time with the game after release. Total War: Warhammer 2 will ship with a robust multiplayer mode, including quick-play skirmish battles and ranked matches. Once lodged, my troops ground hundreds of enemy fighters between them before high-fiving in the middle and moving on toward the city center. In one assault, I knocked in the enemy’s gates along the eastern wall while slow-moving towers landed my most powerful troops along the battlements to the west. When the time was right, the battles that unfolded seemed straight out a storybook. I spent eight or nine turns encamped around enemy cities building massive war engines while I starved out the garrisons huddled inside. While many of the battles you fight will be meeting engagements or ambushes in the field, the game also features elaborate siege battles fought along castle walls. I was excited each time I got to hide my cavalry in the trees, waiting until the perfect moment to spring a trap that totally enveloped the enemy’s forces from the rear. Deploying your forces before battle is a delightful experience, and once the pausable real-time action gets going it’s magical. Like other games in the Total War series, Total War: Warhammer 2 shines at the tactical level. The way these four armies fight isn’t simply cosmetic. The Skaven are as different from the Lizardmen as you can imagine But the real stars of the show are the Lizardmen, one of Warhammer’s oldest races, and the Skaven, skittering, plague-riddled rat people who are an absolute fan favorite. Total War: Warhammer 2 features four of that universe’s iconic factions, including the High Elves and the Dark Elves. Where Warhammer has excelled is in building up lore all around itself, creating a kind of baroque bastion that rivals the towering achievements of the legendary armies portrayed in Tolkien’s own Middle-earth. As that unit is wounded, individual miniatures are removed, and the unit as a whole becomes less powerful. Players gather dozens of miniatures into a singular unit, allowing them to form up in ranks and share statistics in battle. Ever since Margaret Thatcher’s second term as prime minister, tabletop aficionados have been able to purchase, paint and play with massive armies featuring all manner of unspeakable horrors rendered in pewter and plastic.

The Total War: Warhammer series is based on the Warhammer hobby miniatures game that dates back to 1983.

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