Warhammer: Dark Omen

"A Dark Omen approaches... Warhammer is back!"

Introduction

Warhammer: Dark Omen sounded the new beginning for strategy games. As one of the rarer games on the market Medieval warfare has pretty much forsaken the Playstation in favour of the PC. Sure there are loads of war games out there, but which of them require the use of strategy? Which of them require you to buy armour and weapons for your forces? Pretty much none of them, and the ones that do usually do this ''feature'' from behind the scenes.

Warhammer: Dark Omen claims to take Medieval war games out of the Dark Ages, it boasts 3D graphics and many features that many medieval war games do not have…

Story

Dark Omen is the second instalment of the Warhammer series and takes up where the original (Shadow of the Horned Rat) left off. Once again you step into the boots of Commander Morgan Bernhardt the famous mercenary leader of the Grudgebringer Army, the holder of the magical sword Grudgebringer (which is what the army was named after go figure).

Commander Bernhardt and his Grudgebringer army are a mere shadow of their former self… Once commanding hundreds of men and stopping the Skaven threat the Army has been reduced from the hordes of units that waded into battle in the name of the Empire (and all sorts of other places) to none other than 4 units… The Cavalry led by Bernhardt himself, the Infantry led by Bernhardt's second in command, the outlawed Crossbows who have been pardoned by the Empire for their help in the previous game and a cannon crew.

To quicken it up, the Grudgebringers are now taking on loose jobs guarding villages once more for beer money and seem to have dwindled from the famous and feared army of the Empire to nothing more than shallow thugs who will take on the ''little'' jobs that require small effort.

You start off the game fighting to protect one of these villages but as time comes on when the Empire gets a little jittery due to the Orcs and Goblins of the southern Badlands all eyes turn once again to the famed Grudgebringers.

As the story goes on you will uncover the reasons why the Orcs and Goblins are fleeing north into the Empire's land and face a threat bigger than that of the Skaven. But I won't spoil it any further than that of course.

Gameplay

Unlike the original Dark Omen has abandoned the ''choose mission, fight mission, win get gold'' path of playing which had various mini-stories and of course the main storyline to a more tighter form of play.

Freeform gamers will feel a little restricted at the way Dark Omen plays. Dark Omen is pretty much battle - story - battle -story this does mean however that you will never miss out on main plot elements and such but it is a little more restricting.

Once every so often you will be allowed to make a choice. Usually a path select such as ''raid goblin camp'' or ''go around camp'' or optional battles which allow you to recruit your friends from the original game.

The experience bar from the original is retained but a new option of ''skull and shield'' has been added to the game. The skull rating gives you an idea of the power of the troops the more experience the better they get of course. The shield rating allows you to see how strong defensively your men are.

Also new to Dark Omen is the feature allowing you to buy additional armour for your troops before you get all happy about this however I'll point out that every unit you recruit has an armour rating from 1-10. The minimum value for some units will be shown in ''silver'' coloured armour while free slots will be blank and if nothing is shown then no armour may be worn at all. Gold slots is additional armour that you have bought… In such ways this isn't a brilliant feature but it's a crucial one to pointing out if your army survives in the next battle or not.

Dark Omen is made pathetically easy in the fact that you can gain huge amounts of cash from battles. Magic items are much easier to gain as they are no longer a single sprinkle of silver on the ground but are actually shown on the map.

As everyone who has played war games will know money means recruitment and bonuses. Your men aren't immortal and they will die in battle and so you will need to spend money on recruiting trained warriors and mercenaries to join you. In the original you were limited to 20 men after each battle which compared to how many there is in your army made the game evil and hard to win not because you aren't doing the battles right but because you have no manpower.
In Dark Omen this is made too easy in my opinion by allowing you to recruit an unlimited amount of men as your money can buy. Shortage of manpower in this game is not going to be a problem.

Dark Omen like the original however has a lot of fun making you fight forces three to four times larger than yours. Which means even if you do have the manpower you will have to put your thinking cap on. Every battle you will usually lose a unit of men (and no you can't get them back if the leader dies). Hard and smart thinking is required in this game especially in the later levels. Archers and magicians will taunt you with spells and volleys of arrows that will miss by inches while the main force stays behind. This can be called poor AI but it's actually a smart tactic used to lure you the player into sending your entire army into ambushes, hails of arrows and powerful spells. With you as the commander in this game it's up to you to decide whenever the enemy is trying to trap you or they really are dumb.

Graphics and Sound

Graphics are improved from the original, they aren't mindblowing however so don't get your hopes up. I am one of those ''don't judge a book by it's cover'' people so they don't bother me despite the fact many other war games will have better graphics.

The music in this game is great (if you like war drums and such) it's actually interesting to listen to. The voice acting actually has some emotion, there is however no subtitles added to this game so fans of the original who have hearing difficulties or are deaf won't get much from the voice acting here. However for those who are deaf the story is pretty much easy to work out by the events in battle and outside of it without the actual talking so it shouldn't hinder the game too badly.

Replayability

There's a few alternate battles to play but not really much to warrant a third play through after you've completed this twice. Getting all the special magic items and such is one other reason for another try.

Final Verdict

Dark Omen leaves off where the original left off improving on many areas and as all sequels do, does the wrong thing on occasion. Fans of the original will probably find Dark Omen a much easier game to play, and those looking for a wargame that doesn't involve guns but requires huge tactical expertise and quick thinking should like this.

Overall this is a great game for both newcomers and veterans of the series and for those who want a different type of wargame from the typical ''build base - kill bad guys - repeat''.

Buy or rent

Fans of the original should get it while it's out. Those who aren't sure about this should obviously rent it. This is one of the games I would rate as a ''medium'' level game for wargamers around the world. It requires thinking but it isn't the hardest of all (that definitely goes to the original).

Final Ratings

Gameplay: 8/10 Various missions but not much freedom outside of battles.
Story: 8/10 Very good story (Check out Games Workshop for background information on the species in this game)
Graphics: 7/10 An improvement on the original.
Sound: 5/10 (Music's good, voice acting is better than the original)
Replay Value: 7/10

Classic or burnt plastic: CLASSIC GAME
Buy or rent: BUY

Overall score (not an average): 8/10 *Classic* game

(Classic game awarded to games that are OLD)

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/21/02, Updated 10/21/02