The Best Games of February 2017
Honorable Mention: Halo Wars 2
Read the Review!
Managing Editor Ed McGlone: The traditional RTS is a dying breed as of late. Other than StarCraft 2, RTS games have come and gone in recent years with very few being able to hang onto an audience fitting of the genre’s former popularity before MOBAs took over. Halo Wars 2 however has the niche of being the only major traditional RTS on a home console. Making a RTS game work on the Xbox One is an extremely tall task, but 343i and Creative Assembly admirably got the job done.
Players are, more or less, able to do a lot of what they would expect to do in a RTS game on PC. You can easily assign control groups, flip between production and your army, and quickly scroll around the map. Once you get used to the controls, old school fans of the genre like myself won’t really be missing too much from a mouse and keyboard layout, which is quite an impressive feat to pull off.
What’s also impressive is that Halo Wars 2 has multiple well developed game modes that are designed to appeal to not only RTS experts but also newcomers enticed by the Halo branding. The campaign can be adjusted to be as easy and challenging as the player wants, and was well received in our review. Finally, the multiplayer, which is the bread and butter of a game like Halo Wars 2 that wants to stay relevant for the long haul, has a great foundation. The RTS staple modes like 1v1 and team death match are there. Blitz though is quick and simple enough to appeal to anyone, and still retains its depth in terms of strategy.
There’s still some work to be done in balancing the game, and eventually adding a competitive ranked ladder, but Halo Wars 2 has the key elements of success already in order.