I'm done with Supreme Commander 2 Campaign, epic

Hey All,
I just finished my playing single player campaign of supreme commander 2. Thought I should share my experience here, not to the extend of a detailed hardcore review, just what I gotta say.

Supreme commander 2 is a sequel to the earlier Supreme Commander (or SC1) is a strategic scale scifi RTS featuring a, as usual, clash among three factions, in this case, of the human race --- the militant United Earth Federation, the religious  Illuminates and the geeky Cybran Nations. I say strategic to mean player employs strategic nuclear missiles, long range artillery and large scale fighting group in game; not to mean the level of command and control, which is still tactical.

From the left: Illuminate, Cybran and UEF

Supreme Commander 2 is set 25 years after the conclusive battles of the so-called infinite war, which lasted 1000 years, fought back in SC1. A coalition between the UEF, Illuminates and Cybrans was formed at the end of the war to counter an alien invasion, which was featured in the SC1 expansion called Forged Alliance. By the time  SC2 takes place the elected leader to coalition government was assassinated. The alliance broke down and a supposingly senseless war broke out again. Since the setting is at least 1000 years after our time, you can expect their technology is hundred times ahead of us.

An ACU

Talks about senseless, seems like everything in SC2 is quite senseless. But that is also the selling point of the game. The player take the role of the commander, who pilots this multi-purpose combat machine called the Armoured Command Unit or ACU. The ACU, as described, is capable of warping into any planet in the galaxy and start building an army there (assuming enough Mass and Energy can be harvested, think E = Mc^2). All units constructed, including structures, are controlled via the ACU. It is also possible for a commander to turn over control of his units to another commander easily with a flip of switch. The bad thing about these unmanned units however are that they can also be captured by an enemy ACU.


Unlike other RTS in the market, which you can expect fights between the twenties, in SC2 it is between hundreds.

An Epic Battle

Another selling point of this game is that aside from being able to build ordinary units, you may even unleash crazy yet scientifically-realistic experimental units. You can imagine anything rediculous as a giant walking beetle firing long range laser to UFO-like suckers, depending on what faction you play as. Although the destructiveness of  experimental units are down played ever since SC1, they are still capable of turning the tide of battles single-handedly.

Experimental Units in Action

Seriously the skirmish AI are very challenging, that is even without cheating. Yesterday I tried playing against 3 normal difficulty AI thinking that I might be able to outsmart them easily; I was wrong. Apparently even a normal AI know how to mass his army, to counter my experimental rush. This was not like in the olden days RTS where a normal AI was more stupid than a hard AI while less dumb than an easy one. Harder AI back in those times require excessive cheating to achieve their supposing difficulty. The AI in Supreme Commander 2 knows how to change his strategy. At one point I built a line of defensive towers, thinking that I could comfortability sit back and let them mold down the series of little rush attempts by the AI. For the first few times I could see continuous stream of units foolishly advance towards my base defenses and die miserably. My luck changed when I realized they stop sending units and waves and start massing their units at their base. To counter that I could only build more towers and amass my own army of units in case the AI decided to unleash them on my base. When faced with an army of 100 over tiny units, even an experimental doesn't stand a chance. This was not like SC1 where experimental units, although ridiculously expensive to build, are almost invincible against a large army. This is game where there is no reason for your factories to be idling at any point of time, unless you planned a quick game.

AI Base Production Capability

One thing I like about Supreme Commander 2, or just Supreme Commander series in general, is that defensive structures makes a difference. Many recent RTS features almost useless or no defensive structures at all. The intention may be to discourage turtles strategy that stretch the game too long, and in a way force players to abide to the 'Win through movement' rule. The result however, is lesser diversification of strategies, allowing players to employ monotonous tactic to win every game. Defensive structures in Supreme Commander 2 is far from being useless. Like a mentioned previously, a couple of towers can take care of a small rush group. If shield structures are constructed, the same line of defense can even hold off a large army. I personally hates scenario where players can exploit the early vacuum period of the game by sending a small group --- a little as three to five --- of units to raid the opponents' base. This cheap tactic put the opponent into a useless situation, thereby ending the game even before it started. This is a good trick for winning --- just winning --- but if the main objective of gaming is to have fun then the possibility of employing such tricks kills the fun. There is hardly anyway to employ such tricks in Supreme Commander 2 due to effectiveness of defensive structures. Not only that, every factories structures can be fitted with integrated anti-air, missile launchers and shield early in game to protect your early production. Later in the game also every other base structures can be upgraded with their own guns, making even a large scale assault on the base costly to the opponent. And don't forget the Armoured Command Unit you started off with is itself a formidable war machine, and capable of fighting off small attacks alone.

Start of a skirmish game

If you were a fan of the classic RTS Warzone 2100 (1999), you will like this game. Of course, the research engine and choice of units in Supreme Commander 2 is still no match to the classic. Other than that, the complex strategic game engine combined with the epic battle graphic and sound effect in SC2 cannot be match for by any other RTS in the market. 

I'm looking for people to play this game with me online so I wish you'll try out this game. Go download the demo from steam. Bye bye.