The Total War Playlist - czcams.com/video/WA_iXKhoujA/video.html AUGUST 2023 UPDATE: There was a DLC to flesh out the chaos roster, the big map is free for everyone, and some other good improvements, but a significant amount of core features remain horrendously broken and buggy. Siege battles in particular are still in about the same spot.
Try some Mordheim one of these days. I've had some amazingly bad experiences with that game. I also had one of my archers stuck in a knife fight with a one armed Ogre. Your mileage may vary.
"Being irritated at menus probably isn't what you're here for" No no no. That's exactly why I'm here Mando. Thank you for actually providing a critical analysis
This was the part that brought me into the comment section. Never heard of this guy, but he's earned my respect in 16 and a half minutes. Definitely appreciate his time and effort into this, as well as his honesty.
Yes, the UI-design is more than just a little important. Dragon's Dogma's menus were a nightmare for instance. Sometimes the UI itself isn't that bad, but you get swamped in crafting material or some such. The gem-flood in Shadow Warrior 2 is a good example and somebody else has pointed out how awful it is with Dragon Age - Inquisition. This kind of stuff can ruin games on the whole!
13:00 Great point about the rating excuse for the blood DLC, but I have some bad news: This game, with fountains of blood, pooping demons, and vagina siege towers... has a Teen rating in the U.S. I'm not saying the blood DLC is justified. I'm saying the ESRB's rating system is F U C K E D.
@@principalityofbelka6201 they confirmed in a faq I think that it will have the blood dlc like the other games unfortunately, or at least that's their plan, and just like previous games, if you have the dlc for 2 you get it for free
Most impressive thing about this game is that they managed to make the tutorial’s story, one of the most generic and predictable Warhammer stories I’ve ever heard, into a captivating watch leaving you begging for more.
It is why I had more fun with a Slannesh campaign until that impossible to remove "Corrupted by Nurgle" trait made the campaign unplayable. I saved a Herald built for this army. Then 5 Hellscourge as the anvil, 6 units of Heart Seekers, 2 Alluress (Lore of Slannesh) on steeds 1 fore each group with charge buffs, 2 Soul Grinders to help the line, and two Daemonettes that I considered swapping for more Hellscourge for back up for the anvil. 18 units max to encourage the AI to actually fight me and not cower in a settlement. I really liked poking and prodding then running over targets that were weak enough then watching as the magical armour piercing attacks of the Heart Seekers would munch the flanks very quickly. I really like that devastating charge.
Tzeentch : *takes a Settlement and gives it to Skarbrand, in the middle of Cathay Territory* Skarbrand : *starts to shake and teleports instantly in a howl of rage* This is beautiful.
Someone once said to me, an amazing analogy: Khorne hates Slaanesh because Slaanesh would rather torture 1 person over 50 years whereas Khorne would rather kill 50 people in 1 second.
It does not really matter with the big S, S is about emotional excess and perfection So both killing fast and killing slowly can satisfy S If you reach a higher level of perfection and/or excess in killing fast S will like it more than killing slowly So there's a certain amount of overlap between the two and many of their champions could have been the others
@@tamasrehany6532 A 'bear' is a term for a large, generally hairy gay man. Think the diametric opposite of a twink. Leather culture generally overlaps with biker gangs. The Austin part I don't get but maybe its just a place with a lot of bikers
Mandalore recommending a book on the CCP’s obsession with the color red in the middle of a Warhammer review is one of the many reasons I love this channel
me: oh shit sam hyde is a lil popular again cuz of idubbbz, thats some nostalgia... also me: **PTSD seizure after remembering Sseth and friends making fun of america most infamous racist website right before it got shut down* that was some funny shit.
As scummy as some of CA's business practices can be, the presentation on this is next level. It's a shame the effort gets somewhat kneecapped by the campaign AI, which will eat a live hand grenade so long as the blast also hurts the player. Minor things like that really can ruin my experience with a game.
IIRC they're mentioned they're working on adjusting that in a blog post. For now I'd still recommend Warhammer 2 to new players, but I'm excited for what this game will look like in the future.
One would think Chaos Undivided would be the kind of faction who gets low- to mid tier units and abilities of all Chaos Gods but none of the higher tier or endgame ones. Would make more sense both gameplay-wise and thematically.
Weeeell... Lore-wise, if you are meant to be playing someone like Archeon the Everchosen, "Chaos Undivided" doesn't mean that you are a wishy-washy chaos worshiper that can't decide on one deity, but that you are such a badass that they all fall over themselves for Archeon-sama to notice them. If that's the case, it makes sense that you get the best of all worlds.
I'm not sure about the function(I'd need to actually play Danny boy to end game and that's a shit show.) but from what I can see the benefits of going one god is decent sized buffs and upkeep/recruitment reductions for those units while I BELIEVE keeping all minor things of the other faction you already have....but unable to get anymore now that you've chosen. So you lose 3 factions of endgame units to make one fourth of your roster stronger and cheaper to use.....also the specific parts under them but I've not really looked to see if they are remotely worthwhile compared to the gear from undivided I just know they ARE different from the undivided pieces.
Nurgle - Literally has units that shits out of an ass, wrips his own guts apart to throw intestinal fluid at enemies Khorne - Soaked with blood, enemies that spit blood at you and a massive blood tower CA - We can’t do an included blood pack on launch because it will get age restricted…. (Cricket sounds)
I know it's because of the age ratings and everything so but yes ( luckily we're getting the but pack for free because I previously owned the other blood packs)
@@magni5648 Selling the blood pack is the problem. It should be a free DLC only available for countries that don't have excessive regulations. So I still blame CA for it.
Mandy: Speaks about Polish, Hussars and Sabathon. Me: yeah... very original. Every time. Mandy: Mentions *THE* number Me: 😨 OH MY GOD! The evil corruption grasps further than I've expected!
@@johnnyboy2537 You are right about pope dying, but he was not hated. The pope was Jan Paweł II or John Paul II, he was first polish pope and a national hero, and symbol of hope in times of communism. He was loves do much that he was gloryfied to the point of absurd. There are his statues around every corner, every second street is named after him, if you go to any souvenir store in Poland you'll find bunch of random things with pope face on it, from photos to plates and pens, etc. Its only natural it had a reaction with young people, especially liberal ones (but even cathilics and conservatives make fun of it) started making memes with him, portraying him as a nazi, a pedophile, putting his face on porn movies (from which "cenzopapa" name originated : censor + pope) and finally meming hour of his death 21:37. Obviously most elder people were absolutelly furious, which oly lead to more trolling.
For those who want to know what the tree reference 8:30 is about: It is a mirage tank from C&C red alert 2, it is a unit which can disguise as a tree (you can find the clip if you search for "mirage tank meme")
A common theme I'm seeing about total war games is that they can be janky, not always optimized, and expensive, but dear lord their presentation is next level.
@@fiddlesticks7245 I haven’t played them, so I have no opinion on that. I’m just watching mandalore’s reviews, and I’m invested in warhammer as a whole.
"Subsequently synthesizing Sigvalds soldiers into Slanesh's swarm seems sincerely sensible. Saving separations of such squad sustain scheduled schemes and strategies from CA" tongue twister had me do a double take, I thought I was actually going loopy for a second lmao. Amazing video as always, thank you so much for the coverage :)
I have found it strange how story heavy the prologue was, thoroughly enjoyed it, but then the main campaign kind of drops off in the narrative whilst railroading you into the soul collecting mechanic. This takes away from what's a really fun and cool game. I think it will be much better when we get the sandbox campaign. They for sure missed an opportunity to continue the narrative style from the prologue, which for the first time I can recall I would have actually been down for. Loving the Chaos Demons faction, because who doesn't want to play as a beastly demon prince.
@@elmorgano81 Certainly, but it's very much at the whim of the ERSB and their ratings board which basically just pokes a stick into the game and judges it from there. Not defending CA's actions, I don’t think they should charge that much kf at all for blood, but I understand why something like it has to happen, though at the least it's not another DLC you have to buy if you already have the previous.
Even more for me, since I’ve already decided I’m not buying this one. I didn’t like the first two games at all, but I’m still interested in what Mandy has to say
Forgot to mention the reintroduced anti-player AI. In the two kislev games ive played so far ive had enemy agents walk passed 3+ other factions (that they are at WAR WITH) just to pool around my city, and when portals open up in hellgates territory the armies that spawn out of it decide to take the LONGER path to a hostile area and attack my praag instead. Great feature, not bs at all, and makes things very fun and immersive.
@Radigan artificial difficulty is not real difficulty. The best Warhammer players are just the cheesiest of them. I love Total War... But they really need to fix the difficulty and make the game a challenge, not an impossible annoyance
For now I recommend dropping the campaign difficulty down (you can keep the battle difficulty up if you like). It will reduce the extreme anti-player focus of the AI factions on the campaign map.
I am more impressed with fiends of slaanesh - their movement looks so "wrong". They crawl like a crocodile but then start galloping with this uncanny gait that makes them really feel like something unnatural and demonic.
Honestly them and the nurglings are both the most impressive to me. They seem like so much effort and time was put into making them compared to a lot of the more normal units.
The Fiends of Slaanesh are really impressive, true, but Great Unclean Ones crapping out Nurglings just for those Nurglings to dance and make snow angels in the goo... That is truly magical.
Their charge animation is great, looks so bizarre when they propel themselves with their middle pair of limbs but makes sense in motion too. Looks hard as shit to animate.
A real indication of how good the fiend animation is - it made me go look at the (stupidly expensive) physical miniatures from GW again. They always struck me as suitably creepy but rather stiffly posed and hard to imagine in motion. Total War has changed that, anyway. Still stupidly overpriced and about to be more so. Love the GW told everyone there was a 5% price hike coming and the moment the price lists got leaked there were a thousand people calling them out for it being more like 8-15% for most stuff and as high as 20% on some.
I can't believe that you didn't mention CA's baffling choice to make Ogre camps non-movable. It's the only way to get their best units and the best way to get steady meat, but then you have to abandon them. I can't even figure out how to demolish them, but I hear it can be done. The static camps made my Ogre campaign no fun.
I'm super happy Mandalore spent some time being irritated at menus. I fucking hate the all red and "minimalism" approach they took. Warhammer is all about needless flair, give back colors and individuality to factions dammit!
It's essentially just a dlc to WH2, which is essentially just a dlc to WH1. It already runs smoothly for most, and will probably be completely stable within a month or two. It's not a new game with new game bugs, it's a huge update to a 7-year-old game with update bugs.
The UI will probably stay, I hope rthey change some things or pt toggles in because I like many of the new UI changes personally, I'm mostly just iirritated by the whole red thing. Also for me the game runs mostly good, my PC isnt that much above the minnimum requirements and it works, when many units are on the fild it laggs but thats to be expected I think. Sieges also work for me fne I havent seen anyone just stand around points or capture them by accident. What I have seen are units just standing in a point igoring a battle they're side was winning but tahts the worst I saw.
This is the case with a lot more than just RTS, and a huge problem imo with the industry as a whole. Half, if not more, of all releases these days are just glorified early access with the amount of bugs and lack of polish.
@@Loj84 Tbh, with having a friend that worked on WH1, the new game is basically like refreshing a cache. If they didn't, they'd either be like COD with 100gig updates and 500gig total size or be like Destiny and take content from players. New game means new engine, which means more stuff can be crammed into it. Atleast, that's how explained it for my dumbass monkey brain
@@ClothesCat I'm not sure I would've even been able to narrow it down like Mandalore does. I would've just played the game and thought that the menus look weird without being able to pinpoint the issue
@@SwammyCDN There is little worse in life than being annoyed at something and not knowing why. Just that little seed of irritation and aggression that you know has a reason to exist but you can't place exactly why.
“Subsequently synthesising sig vault soldiers in a slanted swarm seems sincerely sensible saving separation of such squads sustains scheduled schemes and strategies” 👏👏👏
The idea you had about the supply system being specifically a pre-battle set up would be infinitely better than the arcade fortnite tower defence we have now. Destroy a tower? The AI instantly tries to rebuild it. Downright annoying.
Mandalore: *Talks about the new variety of city maps* Brain: "Wood needed. MOAR Wood is needed m'lord. Can't place that there m'lord. Can't place that there m'lord."
How is Mandalore simultaneously the most logical, analytical and respectable youtuber I have ever seen, and the most clearly crazy youtuber right beneath the surface? Love your videos, keep up the good work!
Was watching this vid and wondered “hmm I wonder if they added a blood DLC yet?”, checked, and learned it was announced 7 hours ago. Khorne has blessed me this day
I know I can trust game reviewers when they acknowledge that they really like something, and then immediately acknowledge that the thing they like is flawed and that they can't reccomend it at full price rn. Far too often have I heard "yes it's flawed BUT-" and then they go on to why those flaws don't matter and shouldn't impact your purchase decision. A "Maybe" is a fine verdict as long as it's explained. No buttering up, no talking down. This is what I'm here for.
Holding back or removing a feature just to re-sell or pad out future DLC is probably my most hated practice. Guaranteed, the Blood DLC was taken out just to be sold as an added extra. I dread to think how daunting it must be to know you need to review a new Warhammer game. The depth you go into each aspect of your review, even down to the UI with its readability, is honestly astounding. Excellent work as always! 1:02:28 Simply Sublime.
I get the feeling that the audio department constantly outperforms the other parts of game creation because they don't have marketing and management breathing down their neck all day, because the most input those can give is somethingvague like "make it bombastic" anyway. So they can just do sound and music and do it right.
The only real hole in CA's teams is working on the engine. They simply lack the talent to fix any issue that isn't superficial, and it's been showing in game after game. The people who made the engine aren't there any more, and nobody there now is equipped to make any meaningful fixes.
Thats easily one of the big causes, i remember in BF1 days the entire marketing was around "it looks grim but cool" and in trailers you almost never get to ear the sounds of the game: Then you play it and its one of if not the most well done thing in the saga (period) I guess its because it easier to show a big meany demon doing around than to show how well done a canon blast is, even when the later does more to inmerse the player in.
@@blackhammer5035 Engine is at this point over 13 years old, changed and patched over and over again and never intended to work for something like Warhammer. I would expect that the code looks like a chaos spawn by this point with amalgamation of barely comprehensible add-ons. The moshpit for example was an issue in Attila, so it has to be something quite deeply ingrained if it simply returned after so many years.
I’d love a version of the survival battles where you are the defender against a nearly unlimited number of undead with a limited number of troops you can’t reinforce. It could be like a challenge mode like a time trial mode in racing games.
15:36 As someone who is partially red/green colorblind this INFURIATES me to no end. I can see the differences but it's barley noticeable to me. People who are full on red/green colorblind won't be able to see anything with these icons. I really hope they change up all the red UI elements because otherwise ima have to wait for a UI mod just to not get a migraine.
I was wondering if visual accessibility was the reason they changed the building/demolishing from red/green to icon based but with so many other baffling decisions its looking like a half step forward five steps back
Mandalore didn't mention this, but there's a red/green colorblindness accessibility mode in the color options. You can also change the colors to whatever you want.
"The UI reminds of something that happened in China in 1966." Only Mandalore and Warlockracy videos could fit that line without context. Also DAMN, those animations are amazing.
@@mattcollins5974 He makes historical references and tangents in most of his videos. I don't remember a specific video but his Fallout 1 and 2 reviews probably mention it since China plays a prominent role in the lore.
I've never even played a Total War game, but your reviews are just so well done and full of good information, as well as witty but not overdone humor I watched this whole 70-minute video lol.
I'd note the entire reason Boris is that way is because he DOESN'T get to confederate them easily....but if they DON'T confederate then his supposed allies behind him may well murder each other and provide ample opportunity for Chaos to get behind you. So he's throwing his weight behind one of them to force them to be friendly faster so he can just focus forward. (And in co-op I imagine this means he can make another kislev player MUCH happier....or pissed, you know.)
I'm pretty sure Neither major Kislev factions can declare war on each other, and I have seen them confederate each other relatively fast in many streamed campaigns.
@@apple-tarts5026 I've seen them declare war on each other. One game Katarin had Kos on his last legs before it ticked over and she confederated him. And in a multiplayer campaign the npc Kislev took till.....turn 90ish? to confederate. And then over the next thirty turns we fought our way over to kill them only to find that Kislev was half ruins and most of Norsca was held by Katarin. (Also the empire was being split between Skrag and N'kari aside from the three farthest right factions that were fighting vamps.) Like literally when we got to Kislev all of Kos' territory was burnt to the ground aside from.....the two closest to Norsca? I don't remember the name, the Ropsman clan was still alive and holding Praag if barely. Kislev and everything east of it was held by Katarin including the baersonling territory though I'm pretty sure that's purely because the eastern border was entirely dwarves and chaos rebel army held territories keeping any hostile people away from it. Though Krakadrak got taken by Nurgle at some point and was where he went to hide after I took all of his main territory. I also know that in my Katarin game I was on the edge of war with Kos for half the game until my growing popularity raised his impression enough that he was suddenly friendly....and then he did the most evil betrayal of all, he got auto confederated into my nation in the middle of 3 chaos invasions and the portal opening and his 4-5 stacks of crap dropped my economy from +6000 to -5000.... And opened new fronts of war for me because half his armies were in Norsca that I'd avoided so far suddenly giving me sight and more people auto-declaring war on me and then Danny boy joined in on the invading my new lands game the other chaos factions were playing. >.< Once that was done the game was smooth sailing though, I killed the Legion but otherwise never invaded another playable faction's territory and won the game.(though I was creeping on Ku'gath. I'd have killed him if the fourth portal hadn't opened as Katarin walked into his lands.)
While I can see why they did away with the idea of Horde army mechanic, I can’t help but feel like it would’ve been perfect for the Ogre Kingdoms. It feels super clunky for them not to be able to just pick up the camp and move it considering how they rely on them. You don’t wanna out run the camps circle of influence, but you have no way to move it. The only way to fix the issue is to wait until you unlock another one or demolish the whole thing and start over, both of which take too long.
5:41 Richard Armitage as Be'Lakor is sooooo good. Captures the essence of a manipulative, lying schemer perfectly while simultaneously being extremely powerful and dangerous.
Only a matter of time, I expect. Though more than likely FreeLC potential post Mortal Empires, beings there's not really that much else he could add to the bear campaign being the antagonist.
The mosh pit behavior has been in since Warhammer one and possibly as far back as rome. Units when they rout spread way out and units attacking them bug out trying to find the center of the unit to attack. Look very similar to whats happening in the vid.
1:02:28 ... Subsequently Synthesizing Sigvald Soldiers in a Slaanesh swarm seems sincerely sensible. Saving separation of such squads sustains scheduled schemes.. Legendary word play right there.
@@wombatgirl997 "A Total War: Warhammer story" I really like the sound of that. Several of Warhammer 2's DLCs were distant enough from the High Elven vortex drama that I'm surprised they took place in the same campaign.
@@wombatgirl997 They actually did something like this for some of the first game's dlc with mini campaigns, but not many people liked them and they diverted attention from other parts of development, so for future dlc they focused more on unique mechanics and goals on the regular map and more polish.
The Chainsword weapon is likely a reference to the Realm of Chaos books, where you could cross pollinate 40k with Fantasy since they had rules for both, and infact one of the examples was a chainsword for fantasy as a weapon. I love that they added that reference.
That's the name! I basically know thing about this Warhammer but growing up I had access to Realm of Chaos: The Lost and the Damned. So many of the monsters I just recognise from a book I haven't seen for like 20 years.
@@Johnstruct There was Realm of Chaos: The Lost and the Damned and Realm of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness, which came out around 1990 and 1988. The youtube channel Snipe and Wib have a series called Codex Compliant with two of the books they go over being those two books, if you want a trip down memory lane :)
Didn’t one of the End Times books imply that someone who got tossed into the Realm Of Chaos also met a Warhammer 40K character while in there? I know the books for The End Times are *immensely* disliked for stuff like thst (among *many* other infamous plot beats) but I’m not disinclined to the idea of the two being metaphysically linked…… in theory, anyway.
@@jtlego1 dunno about the end times but 40k crossovers and references in warhammer are nothing new so highly doubt that is a reason why the end times are disliked. Warhammer and 40k being linked has been confirmed and denied by gw variously over the decades depending so at this point it’s down to what you prefer to believe: whether the warhammer world is some ancient test world used by the old ones and is now stuck and isolated within the warp or that the whole of 40k exists within some wizards crystal ball. To conclude this rant, chainswords are probably among the lesser 40k gear that sometimes makes it way in fantasy, during the albion campaign the warhammer races recovered a working bolter, a power sword and even power armor (human sized rather then astartes though since it was useable by high elves).
Technically ages back, there was apparently a world campaign for Fantasy where the relic items found (scattered around ancient Lizardmen temples and the like) were eerily similar to 40k weapons like powerfists and the like. 40k and fantasy always had this weird wink and nod element regarding it, to the point where simultaniously 40k was in a snowglobe on a wizard's shelf and fantasy was an isolated world in the Imperium, closed by a warp storm. At this point I think GW has settled on 'the warp touches all realities and reflects on them, but they are not directly tied to them otherwise 40k Khorne entering the Bloodbowl universe would ruin the fun for everyone' As for the End Times cameo, I think it was latched on of the potential for it to be a Grey Knight or Kaldor Drago, but it was eventually walked back to be one of the first appearances of the Stormcast due to warp timey-wimey antics.
the ivory road is really fun it makes me want a standalone game about the ivory road full of random events fitting with the setting like a pesant hiding away warpstone and turning into a chaos spawn at night I actually did a dnd campaign with this idea and had a lot of fun but other things got in the way of it
Companies hate risky reviews, I.E: honesty. So good on CA for giving Mandalore early access to spend an hour critiquing the game. And it works. I couldn't care less about Warhammer Fantasy, but watching Mandalore's series on it convinced me to check it out, 'cause I knew what I was in for and it looked like a good time. I'll look forward to getting 3 when the early release phase is ironed out. Also, Shogun 3 when? Shogun 3.
Yep, thats some balls on CA for giving Mandy early review copy, as he is known for shittalking even his favourite games ever. Even then it's "almost perfect BUT" and after that BUT is 5 minutes of (fair) complaints. A banger of a video for something I hope will be a banger of a game.
the fact that Mandy is brutally honest about games just makes me wanna check them out more, even genres I wouldn't normally gravitate towards. As much as I love RPGs and RTSes, RTT games never really struck a chord in me but Mandy still has me itching to buy them and play them.
On the one hand, this review made me re-consider pre-ordering. On the other hand, his TWW2 review is why I'm into the series at all. I'm honestly unfamiliar with CA launches, so it's good to know perhaps I should rely on game pass for now.
@@GrayderFox "messy" is a charitable description of some of their launch states. But, to their credit, they have a record of continuous patches and support too
@@shigerufan1 Nah, a slaaneshi cultist would mean some happy fun times at the cost of your eternal damnation. You were just replying to a bunch of poorly written code (aka. a bot).
I remember barricades working fine in Total War: Attila, but those were pre-placed at the start of a battle. edit: Now that I think of it, I think there was some AI bugginess with the barricades there as well, but only for a few maps.
@@MandaloreGaming putting it on a hdd did wonders for my health, I could lift hand weights during the loading screens and then all-battle if it was one of those awful all-forest-everywhere fights
Honestly I was so hopeful for the survival mode. If it didn't require me to going from A to B and to C, and it wasnt so tedious going from each. If they made it say one larger map with different hills and open areas, three points, A, B and C and the objective is to say protect A. Maybe the context there is that is your 'exit'. If they cap the exit you are trapped and gotta go recap it. B and C could be extra defense supplies or maybe a buff if you can cap it, making the survival much smoother. Surviving for X minutes then a big boss comes is far more fun, especially with a good arena style map design. With a mix of chokepoints and open areas, cavalry can flank, archers can be placed on hills, and infantry can hold the chokes. I mean we are invading Chaos realms right? That's like their home turf. It's kinda of insane to think I can just bust through their guards and wiggle my finger at the prince going 'come at me bro'.
Hey Mandy. Will you see about doing a video on Sid Meier's Pirates? I loved that game as a kid and thought being able to pick what nation you fought for was the coolest thing.
Your review of Warhammer 2 let me want to play the game so much that I ended up spending 1k+ on a computer all based on your review. You are the only reviewer that had made that kind of impact with me, besides the dark elves that convince me to get a VPN to play God hand.
@@artofox Game's not even out. We can't really say which game is best for what factions until 3's gone through the dev cycle of post-launch. I reckon 2 will be best if you don't want to fight any of the new factions as Empire, but 3 will be the king of variety... And as someone who used to main Empire, I can't wait to give them another play on the global map, and conquer far off lands with Franz.
What pisses me off is that the Empire will get no excursion into the Realm of Chaos. I really wanted the old factions' story campaigns to be tweaked so they could all have an excuse to kinkshame Slaanesh.
I love how these are genuine reviews. Mandalore you don’t have any agenda except objective criticism from your passion in obviously playing these games. Idk if you’d ever read this but you got me into the whole total war series about a year ago with your first review. I’m proud of your grind and consistency and wish you good health and fortune. For every game you’ve reviewed there’s probably someone like me for each game. I tip my hat to you as a game reviewer to the fullest. No outside influence. Just Mandalore.
Same here. Never played Warhammer although I did have Bloodbowl. (Total Biscuit got me into Bloodbowl RIP) Loved his review and so far loving total Warhammer.
@@lazlo686 Battlesector is another one worth checking out too if you want to branch out into 40k, probably the best turn-based-strategy for that setting from what I've seen.
34:15 I doubt Khorne would enjoy skulls taken from corpses the khornite cult didnt cause, and not in his name either. Khorne is the god of honor and courage as well, afterall.
There’s something really special about your reviews. I am only 8 minutes in, but I already know I’ll rewatch this before the game comes out. More than once, I’m sure.
I feel like I’m amongst my fellow internet boomers when someone mentions TB. It’s like being at the block party BBQ and someone rolls up playing your favorite song.
WOW .. I actually have over 400 hours in Warhammer 2 and I never knew walled settlements have crenellations on the name flag to let me know at a glance.
The Total War Playlist - czcams.com/video/WA_iXKhoujA/video.html
AUGUST 2023 UPDATE: There was a DLC to flesh out the chaos roster, the big map is free for everyone, and some other good improvements, but a significant amount of core features remain horrendously broken and buggy. Siege battles in particular are still in about the same spot.
Try some Mordheim one of these days. I've had some amazingly bad experiences with that game. I also had one of my archers stuck in a knife fight with a one armed Ogre. Your mileage may vary.
Have faith in Lowry bcs Demons won´t haunt winners !
Thanks blud.
I watched your Review to Warhammer 2 so many times, thanks for your work!
Mandalore please confirm that was an intended gay reference 12:06-12:08. That caught me so believeably off gaurd....
"Being irritated at menus probably isn't what you're here for"
No no no. That's exactly why I'm here Mando. Thank you for actually providing a critical analysis
This was the part that brought me into the comment section. Never heard of this guy, but he's earned my respect in 16 and a half minutes. Definitely appreciate his time and effort into this, as well as his honesty.
Mandalore's critical analysis is absolutely fantastic. Reminds me a lot of Totalbiscuit honestly.
@@anthonyscott2020 like TB but with testicles.
I really wish they'd fix the ui
Yes, the UI-design is more than just a little important. Dragon's Dogma's menus were a nightmare for instance. Sometimes the UI itself isn't that bad, but you get swamped in crafting material or some such. The gem-flood in Shadow Warrior 2 is a good example and somebody else has pointed out how awful it is with Dragon Age - Inquisition.
This kind of stuff can ruin games on the whole!
*Pendulum is perfectly balanced!!! All praise the sexy pendulum!*
The horny pendulum is sponsored by Yorkshire tea
I swear mandalore has the best cameos
@@janedoe186 cameos? Didn't you know most of the good gaming CZcamsrs are one person?
@@Haverlock Secretly Spiffing Brit is Sseth's real persona.
SKARBRAND DOES NOT APPRECIATE BEING HIT BY PENDULUMS
43:30 "I'm gonna take a great leap forward and talk about Cathay"
Gold.
13:00
Great point about the rating excuse for the blood DLC, but I have some bad news:
This game, with fountains of blood, pooping demons, and vagina siege towers... has a Teen rating in the U.S.
I'm not saying the blood DLC is justified. I'm saying the ESRB's rating system is F U C K E D.
CA to the ESRB: that's tomato soup in that fountian.
@@glizzywrangler774 I hope the game will get a blood *update* rather than having to pay for an important aesthetic effect.
@@principalityofbelka6201 they confirmed in a faq I think that it will have the blood dlc like the other games unfortunately, or at least that's their plan, and just like previous games, if you have the dlc for 2 you get it for free
@@nostahex reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
On one hand you can understand why for processing power, but it should be something that can be turned on or off, and already in the game!
38:55
"Its all about rear charges."
How very ....fitting
The Slaanesh jokes will be pretty numerous for awhile to come :P
"so what formation we should use?"
"THE PENETRATOR!"
"But sir: where do we put the archers?"
"At the tip so they can cover the enemy faces"
Yeah, filling holes in the roster fits too.
They're very good for perfect charge when the position is right to thrust and penetrate any army formation ;) ~
"You will still have a daemon problem, but it's a much better commute." -Famous Astropath last words
"This are just illusions"
@Andrew Ryan GELLAR FIELD JUST STOPS THE IN-FLIGHT ENTERTAINMENT, SILLY HUMIE!
WAUUUUUUGH!
And then the navigator locks himself in his room because the Astronomicon just flipped him off.
@@boomanchu2 Emperor's Children Marine, surrounded by hot demonette waifus: "He's out of line, but he's right."
55:56 Wasn't expecting Mandalore to reveal himself as one of the 12 people who played Madworld.
Hey, I'm one of those 12!
God, I wish it got a remake for the Switch.
I remember thinking "How the hell is this on the Wii?"
Oh yeah, I’m a part of that 12!
It's a bloody good game
Madworld was a great game
Most impressive thing about this game is that they managed to make the tutorial’s story, one of the most generic and predictable Warhammer stories I’ve ever heard, into a captivating watch leaving you begging for more.
"Slaanesh is all about rear charges and hitting the right spot in the right time." -- Mandalore, 2022
He's just got a way with words doesn't he
It’s at 666 likes. Praise slannesh
*UwU intensifies*
Spunds like a very slanneshy thing to do
It is why I had more fun with a Slannesh campaign until that impossible to remove "Corrupted by Nurgle" trait made the campaign unplayable. I saved a Herald built for this army. Then 5 Hellscourge as the anvil, 6 units of Heart Seekers, 2 Alluress (Lore of Slannesh) on steeds 1 fore each group with charge buffs, 2 Soul Grinders to help the line, and two Daemonettes that I considered swapping for more Hellscourge for back up for the anvil. 18 units max to encourage the AI to actually fight me and not cower in a settlement. I really liked poking and prodding then running over targets that were weak enough then watching as the magical armour piercing attacks of the Heart Seekers would munch the flanks very quickly. I really like that devastating charge.
Tzeentch : *takes a Settlement and gives it to Skarbrand, in the middle of Cathay Territory*
Skarbrand : *starts to shake and teleports instantly in a howl of rage*
This is beautiful.
SKARBRAND HATES UNEXPECTED INFRASTRUCTURE EXPANSION
@@primarisrice6820 SKARBRAND HATES LITTLE RAMEN MEN, SKARBRAND ONLY EATS RESPECTABLE MEAT
@@kairosprods SKARBRAND HATES MOVING STATUES! HE HATES NON-MOVING STATUES SLIGHTLY LESS!
*SKARBRAND HATES COMMENTS THAT RIDICULE HIM AND HIS SPEECH*
@@GyroGarrison SKARBRAND HATE PEOPLE THAT TALK LIKE HIM
Someone once said to me, an amazing analogy:
Khorne hates Slaanesh because Slaanesh would rather torture 1 person over 50 years whereas Khorne would rather kill 50 people in 1 second.
Competitive murderer vs competitive sadist.
It does not really matter with the big S, S is about emotional excess and perfection
So both killing fast and killing slowly can satisfy S
If you reach a higher level of perfection and/or excess in killing fast S will like it more than killing slowly
So there's a certain amount of overlap between the two and many of their champions could have been the others
Your first rather is unneeded, confused me lol
"Biker week in Austin doesn't have this many bears." I was so astounded at how clever and absolutely hilarious that line was that I couldn't laugh.
Can you explain it for me pls?
@@tamasrehany6532 big homosexual hairy men
@@tamasrehany6532 A 'bear' is a term for a large, generally hairy gay man. Think the diametric opposite of a twink. Leather culture generally overlaps with biker gangs. The Austin part I don't get but maybe its just a place with a lot of bikers
@@anemoi6803 Austin is both a large city in texas (bikers) and has a massive, bustling, lefty arts community (gays)
@@anemoi6803 there's a large motorcycle rally in Austin that's held for a full week once a year
Mandalore recommending a book on the CCP’s obsession with the color red in the middle of a Warhammer review is one of the many reasons I love this channel
Sometimes I play with my willy and the white stuff comes out
@@TippyHippy セックス大好き
Ccp?
@@ColombianThunder Chinese Communist Party.
During the menu section of the review, no less
Mandalore: "I won't go through units otherwise I'd go feral."
But Mandalore, it's been a long time since we got a Sseth video!
me: oh shit sam hyde is a lil popular again cuz of idubbbz, thats some nostalgia...
also me: **PTSD seizure after remembering Sseth and friends making fun of america most infamous racist website right before it got shut down*
that was some funny shit.
@@drewinsur7321 what website?
@@TrinityBigT I must know. Also Sseth = Mandalore is greatest fanfic sexy time erotica novel.
@@drewinsur7321 Sounds like a based website
@@casedistorted fanfiction? No, it's just the truth.
As scummy as some of CA's business practices can be, the presentation on this is next level. It's a shame the effort gets somewhat kneecapped by the campaign AI, which will eat a live hand grenade so long as the blast also hurts the player. Minor things like that really can ruin my experience with a game.
IIRC they're mentioned they're working on adjusting that in a blog post.
For now I'd still recommend Warhammer 2 to new players, but I'm excited for what this game will look like in the future.
Eeh id argue not CA specifically, its the higher ups pushing money shit while devs bring quality to the game
One would think Chaos Undivided would be the kind of faction who gets low- to mid tier units and abilities of all Chaos Gods but none of the higher tier or endgame ones. Would make more sense both gameplay-wise and thematically.
I think maybe they can get debuffs for their daemons or that they get Daemon Princes as their greater daemon.
@@PineWierdo nope, hey get every unit from all demon factions if they stick with undivided.
Weeeell... Lore-wise, if you are meant to be playing someone like Archeon the Everchosen, "Chaos Undivided" doesn't mean that you are a wishy-washy chaos worshiper that can't decide on one deity, but that you are such a badass that they all fall over themselves for Archeon-sama to notice them. If that's the case, it makes sense that you get the best of all worlds.
@@andrzejsugier That's exactly what Chaos Undivided is: Chaos is stronger as a whole then it is separately
I'm not sure about the function(I'd need to actually play Danny boy to end game and that's a shit show.) but from what I can see the benefits of going one god is decent sized buffs and upkeep/recruitment reductions for those units while I BELIEVE keeping all minor things of the other faction you already have....but unable to get anymore now that you've chosen. So you lose 3 factions of endgame units to make one fourth of your roster stronger and cheaper to use.....also the specific parts under them but I've not really looked to see if they are remotely worthwhile compared to the gear from undivided I just know they ARE different from the undivided pieces.
Nurgle - Literally has units that shits out of an ass, wrips his own guts apart to throw intestinal fluid at enemies
Khorne - Soaked with blood, enemies that spit blood at you and a massive blood tower
CA - We can’t do an included blood pack on launch because it will get age restricted…. (Cricket sounds)
I know it's because of the age ratings and everything so but yes ( luckily we're getting the but pack for free because I previously owned the other blood packs)
Meanwhile Slaanesh is just barely tip toeing the line of suggestive themes. Tap dancing on a balancing beam, doing ballet on a tight rope.
Blame the dumb age restriction regulations of certain countries. I'm not even joking, all of this makes perfect sense in light of some of them.
@@magni5648 Selling the blood pack is the problem. It should be a free DLC only available for countries that don't have excessive regulations. So I still blame CA for it.
@@Yemeth42pis 100% it's gonna be free there's no chance they try and sell it
“They will never know the safe word.” Fucking killed me
oh my fuck I thought this was something MANDELORE said, not the goddamn GAME what the FUCK
When you use an ability in battle with N'kari, he sometimes literally does I'M COOOMING.
@@Hargrovius At least they got the "feel" of the faction right...
It isn't their name that gives you power over a slaaneshi daemon
it's their safeword
@@Hargrovius This just reminds me of the sketch ProZd made where a game sounds dirtier than it is. I never expected it to become true.
Mandy: Speaks about Polish, Hussars and Sabathon.
Me: yeah... very original. Every time.
Mandy: Mentions *THE* number
Me: 😨 OH MY GOD! The evil corruption grasps further than I've expected!
How the fuck does he know the number??
The fuck is the number?
@@TheT1111x1 If I remember right it was the exact time the pope most Slavs hate died so they celebrated it and made it into a meme.
@@johnnyboy2537 You are right about pope dying, but he was not hated. The pope was Jan Paweł II or John Paul II, he was first polish pope and a national hero, and symbol of hope in times of communism. He was loves do much that he was gloryfied to the point of absurd. There are his statues around every corner, every second street is named after him, if you go to any souvenir store in Poland you'll find bunch of random things with pope face on it, from photos to plates and pens, etc.
Its only natural it had a reaction with young people, especially liberal ones (but even cathilics and conservatives make fun of it) started making memes with him, portraying him as a nazi, a pedophile, putting his face on porn movies (from which "cenzopapa" name originated : censor + pope) and finally meming hour of his death 21:37. Obviously most elder people were absolutelly furious, which oly lead to more trolling.
Which number?
The amount of effort, creativity and enthusiasm that went into every second of this video is crazy. Classic Mandalore.
For those who want to know what the tree reference 8:30 is about:
It is a mirage tank from C&C red alert 2, it is a unit which can disguise as a tree (you can find the clip if you search for "mirage tank meme")
No one but us trees...
Thanks.
Need some shade?
A tree? Wait, is that.... CREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED!!!
"One more for the landfill!"
"This seemed to work fine before but now it's worse needlessly" You've basically summed up a decade of my life working in software QA my dude.
Any good stories?
As a software product manager this makes me laugh and laugh. Dev tears sustain me. “Long shall be your suffering. Joyous be your pain.”
posting to keep getting notified
Come on stuff happens... You can't toast eggs without breaking some.
The new stuff works right... Mostly?
Same here. It's like a QA catchphrase, lol.
“We are doomed, comrades!”
“Yeah, this place sucks.”
I am obsessed with this part (9:20)
imagine a deamon horde in hell descenting apon and army and a knight acknowledges but treats it so casually in context it's hilarious
I came across this comment right as this part played
A common theme I'm seeing about total war games is that they can be janky, not always optimized, and expensive, but dear lord their presentation is next level.
Most women are like that.
@@jdoc3118 fine, take my like.
How about they lack all of the intricacies of the old games and are massive disappointments?
@@fiddlesticks7245 I haven’t played them, so I have no opinion on that. I’m just watching mandalore’s reviews, and I’m invested in warhammer as a whole.
@@TuShan18 yeah sorry to hear that, also didn't ask
Being irritated at menus is what i'm here for
They do underestimate the importance of UI in these types of games
Tbh, they shouldn't underestimate UI in ANY types of games xD
Incoming "Tolerable UI" dlc
100% I can't play old games, especially RTSs. The little creature comforts we grown to expect make older games unplayable.
@@johnlea3597 is new games that give me trouble, stuff like crusaders kings 3 and age of empires 4
@@johnlea3597 is new games that give me trouble, stuff like crusaders kings 3 and age of empires 4
"Subsequently synthesizing Sigvalds soldiers into Slanesh's swarm seems sincerely sensible. Saving separations of such squad sustain scheduled schemes and strategies from CA" tongue twister had me do a double take, I thought I was actually going loopy for a second lmao.
Amazing video as always, thank you so much for the coverage :)
This one killed me so hard xD lovely
Sigvald gives a speech like that in a quest battle.
Surely such seditious sentiments shall soon be subordinated to the salacious sadism of Slaanesh.
I didn't realise how much I missed it
I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought they crossed a wire.
"It feels like change for the sake of change"
Sigmar damn you, Tzeentch!
I have found it strange how story heavy the prologue was, thoroughly enjoyed it, but then the main campaign kind of drops off in the narrative whilst railroading you into the soul collecting mechanic. This takes away from what's a really fun and cool game. I think it will be much better when we get the sandbox campaign. They for sure missed an opportunity to continue the narrative style from the prologue, which for the first time I can recall I would have actually been down for. Loving the Chaos Demons faction, because who doesn't want to play as a beastly demon prince.
Also the Blood Dlc is stupid in this game when you play Khorne without it you're fighting for the Blood god...without blood. A bit silly.
@@elmorgano81 Certainly, but it's very much at the whim of the ERSB and their ratings board which basically just pokes a stick into the game and judges it from there. Not defending CA's actions, I don’t think they should charge that much kf at all for blood, but I understand why something like it has to happen, though at the least it's not another DLC you have to buy if you already have the previous.
@@tylerp.5004 Sounds like the ESRB needs some reviewing.
The line: "...Kugath is practicing some sort of mobility scooter krav maga..." is pure gold.
The whole Greasus falling into a diabetic coma part got me too
@@user-nr3ei8ji8u
"God bless him."
@@user-nr3ei8ji8u n Nnm m mc nm NBC k n no I
Been looking forward to this video just as much as the full game!
Huh, didn't expect to see you here...
Even more for me, since I’ve already decided I’m not buying this one. I didn’t like the first two games at all, but I’m still interested in what Mandy has to say
I see you everywhere nowadays
amen
I see the thumbnail, I hear the Turtles in Time SNES music, and I'm like "You know what I'm gonna listen to while writing a sociology paper?!"
Still waiting to see mandalores thoughts on Immortal Empires, Champions of Chaos, Chorfs and soon to be probably Shadows of Change 😱
I love the idea of the elemental bear being available once you unite kislevs factions
Forgot to mention the reintroduced anti-player AI. In the two kislev games ive played so far ive had enemy agents walk passed 3+ other factions (that they are at WAR WITH) just to pool around my city, and when portals open up in hellgates territory the armies that spawn out of it decide to take the LONGER path to a hostile area and attack my praag instead.
Great feature, not bs at all, and makes things very fun and immersive.
@Radigan artificial difficulty is not real difficulty. The best Warhammer players are just the cheesiest of them. I love Total War... But they really need to fix the difficulty and make the game a challenge, not an impossible annoyance
@Radigan very based
For now I recommend dropping the campaign difficulty down (you can keep the battle difficulty up if you like). It will reduce the extreme anti-player focus of the AI factions on the campaign map.
@Radigan Rope. You'll be doing yourself a favour.
very true
I am more impressed with fiends of slaanesh - their movement looks so "wrong". They crawl like a crocodile but then start galloping with this uncanny gait that makes them really feel like something unnatural and demonic.
Yeah, surprisingly fluid and interesting movement cycle on those. Really stands out...although the nurglings are pretty good too.
Honestly them and the nurglings are both the most impressive to me. They seem like so much effort and time was put into making them compared to a lot of the more normal units.
The Fiends of Slaanesh are really impressive, true, but Great Unclean Ones crapping out Nurglings just for those Nurglings to dance and make snow angels in the goo... That is truly magical.
Their charge animation is great, looks so bizarre when they propel themselves with their middle pair of limbs but makes sense in motion too. Looks hard as shit to animate.
A real indication of how good the fiend animation is - it made me go look at the (stupidly expensive) physical miniatures from GW again. They always struck me as suitably creepy but rather stiffly posed and hard to imagine in motion. Total War has changed that, anyway.
Still stupidly overpriced and about to be more so. Love the GW told everyone there was a 5% price hike coming and the moment the price lists got leaked there were a thousand people calling them out for it being more like 8-15% for most stuff and as high as 20% on some.
Just discovered Mandalore‘s and Sseths channels around the same time and gotta say this is one of the biggest rabbit holes I’ve ever fallen into 🤣
If you like Mandalore, check out the podcast he's on "Please Stop Talking"
It's hilarious
Well clearly you're slow AF and you're literally too stupid to use that word properly - you just *binged*
It’s really a shame neither of them make videos very often
I can't believe that you didn't mention CA's baffling choice to make Ogre camps non-movable. It's the only way to get their best units and the best way to get steady meat, but then you have to abandon them. I can't even figure out how to demolish them, but I hear it can be done. The static camps made my Ogre campaign no fun.
being irritated at menus is "EXACTLY" what I'm here for Mandalore
I read this comment maybe a second before I heard him say that line.
Based profile picture, sir.
Peak autism, boys.
@@Malaneth bootlicker profile pic
I'm super happy Mandalore spent some time being irritated at menus. I fucking hate the all red and "minimalism" approach they took. Warhammer is all about needless flair, give back colors and individuality to factions dammit!
As with most RTS, I cant wait to get this game in about a year of bug fixes and UI changes
It's essentially just a dlc to WH2, which is essentially just a dlc to WH1. It already runs smoothly for most, and will probably be completely stable within a month or two. It's not a new game with new game bugs, it's a huge update to a 7-year-old game with update bugs.
The UI will probably stay, I hope rthey change some things or pt toggles in because I like many of the new UI changes personally, I'm mostly just iirritated by the whole red thing.
Also for me the game runs mostly good, my PC isnt that much above the minnimum requirements and it works, when many units are on the fild it laggs but thats to be expected I think. Sieges also work for me fne I havent seen anyone just stand around points or capture them by accident. What I have seen are units just standing in a point igoring a battle they're side was winning but tahts the worst I saw.
This is the case with a lot more than just RTS, and a huge problem imo with the industry as a whole. Half, if not more, of all releases these days are just glorified early access with the amount of bugs and lack of polish.
@@Loj84 Tbh, with having a friend that worked on WH1, the new game is basically like refreshing a cache. If they didn't, they'd either be like COD with 100gig updates and 500gig total size or be like Destiny and take content from players. New game means new engine, which means more stuff can be crammed into it. Atleast, that's how explained it for my dumbass monkey brain
@@dariusgunter5344 the whole red thing really isnt as bad as it sounds from this video, but thats just me.
"It's all about rear charges and hitting the right spot at the right time."
Slaanesh herself would certainly approve of that choice of words.
The models don’t bleed because all the blood went into the menus. And the blood lakes and fountains.
I swear Mandalore is one of the few people who can make an hour long video not even remotely feel like an hour, so entertaining and well paced.
I watch his videos as white noise or while eating. Him and Seth are my favorite reviewers lol.
Noah Caldwell Gervois 7.5 hours resident evil video feels like it’s 10 minutes
@@user-vu6vf4ev4m Noah's on another level
@@QuestionableObject Nah, you are all just severely socially maladjusted and are unhealthy screen addicts with no real purpose to existence
@@r0br33r lol ok
You picking up on the little things like menus at 16:27 is exactly why I'm here
I certainly appreciated it. If I had seen red
ed build timers on my own I think it would have ruined my day, now I think I can handle it.
@@ClothesCat I'm not sure I would've even been able to narrow it down like Mandalore does. I would've just played the game and thought that the menus look weird without being able to pinpoint the issue
@@SwammyCDN There is little worse in life than being annoyed at something and not knowing why. Just that little seed of irritation and aggression that you know has a reason to exist but you can't place exactly why.
“Subsequently synthesising sig vault soldiers in a slanted swarm seems sincerely sensible saving separation of such squads sustains scheduled schemes and strategies” 👏👏👏
By "slanted" my heart was racing like I was listening to a horse race.
That’s an 0.81 alliteration quotient!
>sig vault
Retard
The idea you had about the supply system being specifically a pre-battle set up would be infinitely better than the arcade fortnite tower defence we have now. Destroy a tower? The AI instantly tries to rebuild it. Downright annoying.
Mandalore: *Talks about the new variety of city maps*
Brain: "Wood needed. MOAR Wood is needed m'lord. Can't place that there m'lord. Can't place that there m'lord."
Aw fuck I heard it.
"Site your granary sire. Speeeears... forwaaaard.." all of it
I literally paused the video and redownloaded that game after hearing the music...
What game is it
@@erensametkaratas6593 Stronghold
48:30
"Maybe I should stop talking about the trees. They don't like that. They've never liked that."
*Durthu nods approvingly*
misread this as Durthu nods grovingly
How is Mandalore simultaneously the most logical, analytical and respectable youtuber I have ever seen, and the most clearly crazy youtuber right beneath the surface? Love your videos, keep up the good work!
Because it’s Sseth on meds
Sometimes the meds fades away and sseth takes the wheel
Was watching this vid and wondered “hmm I wonder if they added a blood DLC yet?”, checked, and learned it was announced 7 hours ago. Khorne has blessed me this day
Marv’s scream at the end, I’m not used to having to wait so long for it. But at least he was still in there, as tradition requires.
I didn't hear any guardsmen saying IT'S QUIET though
@@pnutz_2 Maybe he was too quiet for us to notice.
I know I can trust game reviewers when they acknowledge that they really like something, and then immediately acknowledge that the thing they like is flawed and that they can't reccomend it at full price rn. Far too often have I heard "yes it's flawed BUT-" and then they go on to why those flaws don't matter and shouldn't impact your purchase decision. A "Maybe" is a fine verdict as long as it's explained. No buttering up, no talking down. This is what I'm here for.
You are the Chosen One to review Planescape: Torment. You know you must.
Holding back or removing a feature just to re-sell or pad out future DLC is probably my most hated practice. Guaranteed, the Blood DLC was taken out just to be sold as an added extra.
I dread to think how daunting it must be to know you need to review a new Warhammer game. The depth you go into each aspect of your review, even down to the UI with its readability, is honestly astounding. Excellent work as always!
1:02:28 Simply Sublime.
I get the feeling that the audio department constantly outperforms the other parts of game creation because they don't have marketing and management breathing down their neck all day, because the most input those can give is somethingvague like "make it bombastic" anyway. So they can just do sound and music and do it right.
The only real hole in CA's teams is working on the engine. They simply lack the talent to fix any issue that isn't superficial, and it's been showing in game after game. The people who made the engine aren't there any more, and nobody there now is equipped to make any meaningful fixes.
Thats easily one of the big causes, i remember in BF1 days the entire marketing was around "it looks grim but cool" and in trailers you almost never get to ear the sounds of the game: Then you play it and its one of if not the most well done thing in the saga (period)
I guess its because it easier to show a big meany demon doing around than to show how well done a canon blast is, even when the later does more to inmerse the player in.
@@blackhammer5035 code man.. after a certain point it's like staring into the void... And it gazes back at you
Lmao compare gun and cannon sounds in warhammer to shogun/medieval. "The audio department" is most likely deaf
@@blackhammer5035 Engine is at this point over 13 years old, changed and patched over and over again and never intended to work for something like Warhammer. I would expect that the code looks like a chaos spawn by this point with amalgamation of barely comprehensible add-ons. The moshpit for example was an issue in Attila, so it has to be something quite deeply ingrained if it simply returned after so many years.
54:46 Slaansh's army NOT having phallic battering rams is a missed opportunity...
They probably went against it for the sake of the game's rating.
modders will fix it
It'll just be added in the upcoming cock dlc
@@karlturner5678 CBT dlc when??
But they left the line about them never knowing the safe word XD
Would love to see an updated version on wh3, including the new dlc
I’d love a version of the survival battles where you are the defender against a nearly unlimited number of undead with a limited number of troops you can’t reinforce. It could be like a challenge mode like a time trial mode in racing games.
horde mode, you mean you want a horde mod.
15:36 As someone who is partially red/green colorblind this INFURIATES me to no end. I can see the differences but it's barley noticeable to me. People who are full on red/green colorblind won't be able to see anything with these icons. I really hope they change up all the red UI elements because otherwise ima have to wait for a UI mod just to not get a migraine.
I was wondering if visual accessibility was the reason they changed the building/demolishing from red/green to icon based but with so many other baffling decisions its looking like a half step forward five steps back
I am indeed full on red/green color blind.
Mandalore didn't mention this, but there's a red/green colorblindness accessibility mode in the color options. You can also change the colors to whatever you want.
@@elvastan He literally showed how to use it and complained how it changed healthbar colours as well instead of individual elements.
Just see better
"The UI reminds of something that happened in China in 1966."
Only Mandalore and Warlockracy videos could fit that line without context.
Also DAMN, those animations are amazing.
Sometimes I play with my willy and the white stuff comes out
Bing Chilling Moment
@@alonihuang93 that is a bilingual pun that I can get behind
Cool, what video did Warlockracy do it for?
@@mattcollins5974 He makes historical references and tangents in most of his videos. I don't remember a specific video but his Fallout 1 and 2 reviews probably mention it since China plays a prominent role in the lore.
I know ive been here but where are you Mandalore I miss you
I've never even played a Total War game, but your reviews are just so well done and full of good information, as well as witty but not overdone humor I watched this whole 70-minute video lol.
When you really think about it, t's kind of funny that Slaanesh is all about positioning and hitting enemies from the back.
You mean "from behind" *wink wink*
@@Nugire better yet "in the rear"
"They came from...behind."
@@Haan22 "they stuck us in the rear"
I mean, you need to penetrate their lines to win
I'd note the entire reason Boris is that way is because he DOESN'T get to confederate them easily....but if they DON'T confederate then his supposed allies behind him may well murder each other and provide ample opportunity for Chaos to get behind you. So he's throwing his weight behind one of them to force them to be friendly faster so he can just focus forward. (And in co-op I imagine this means he can make another kislev player MUCH happier....or pissed, you know.)
Boris: "Can you two stop trying to kill each other...."
*Katarin and Kostaltyn aggressively swinging at each other*
Boris: "FOR FIVE MINUTES!?"
@@smileybones9172 "if i'd known this would happen i would have never left blyat"
I'm pretty sure Neither major Kislev factions can declare war on each other, and I have seen them confederate each other relatively fast in many streamed campaigns.
@@apple-tarts5026 I've seen them declare war on each other. One game Katarin had Kos on his last legs before it ticked over and she confederated him. And in a multiplayer campaign the npc Kislev took till.....turn 90ish? to confederate. And then over the next thirty turns we fought our way over to kill them only to find that Kislev was half ruins and most of Norsca was held by Katarin. (Also the empire was being split between Skrag and N'kari aside from the three farthest right factions that were fighting vamps.) Like literally when we got to Kislev all of Kos' territory was burnt to the ground aside from.....the two closest to Norsca? I don't remember the name, the Ropsman clan was still alive and holding Praag if barely. Kislev and everything east of it was held by Katarin including the baersonling territory though I'm pretty sure that's purely because the eastern border was entirely dwarves and chaos rebel army held territories keeping any hostile people away from it. Though Krakadrak got taken by Nurgle at some point and was where he went to hide after I took all of his main territory.
I also know that in my Katarin game I was on the edge of war with Kos for half the game until my growing popularity raised his impression enough that he was suddenly friendly....and then he did the most evil betrayal of all, he got auto confederated into my nation in the middle of 3 chaos invasions and the portal opening and his 4-5 stacks of crap dropped my economy from +6000 to -5000.... And opened new fronts of war for me because half his armies were in Norsca that I'd avoided so far suddenly giving me sight and more people auto-declaring war on me and then Danny boy joined in on the invading my new lands game the other chaos factions were playing. >.< Once that was done the game was smooth sailing though, I killed the Legion but otherwise never invaded another playable faction's territory and won the game.(though I was creeping on Ku'gath. I'd have killed him if the fourth portal hadn't opened as Katarin walked into his lands.)
While I can see why they did away with the idea of Horde army mechanic, I can’t help but feel like it would’ve been perfect for the Ogre Kingdoms. It feels super clunky for them not to be able to just pick up the camp and move it considering how they rely on them. You don’t wanna out run the camps circle of influence, but you have no way to move it. The only way to fix the issue is to wait until you unlock another one or demolish the whole thing and start over, both of which take too long.
"So I wont point out minor stuff they might fix over the next week or so."
*One month later without any serious patches* - Well that didnt age well.
5:41 Richard Armitage as Be'Lakor is sooooo good. Captures the essence of a manipulative, lying schemer perfectly while simultaneously being extremely powerful and dangerous.
He's perfect for the role. I hope they gave him his own start on the combined map because he seems too wasted how he's used now.
Only a matter of time, I expect. Though more than likely FreeLC potential post Mortal Empires, beings there's not really that much else he could add to the bear campaign being the antagonist.
The mosh pit behavior has been in since Warhammer one and possibly as far back as rome. Units when they rout spread way out and units attacking them bug out trying to find the center of the unit to attack. Look very similar to whats happening in the vid.
1:02:28
...
Subsequently
Synthesizing
Sigvald
Soldiers
in
a
Slaanesh
swarm
seems
sincerely
sensible.
Saving
separation
of
such
squads
sustains
scheduled
schemes..
Legendary word play right there.
And
Strategies
Mando, it's been almost 3 months. Where you at?
Nappin'
They should definitely make the tutorial campaign into a demo for the game.
@@wombatgirl997 "A Total War: Warhammer story"
I really like the sound of that. Several of Warhammer 2's DLCs were distant enough from the High Elven vortex drama that I'm surprised they took place in the same campaign.
@@wombatgirl997 They actually did something like this for some of the first game's dlc with mini campaigns, but not many people liked them and they diverted attention from other parts of development, so for future dlc they focused more on unique mechanics and goals on the regular map and more polish.
The Chainsword weapon is likely a reference to the Realm of Chaos books, where you could cross pollinate 40k with Fantasy since they had rules for both, and infact one of the examples was a chainsword for fantasy as a weapon. I love that they added that reference.
That's the name! I basically know thing about this Warhammer but growing up I had access to Realm of Chaos: The Lost and the Damned. So many of the monsters I just recognise from a book I haven't seen for like 20 years.
@@Johnstruct There was Realm of Chaos: The Lost and the Damned and Realm of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness, which came out around 1990 and 1988. The youtube channel Snipe and Wib have a series called Codex Compliant with two of the books they go over being those two books, if you want a trip down memory lane :)
Didn’t one of the End Times books imply that someone who got tossed into the Realm Of Chaos also met a Warhammer 40K character while in there?
I know the books for The End Times are *immensely* disliked for stuff like thst (among *many* other infamous plot beats) but I’m not disinclined to the idea of the two being metaphysically linked…… in theory, anyway.
@@jtlego1 dunno about the end times but 40k crossovers and references in warhammer are nothing new so highly doubt that is a reason why the end times are disliked. Warhammer and 40k being linked has been confirmed and denied by gw variously over the decades depending so at this point it’s down to what you prefer to believe: whether the warhammer world is some ancient test world used by the old ones and is now stuck and isolated within the warp or that the whole of 40k exists within some wizards crystal ball.
To conclude this rant, chainswords are probably among the lesser 40k gear that sometimes makes it way in fantasy, during the albion campaign the warhammer races recovered a working bolter, a power sword and even power armor (human sized rather then astartes though since it was useable by high elves).
Technically ages back, there was apparently a world campaign for Fantasy where the relic items found (scattered around ancient Lizardmen temples and the like) were eerily similar to 40k weapons like powerfists and the like. 40k and fantasy always had this weird wink and nod element regarding it, to the point where simultaniously 40k was in a snowglobe on a wizard's shelf and fantasy was an isolated world in the Imperium, closed by a warp storm. At this point I think GW has settled on 'the warp touches all realities and reflects on them, but they are not directly tied to them otherwise 40k Khorne entering the Bloodbowl universe would ruin the fun for everyone'
As for the End Times cameo, I think it was latched on of the potential for it to be a Grey Knight or Kaldor Drago, but it was eventually walked back to be one of the first appearances of the Stormcast due to warp timey-wimey antics.
the ivory road is really fun
it makes me want a standalone game about the ivory road full of random events fitting with the setting
like a pesant hiding away warpstone and turning into a chaos spawn at night
I actually did a dnd campaign with this idea and had a lot of fun but other things got in the way of it
Everytime Mandalore intros with that song I'm reminded how OG he is. Despite how famous it should be, I never see others use it on YT.
I’m torn between the bg2 music and the morrowind soundtrack for what gets me more hyped to play an rpg.
Companies hate risky reviews, I.E: honesty. So good on CA for giving Mandalore early access to spend an hour critiquing the game.
And it works. I couldn't care less about Warhammer Fantasy, but watching Mandalore's series on it convinced me to check it out, 'cause I knew what I was in for and it looked like a good time. I'll look forward to getting 3 when the early release phase is ironed out.
Also, Shogun 3 when? Shogun 3.
Yep, thats some balls on CA for giving Mandy early review copy, as he is known for shittalking even his favourite games ever. Even then it's "almost perfect BUT" and after that BUT is 5 minutes of (fair) complaints. A banger of a video for something I hope will be a banger of a game.
the fact that Mandy is brutally honest about games just makes me wanna check them out more, even genres I wouldn't normally gravitate towards. As much as I love RPGs and RTSes, RTT games never really struck a chord in me but Mandy still has me itching to buy them and play them.
Medieval 3? :(
On the one hand, this review made me re-consider pre-ordering. On the other hand, his TWW2 review is why I'm into the series at all. I'm honestly unfamiliar with CA launches, so it's good to know perhaps I should rely on game pass for now.
@@GrayderFox "messy" is a charitable description of some of their launch states. But, to their credit, they have a record of continuous patches and support too
"Being irritated at menus probably isn't what you're here for"
Don't assume, Mr Mandalore
the dwarf fortress UI just called, they said it's for you
Yeah, that menu problem made me recoil in terror. Nothing worse than a clunky UI in a game you'll be plunking 100 hours into.
HOWEVER
you'll still plunk a hundred hours into it. i consider myself a casual DF player and probably have like 1k hours already
23:33
I was not expecting a 2137 joke in a non-Polish video. It was extremely pleasing
#JP2GMD
Me either XDDD
GMD?
@@faceoctopus4571 He doesn't know.
@@donradkos6655 if you are going to be deliberately unhelpful, why go through the time and effort of saying anything at all?
@@faceoctopus4571 Because poles are gimps, how did you not know that?
28:15 I greatly appreciate the use of crunchy Left 4 Dead sound effects, down to the Midnight Riders on the jukebox lol
The game isn't even out yet and still Mandalore makes a perfect review like allways
The prestige that comes with getting an early review is well earned for making several hours worth of quality content.
Sometimes I play with my willy and the white stuff comes out
@@TippyHippy Found the Slaaneshi cultist.
@@shigerufan1 Nah, a slaaneshi cultist would mean some happy fun times at the cost of your eternal damnation. You were just replying to a bunch of poorly written code (aka. a bot).
@@shigerufan1 Well it wasn't that hard to find him.
Compared to how hard he is
Gotta say, they really turned the game around. Now that immortal empires is out and chaos doesn't suck its a blast to play
@@TheCoolCucumberwhy what happened?
It’s been 2months where you at mandalore? The world needs you.
I remember barricades working fine in Total War: Attila, but those were pre-placed at the start of a battle.
edit: Now that I think of it, I think there was some AI bugginess with the barricades there as well, but only for a few maps.
Wait, these aren't placed before battle?
Mmm navmesh updating issues and/or dynamically updating AI priority list getting stuck flip flopping
I think when it comes to the quality to attention ratio in the franchise, Attila is by far the most slept on. Shame about the optimization with it.
@@MandaloreGaming you tell me. Can't even lock it at 60 fps with a 5800x and a 3080.
@@MandaloreGaming putting it on a hdd did wonders for my health, I could lift hand weights during the loading screens
and then all-battle if it was one of those awful all-forest-everywhere fights
I did not expect that Spiff cameo 😂
And i did not expect Dr Simon Clark's cameo in the comments!
No one expects the Spiffing inquisition
he arrived in the middle of the video when we least expected it
@@AjLechtenberg thanks for that laugh too.
An appearance from Mrs Imon Clark!
Honestly I was so hopeful for the survival mode. If it didn't require me to going from A to B and to C, and it wasnt so tedious going from each.
If they made it say one larger map with different hills and open areas, three points, A, B and C and the objective is to say protect A. Maybe the context there is that is your 'exit'. If they cap the exit you are trapped and gotta go recap it. B and C could be extra defense supplies or maybe a buff if you can cap it, making the survival much smoother. Surviving for X minutes then a big boss comes is far more fun, especially with a good arena style map design. With a mix of chokepoints and open areas, cavalry can flank, archers can be placed on hills, and infantry can hold the chokes.
I mean we are invading Chaos realms right? That's like their home turf. It's kinda of insane to think I can just bust through their guards and wiggle my finger at the prince going 'come at me bro'.
Hey Mandy. Will you see about doing a video on Sid Meier's Pirates? I loved that game as a kid and thought being able to pick what nation you fought for was the coolest thing.
Your review of Warhammer 2 let me want to play the game so much that I ended up spending 1k+ on a computer all based on your review. You are the only reviewer that had made that kind of impact with me, besides the dark elves that convince me to get a VPN to play God hand.
Ditch ExpressVPN. They threw Sseth under the bus.
The 'S' alliteration when discussing Sigvlad did not go unnoticed. Nice touch
Mandalore taking a loooooooong nap lol
CHAMPIONS DLC AND IMMORTAL EMPIRES TMR
WHERES THE VID MANDY
As a die hard Empire player, I can’t wait for the giga-turbo-mega campaign
Empire player here and all I can say is first and second game is a lot more enjoyable as Empire, no need to play it again in this mess
@@artofox Game's not even out. We can't really say which game is best for what factions until 3's gone through the dev cycle of post-launch. I reckon 2 will be best if you don't want to fight any of the new factions as Empire, but 3 will be the king of variety... And as someone who used to main Empire, I can't wait to give them another play on the global map, and conquer far off lands with Franz.
I'm not even buying until ME3, the chaos campaign is not sandbox enough and maybe they'll fix the trash UI by then.
"This action does have my consent"
What pisses me off is that the Empire will get no excursion into the Realm of Chaos. I really wanted the old factions' story campaigns to be tweaked so they could all have an excuse to kinkshame Slaanesh.
Spiff is just so powerful when random people start mentioning balance he wills himself into existence during their recording session😂
He found the physics exploit that allows him to be in any and all places at once.
@@GearShotgun perfectly balanced 👌, as all things are
"Man, Biker Week in Austin doesn't have this many Bears" (27:00)
Please, @MandaloreGaming , you're killin' me
You need to please do an update video and showcase all the bugs that haven't been fixed because last time you did CA actually listened
I love how these are genuine reviews. Mandalore you don’t have any agenda except objective criticism from your passion in obviously playing these games. Idk if you’d ever read this but you got me into the whole total war series about a year ago with your first review. I’m proud of your grind and consistency and wish you good health and fortune. For every game you’ve reviewed there’s probably someone like me for each game. I tip my hat to you as a game reviewer to the fullest. No outside influence. Just Mandalore.
inb4 salty planetside 2 virgins
Same here. Never played Warhammer although I did have Bloodbowl. (Total Biscuit got me into Bloodbowl RIP) Loved his review and so far loving total Warhammer.
LOL "objective criticism"
@@lazlo686 Battlesector is another one worth checking out too if you want to branch out into 40k, probably the best turn-based-strategy for that setting from what I've seen.
@@Solano1111 criticism is objective whenever I agree with it, obviously. I ascribe to the Mauler school of critique.
22:48 Very nice touch with the Red Alert Theme music in the background when going over Kislev
34:15 I doubt Khorne would enjoy skulls taken from corpses the khornite cult didnt cause, and not in his name either. Khorne is the god of honor and courage as well, afterall.
There’s something really special about your reviews. I am only 8 minutes in, but I already know I’ll rewatch this before the game comes out. More than once, I’m sure.
I usually watch Mandalore's videos again when the subtitles come out, so that they can point out the jokes that went over my head.
16:26 "being irritated menus probably isn't what you're here for"
*TB rolls over*
Total Biscuit jumpscare
I feel like I’m amongst my fellow internet boomers when someone mentions TB. It’s like being at the block party BBQ and someone rolls up playing your favorite song.
@@NotaDrDoom ikr
@@NotaDrDoom
It's funny, TB got me into Warhammer 40k by talking about the first Battlefleet Gothic, specifically the Co Optional animation.
@@damoclesecoe7184 I just think it’s kinda sad that his name isn’t invoked more often he has his historic importance to his part internet ya know?
Anyone else noticing the Red Alert 3 main menu music in the Kislev part of the video? so nice to see CNC references now and again.
WOW .. I actually have over 400 hours in Warhammer 2 and I never knew walled settlements have crenellations on the name flag to let me know at a glance.