FE ATURE
2022 Preview
BEACON PINES
Adorable artwork disguises a surprisingly
creepy atmosphere in this adventure
game through a magical storybook. By
changing words in the text, you can alter
the direction of the tale – and change the
fates of the various characters within it,
for better or worse.
RELEASE 2022A PLAGUE TALE: REQUIEM
The first game left a lot on the table by the
end – both in terms of dangling story
threads and untapped potential in its
rat-based puzzles. We’re hoping this
swarming sequel will round out the
concept more fully as it takes us to new
regions of its alt-history world.
RELEASE 2022TOTAL WAR: WARHAMMER III
A
fter two glorious To t a l
War: Warhammer
games and a cavalcade
of DLC featuring most
noteworthy factions
from Games Workshop’s universe,
many of us were left asking what could
possibly be next for the third and final
game in the trilogy? Of course, there
are many Warhammer factions whose
units and lore aren’t as well
documented, as well as the semi-
abstract realms of those colourful
Chaos Gods, but would Creative
Assembly really venture into this
strange new territory?
Why but of course it would! And it’s
doing it with the exponentially growing
confidence of a studio that’s been
intertwined with the world of
Warhammer for a good seven years
now. The new factions are a motley mix
of the rough (Ogre Kingdoms), the regal
(Kislev and Cathay), and the
otherworldly, with the Daemons of
Chaos divided into separate Nurgle,
Tzeentch, Slaanesh, and Khorne armies.
That confidence has been palpable
in all the Total War: Warhammer III
battle footage we’ve seen throughout
- Cathay using dragons and hot air
balloons to defend a great wall against
the neon-firing hordes of the Lord of
Change, the Ice Queen of the Slavic-
inspired Kislev taking her winged
lancers and War Bear Riders to the
gates of hell against Khorne, and even
an all-Chaos showdown in a realm of rot
between the Plaguebearers of Nurgle
and horny hedonists of Slaanesh.
It really is spectacular stuff – a
firework ending to a trilogy that, by the
end of the third game’s DLC run, will
have been in almost non-stop
development for the best part of a
decade. But beyond the bright lights
and dazzle of the battlefield, it’s
impressive to see how Creative
Assembly is digging ever-deeper into
making each faction’s campaigns feel
distinct. Where the first To t a l Wa r :
Warhammer played things relatively
safe, the second really mixed things up,
and the success of that experiment has
propelled Creative Assembly to go all
out in weird and wonderful campaign
mechanics for the third game.
As you might imagine, Chaos
factions aren’t too keen on cramming
themselves into human settlements, so
their focus is very much on spreading
their respective god’s kinks throughout
the mortal realms. Nurgle turns human
settlements into foetid fields, while
Tzeentch, God of Change, can mess
with the campaign map like a cheating
child with a board game – tracking
armies, messing with enemy turns, and
even transferring control of settlement
between different factions.GODS DAMN IT
The campaign map looks set to be more
alive than ever, constantly changing to
reflect the advances and schemings of
the Chaos Gods, while Cathay and
Kislev attempt to keep them at bay.
Then there are the little things, like
tiered cities and the ability to build
barricades in them, giving depth to the
urban combat that’s been oddly lacking
throughout the 20-plus year history of
the To t a l Wa r series.
Nurgle only knows how this most
out-there of entries in an already
out-there series will merge into the
Mortal Empires campaign, which will
eventually contain the maps and
factions from all three games in the
series. However it ends up looking, in a
series that has so far answered all
questions with the force of a Mournfang
Cavalry charge, we have no reason to
doubt they’ll do it right.RELEASE February 17, 2022 | DEV Creative Assembly | PUB Sega | LINK totalwar.com