[Col. Fishguts]

I wonder if you played post-patch, enemy numbers got nerfed pretty hard

Wasn't the automatic difficulty setting linked to your own losses?
On my very first play-through I was playing it like I did HW1, not accepting to lose anything above frigate-class. And at Taddis Sabbah I was faced with a dozen BCs all converging on my starting position at mission begin (there was no way to slowly take them down one by one). The only way to win I found after god-know-how-many tries, was to order my fleet into retreat immediately (moving away from the station) so the time interval the enemy BCs got into contact with my fleet was a bit larger. All the while some lonely marine frigates were sneaking to the station, successfully boarded and managed to slip away.

On a later play-through I let destroyers die every now and then and generally was much less careful with saving my units... and the game was much easier. There were 4 or 5 BCs at Taddis Sabbah and I could easily move my fleet up to the station, steamrolling everything in my way.

[crizza]

If I remember things right the difficulty was also tied to your ressources too.
I once ****ed around with the REs, added way too much and ended up facing way to many enemies, which were by far out of the usual unit limit, so I couldn't fight them properbly.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

I never got where the "too hard" comments came from, me and my brothers always found the game piss-easy compared to HW1 and HWC. My biggest issue with Homeworld 2 is how rushed the game feels, as if they had a very complex story lined up, with a bunch of features and assets being worked on, then somebody said "guys, we need to release to game".
It's funny there's a few other games from that time that had the same kind of feeling, like everybody got over-ambicious then had to cut everything down before running out of money.

Also, we need a snuffy option.

[Colonol Dekker]

Kharak is.............burning.

 


Nothing in HW2 compares to that. Especially after reading the civilisations history throughout the HW1 hardcopy manual.

I do prefer the Higaaran Interceptors though.

[Luis Dias]

I curse the poll for dismissing the brilliant Homeworld Cataclysm out of it. Couldn't care less about the rest. (I kid I kid)

[Aesaar]

I liked both, I first played HW2 then moved to Cataclysm and then to HW1.
I only regret playing Cataclysm, it was kinda bad.

This guy gets it.

Although I wouldn't call Cata bad per se.  Just a bad HW game, given that it ignored a great many things that made the HW1/HW2 atmosphere so good.  And gods were the new ships in it hideous.  Not even utilitarian ugly, just plain ugly.

And HW2's story has serious potential with some edits.  Still not what Dustwars might have been though.

[Luis Dias]

Funny, I really really enjoyed Cataclysm.

Perhaps it helped that it was my first HW game... but still the atmosphere of it was something truly remarkable. It wasn't "HW" per se, it was full Lovecraft, and that's probably why I like it more.

[MatthTheGeek]

HWC is the only HW I actually enjoy replaying.

The x8 time compression is a godsend for end-mission resource harvesting, and gameplay was very fun.

So, hatters gotta hate.

[Colonol Dekker]

The cutscene where the beast breaks containment and takes over the sub-levels...



CUT US LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSE!

[Phantom Hoover]

I tried playing HWC but the aesthetics just didn't work for me. It's a shame really, if you married Cataclysm's gameplay with 2's visual design you'd have something that could really match up to the original.

[MatthTheGeek]

Wait, there are still people for which visuals is a stopper ? In 2012 ?

What is wrong with you people.

[Luis Dias]

Bah, all he needs is a day where he can only play Pong.

[Colonol Dekker]

Not to encourage a tangent but.,.........

I imagine that anyone who says graphical quality is a showstopper if good gameplay is present does not often read good books.

[Fury]

I loved HW1, except for its lack of time speed control. That we got in HWC and it was a lot of fun, but otherwise gameplay of HW1 was better. HW2 had the poorest campaign of the three, can't really recommend it because of that. Give HW1 time speed control and it'd easily beat the other two on all fronts, except maybe modding.

[Ghostavo]

The cutscene where the beast breaks containment and takes over the sub-levels...



CUT US LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSE!

WE LIVE.

[crizza]

I would've loved to see the Cata storyline incorporated in HW2 though.

[Phantom Hoover]

Wait, there are still people for which visuals is a stopper ? In 2012 ?

What is wrong with you people.

"I mean really why are you fawning over the Mona Lisa? Aesthetic quality is for shallow philistines!"

Homeworld had ships which, whilst primitive, made excellent use of every pixel and polygon, using solidly-built models and carefully contrasting textures; and it had a very clean, minimalist interface. For me, at least, that was a big part of its charm. Whilst I am well aware of the folly of trying to impress upon you the value of respecting other people, can you at least understand that this isn't a simple matter of "EURGH it doesn't even have BLITMAPPING"?

[Scourge of Ages]

So Phantom, you just didn't like the design and style of Cataclysm then? That's perfectly understandable.

There were only a few ships I actually liked in that one. Actually, I think only the Somtaaw destroyer and drone frigate appealed to me.

[An4ximandros]

The Somtaaw Space Cake was an interesting take on a dreadnought-type craft. I like it, even if it is not as "aesthetically pleasing" as, say, the HigBC

[Aesaar]

I would've loved to see the Cata storyline incorporated in HW2 though.

I'm glad that didn't happen.  Cata would have been miles better if it had built on the Ghost Ship from HW1's Sea of Lost Souls instead of introducing a silly organic version of the Borg.

Oh, and let's not forget that a kiith of miners has loads of fancy tech that no one else has.  And the Bentusi became hateful towards anyone who wasn't part of their buddy club.  Gameplay-wise, supply limit encouraged just building one thing and nothing else, whereas HW1 and 2 had limits on each class type, encouraging diversification.  Energy cannons completely ****ed over the capship-fighter dynamic.  HW2, despite its failings, was much more faithful to HW1's gameplay, theme, and atmosphere than Cata ever was.  Which is why I say Cata is decent as a standalone.

I could go on, but I've had this conversation so much over the years I've gotten tired of it.  Have a search through the Homeworld series forums at Relicnews if you want to see.


As an aside, I gave up modding HW2 for exactly the same reason Matth did.