GameTavern - Savage 2 - A tortured Soul

So, I've been beta testing Savage 2 for quite some time now. But today is the day it's finally available for download/purchase.

Website:
http://savage2.s2games.com/

If you never played the original Savage, I'll explain the basic premise. There are two main factions, Humans and Beasts. They each have three free starter dps classes - each with their own unique abilities; they also have a free healing class, another (stronger) damage class that costs additional gold, and two (expensive) siege classes which are all unlocked as your commander builds technology (through the overhead RTS style gameplay). Either side has advantages and disadvantages. Humans main strengths are their ranged abilities - both with their damage classes and their healing class while Beasts have more melee centric charms and abilities. They balance very well.

Each team has a stronghold and it is your goal as a team to destroy the enemy's stronghold. One player on each team takes the commander role at the beginning of a match and assigns officers. The commanders role is to build mines on top of gold veins (providing your income), build various charm shrines and research facilities to augment your ground troops, and to use your Commander abilities to aid your team (heal, buff, debuff, resurrect, etc). The rest of the team plays a first/third person role - scouting, fighting, and destroying the enemy's facilities while defending their own. Officers (chosen by the commander) can give orders to their squad (groups of 5) and spawn portals on the map in addition to their standard roles.

The game right now is free to download with an online trial, it is free to play over LAN, and online play can purchased for a one time price of $29.99 - no monthly fees (they're also offering a physical CD 'Collectors Edition' for $20.00 more if you really want a hard copy). I'm fairly certain this will show up on Steam very shortly.

At any rate, I'm mighty psyched about it. I really like the game. It's come leaps and bounds through beta; I can honestly say I've never been in a beta where so much was accomplished so quickly (and I've been in quite a few). If you happen to buy it, be sure to say 'Lanwhim' sent you (my tag). I don't get much but we'll be added as friends in game automatically.