Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War II

Dawn of War II Graphics

Being based on the Warhammer 40K universe, the general aesthetic and colour palette was already chosen long before Relic sat down to make a sequel. It was already established exactly what the different units should look like, from the jutting jaws and WAAAGH! banners of the Orks, to the gargantuan Space Marine armours.

That doesn’t stop the game looking good though, especially in this updated version of Relic’s Essence engine. From a pure design point of view the game looks as gorgeous as a party of lingerie models who’ve accidentally fallen into a vat of honey and found themselves... never mind. We’re going off track.

In order to gauge just how good Dawn of War II might look on your computer though we’ve got an overview of some of the most important graphical tweaks on offer in the game below. Check out the screenshots and see what you think.

Graphical Presets

For those who don’t want to start fiddling with individual settings and worrying about performance, Relic has included a Graphical Preset option to quickly alter other settings. It has four variations; Ultra, High, Medium and Low.


Capturing screenshots in Dawn of War II can be quite difficult sometimes as the game seems to change some of the weather and day/night conditions on the fly, to a degree. You can play a level one time and it’ll be pouring with rain, while another it’ll be sunnier than the disposition of a Prozac addict.

Still, on the Low setting the impact of this is definitely reduced and though we tried the same level three times on Low setting it was always broad daylight, as above. It also lacked AA, while texture quality also takes a noticeable hit when you’re zoomed in.

Fortunately though, the system requirements for Dawn of War II aren’t all that demanding, so most gamers shouldn’t have to dip lower than the Medium preset.

Terrain Detail

One of the cool things about Dawn of War II is that the large terrains are pretty complex. They have multiple routes through them, secondary objectives and hidden items to discover – and they’re also pretty detailed.


At a first in-game glance the Terrain Detail setting doesn’t seem to alter all that much. As usual though, first impressions are wrong – as can be seen from the disappearing foliage in these crop-downs. The amount of undergrowth and trees gets steadily culled the lower you push the setting.

At the same time, the complexity of rocky mountain paths is reduced. That means less shadows, less AA and less stuff to get blown around by your artillery strikes and grenades. It all saves the computer some extra strain, but it also means the game is getting a little bit sparser.

Again, it’s worth remembering that the system requirements for Dawn of War II aren’t that high, since the game is built on an enhanced version of the same engine in Company of Heroes. Maybe an upgrade is a good alternative to lowering the settings if you’re having trouble?