Steam switch boosted Dawn of War sales

By Wesley Yin-Poole Published 21 April, 2011

New online matchmaking "a step up".

THQ's decision to ditch Games for Windows Live in favour of Steam for real-time strategy game Dawn of War II - Retribution boosted sales, the publisher has said.

"Going exclusive through Steam helped drive awareness with their millions of users by way of banners and message support so by the time we opened the beta up to all Steam customers, we had a huge number of people playing," THQ director of global brand management Georgina Verdon told the[a]listdaily.com.

"At the very tail end of the beta we partnered with Justin.TV and some of their top StarCraft players, who held several live streaming broadcasts of the Retribution MP beta and single-player campaign mode to a receptive StarCraft fan base. This hype and activity helped us exceed our digital pre-order forecast by 129 per cent."

Retribution is the standalone expansion to 2009's excellent Dawn of War II. Al Bickham micro-managed an 8/10 in Eurogamer's Dawn of War II - Retribution review.

Last year THQ announced that the game would drop the GFWL multiplayer platform for Steamworks – a move that pleased many players.

"The content of the game wasn't dependent on the online service provider," Relic producer Jeff Lydell said. "However, one of our goals when making expansions to our games is to address problems in the original.

"The combination of requiring both a Steam account and a Games for Windows Live account had been a source of frustration for many of our players, so we took the necessary steps to fix that. We also got to take full advantage of the Steamworks SDK features like cloud saving."

He continued: "The new online matchmaking experience is definitely a step up in many player's eyes. The new skill rating system gives better granularity on ladder standings, and makes it easier to see the changes in rating after a match. The Steam community features for organizing friends lists are all frequently used, and there are many groups with active users, as well the in-game chat lobby is always active with players.

"There was a lot of concern the move away from our previous expansion strategy would fragment the community. Looking at the numbers, it's clear most active players have moved over to Retribution, and the total hasn't gone down."

Picture of Wesley.

About Wesley Yin-Poole

Wesley is Eurogamer's news editor. He likes news, interviews, and more news. He also likes Street Fighter more than anyone can get him to shut up about it.

Read more articles from Wesley by visiting the Wesley Yin-Poole archive page.

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Comments (19) Latest comment 1 year ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • acare84 #1 1 year ago

    Steam rulez. GFWL is shit!

  • Sunyavadin #2 1 year ago

    Alas, retribution was the point at which I ditched DoWII in favour of the original DoW...

  • levitate #3 1 year ago

    All five people and their grandpa didn't have to do much because they were probably already using Steam anyway.

  • Headache #4 1 year ago

    Can we make sure that any other developer considering using GfWL is made to read and consider these comments before they continue down a path that only leads to frustration and complaints from gamers please.

  • patriot #5 1 year ago

    haha, is there anyone that actually likes GFWL?

  • Drygore #6 1 year ago

    I like GFWL...
    First of all, i havent had any issues what so ever with it. It works just as good for me as it does on my 360. Which leads me to my next point. As both a console gamer and a PC gamer i love the fact that i can earn achievements on both my 360 and my PC. I love that i can choose some multiplatform titles for my PC instead of my 360 (those that suits the PC equally or even better, plus they ALWAYS look better). In short: GFWL is probably best suited for people who also owns a 360 and are at least a little interrested in 360 achievements.

  • RodHull #7 1 year ago

    If it wasn't for the Live Achievements I'd avoid GFW like the plague. However Steam's not perfect and I still shudder at the memory of its shoddiness during the first few years of its release.

  • Dizzy #8 1 year ago

    What? No.. the new matchmaking is a bit of a mess and the ELO system (not made for team fights) is inferior to True Skill.

    Having a network dc during replays just kicks you out of the game now... great. Or what about permanent hangs when there is a "synchronisation error". For me it (network stuff) has been a massive step back... luckily the game is pretty good.
    Edited by Dizzy at 21/04/11 @ 12:31

  • subedii #9 1 year ago

    @Dizzy:

    Sorry but I cannot diagree more. GFWL's TruSkill matchmaking system was an abject pain, the worst being its ridiculous tendency to match up completely new players into high ranked games in order to "ascertain" their skill levels. It was ridiculous.

    I like DoW2 multi, but it was an absolute pain to play before they dropped GFWL. Almost all the games I ever played would end up with us either getting completely rolled, or completely rolling the opposition, all because of the completely flaky matchmaking (which was compounded by the fact that constant NAT errors forced bad team configurations).

    Since the switch to Steamworks, most of the games I've played, even the ones I've lost, have typically been far more closely fought affairs. And that genuinely makes the game more fun than it ever was previously.


    EDIT: And this is all before you get into the other major changes that came in the switch. Massively improved community system, proper chat support (as opposed to flipping e-mail exchanges when you want to correspond with people over GFWL), much better VOIP, even a community chat channel. Playing with friends is far easier and intuitive, and doesn't result in those constant freaking NAT errors. And heck, they even re-introduced custom badges now. This is a features that was available in DoW 1 but was forbidden from GFWL, and something that was brought back when GFWL was dropped.
    Edited by subedii at 21/04/11 @ 12:53

  • Davemanz #10 1 year ago

    Good to see Relic's games continue to sell well. They certainly deserve the respect and success. Here's hoping Space Marine doesn't suck and does well, so that we can get Homeworld 3 at some point in the future.

  • TormDK #11 1 year ago

    For the record, G4WL also supports cloud saves.

    I'm missing some features like the review option that G4WL offers, and the ability to block people in chat (Which really should be moderated or have a report feature).

    On a match making level I find that it's about the same. It takes longer to find games for me now than it did with G4WL and on a balance side of things the current rating system is about as bad as the TruSkill as I've whopped people with 1800+ rating while getting hammered by people with sub1K (I'm around 1500 in 2vs2, I don't do premades so it's all down to whatever partner I get hooked up with)

    *EDIT* Oh and

    "Sorry but I cannot diagree more. GFWL's TruSkill matchmaking system was an abject pain, the worst being its ridiculous tendency to match up completely new players into high ranked games in order to "ascertain" their skill levels. It was ridiculous. "

    Steam Matchmaking also does this, FYI. The first five matches or so you can end up playing against 1500+ rated people, often resulting in a steamroll. I tend to appologize if I end up doing it to end the match quicker, since I know that the newbie might not come back for more games due to it.
    Edited by TormDK at 21/04/11 @ 13:11

  • Feanor #12 1 year ago

    GFWL always worked fine for me on DoW II, but I don't blame Relic for switching to the more popular Steam.

  • subedii #13 1 year ago

    Steam Matchmaking also does this, FYI. The first five matches or so you can end up playing against 1500+ rated people, often resulting in a steamroll. I tend to appologize if I end up doing it to end the match quicker, since I know that the newbie might not come back for more games due to it.

    Five matches I can understand. Heck even BNet does that on occasion.

    When I first started out on DoW2 it took me something like 50+ matches to even come close to normalising, that is no exaggeration.

    But what was most annoying was the simple fact that in team games my team's skill ratings would be all over the place. The vast majority of my matches under GFWL, my match-made teams would almost always have one completely new guy on our side (or theirs. Or both). But looking over the skill values on the post screen matches now, having an actual spread inside a team is actually fairly rare. Opposing teams will often have different overall skill rankings, but in general I find it far rarer to be matched up with guys who are way above or below my level.

    Haven't played a in a while (Portal 2 and Dead Space 2 have been sucking up my time), but last I was online my ELO was something like 1400-1500 IIRC. About mid-rank ish. Not sure if that changes the situation somewhat. But in general under GFWL I found it extremely hard to advance any in the 3v3's. For every game where I had a decent selection of team mates there were two more where I'd be paired up with dudes who didn't know what they were doing, or against guys who were clearly way out of my league.

    The most annoying thing about those matches is simply the fact that new players never understood when a game was over, and insisted on never pressing the concede but when we'd clearly lost already and they just didn't understand that.
    Edited by subedii at 21/04/11 @ 13:25

  • TormDK #14 1 year ago

    Your G4WL must have behaved differently from mine then. G4WL places new people at TruSkill 25 in order for matches to happen so that placement can take place.

    ELO does the same, the only difference as I see it is that placements up and down move at a faster pace depending on your winning stream where as the TruSkill due to only having 1-50 takes awhile to move. But you still end up with odd matchings regardless so I wouldn't go ahead and announce a clear "winner".

    I'm finding it hard to advance currently also since there's still alot of randomness involved. I suppose I should get one of my mates to play (They only play SM) and while he got his placements done I would toy around with Eldar or similar to get the show on the road.
    Edited by TormDK at 21/04/11 @ 13:34

  • subedii #15 1 year ago

    I'm guessing it's all anecdotal.

    There's no real way for me to quantify what I'm saying. All I can say is that in my personal experience, I've been able to advance up the skill tree and find a comfortable spot far more easily than under GFWL. Under GFWL my experience was that there wasn't any comfortable spot, just bad matchups after bad matchups.

    I mean, under GFWL, having entire nights where I would get rolled for 7 straight matches due to dodgy matchmaking, that was a fairly common experience for me. It's also an experience I have yet to replicate, or even come close to replicating under the new Steamworks / ELO system.

    So yeah, if you never experienced that under GFWL, I can appreciate your sentiment. But I'm guessing you can appreciate my frustration after several nights of that, and what a relief it's been that so far I haven't seen anything like that since the switchover.
    Edited by subedii at 21/04/11 @ 13:42

  • Dizzy #16 1 year ago

    "Not sure if that changes the situation somewhat. But in general under GFWL I found it extremely hard to advance any in the 3v3's. For every game where I had a decent selection of team mates there were two more where I'd be paired up with dudes who didn't know what they were doing, or against guys who were clearly way out of my league.

    The most annoying thing about those matches is simply the fact that new players never understood when a game was over, and insisted on never pressing the concede but when we'd clearly lost already and they just didn't understand that. "

    TBH this is probablmy more due to the fact that the people playing DoW now are the hardcore players that are left and the few noobs have given up ages ago.

    If you look at the math behind TS and ELO, TS is the greatly superior system, especially for team games. ELO was invented for Chess and for 1v1 matches.

    Both systems, as implemented now, broaden their "level-search" as time goes by. This is an implementation specific decision and has nothing really to do with TS/ELO. So if you want a quick starting game, there is a big chance that you will be mismatched. If the dev chooses to match you up correctly (you might have to wait ages), TS will yield the better matchup and will give you a more accurate rating if you like to play team games.

  • subedii #17 1 year ago

    TS is based off of ELO isn't it? Basically it was designed to address some flaws in ELO when it comes to other XBL games.

    Similarly, the system currently being used in DoW2 isn't pure ELO, but is tailored by Relic for the game from what I understand.

    As for the playerbase, I couldn't really say. The biggest point of concern I had with the transition over to Steamworks from GFWL was that it would split the playerbase. But if we're going by what Jeff Lydell says in the actual interview, that didn't happen. Most of the multiplayer base simply transitioned over, and they still managed to grow the playerbase for the game in general.

    Still, as far as I'm concerned the improvements in 3v3 matchmaking might not even be due to the matchmaking algorithm at all, but simply due to the fact that NAT errors between players are no longer an issue, meaning that teams can be formed much better. This was a pretty big factor in why Team games ended up so skewed.
    Edited by subedii at 21/04/11 @ 13:49

  • TormDK #18 1 year ago

    The more I read about the TrueSkill system the more I like it, it seems to be the better system from a mathematical and real world point of view as the ELO system was designed for 1vs1 in mind. It's a shame Microsofts delivery mode isn't up to par with Steam currently, because that is what people seem to slam the most - the G4WL client.

    In any case, according to usage data there's still about 4K players that play DoW2 or CR on a daily basis, and about 9K that play Retribution. Meaning about ~30% of all daily players still hasn't hopped over.

    30% is still a pretty big devide. Prehaps Relic and THQ should consider giving the users on the older game versions an offer they can't refuse?
    Edited by TormDK at 21/04/11 @ 15:05

  • subedii #19 1 year ago

    Multiplayer base is separate from singleplayer.

    For that matter, You must be looking at different stats to me. The steam stats are showing that DoW2 / CR combined are maxing out at something a little less than 2000 simultaneous connections peak time at the moment. Even before Retribution came out, that figure was typically more in the 3000-4000 range, which is where Retribution's currently a bit above on its own by the look of things.


    EDIT: In genera between casting and leagues, the community has been quite a bit more active since Retribution released.

    5* General (project L2P, amongst other things) mentioned that in his own recent interview with Jeff Lydell at Game Replays:

    [link url=http://www.gamereplays.org/dawnofwar2/portals.php?show=page&name=interview-with-jeff-lydell&home
    ]http://www.gamereplays.org/dawnofwar2/po...[/link]


    -----------------------------------------------

    5*General:
    We feel Dawn of War 2 has the legs for it, so we really hope you can find the staff! The eSports scene for Dawn of War 2 has seen a lot of growth recently. Retribution sparked a lot of renewed interest, and with casts like Harlequin's and iCCup Dawn of War 2 Dailies joining DoW 2 Live's efforts a great many StarCraft 2 players have taken an interest in the game. As tournaments like the GameReplays Open Season meet with positive success, the scene definitely has some viability. Is this something Relic and THQ are interested in supporting?

    Jeff Lydell:
    Possibly, if the numbers of players are there. I personally love the renewed interest in casting and tournaments. And the balance team spends a lot of time watching what's going on.

    5*General:
    Honestly, it's all thanks to you guys- the game was in a scary state when vanilla Dawn of War 2 released, but between consistent balancing efforts and major feature overhauls like switching from Games for Windows Live to Steamworks, it's just a much better environment for eSports now.

    -----------------------------------------------


    Oh, and as a final edit, like I said, the system used in DoW2 isn't strict ELO, it's modified for RTS's. Most crucially is that they actually took their cue from Starcraft 2, which probably has one of the best matchmaking systems around when it comes to RTS's.

    You can read a little more about that here:

    [link url=http://community.dawnofwar2.com/blog-post/new-retribution-matchmaking-and-more
    ]http://community.dawnofwar2.com/blog-pos...[/link]

    The whole "Rest System" mechanic is likely a BIG part of why progression through the ranks to the right level is far easier in Retribution than it was previously when using TS skill rankings.
    Edited by subedii at 21/04/11 @ 16:25