THQ embarks on digital distribution

By Robert Purchese Published 5 February, 2009

DOWII plus extras leads the charge.

THQ will be moving into digital distribution of its games with the launch of Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II on 20th February.

Fans can pre-order and download the RTS now for EUR 49.99 (GBP 43.90). An activation key will be sent just after midnight on the day of release.

To entice users away from Steam, where play begins a day earlier, THQ will offer exclusive in-game goodies.

The Artificer Wargear Set tops this list, and contains a Blood Ravens battle standard, a Scourge of Xenos heavy bolter, a Purifier of Tombs plasma gun, a Snarl of Wolf 'chainsword' and an Honoured Silencer sniper rifle.

There's a bonus Legis High Stratum multiplayer map, too, plus an exclusive Marauder chapter to order about. Rounding this off are four extra metallic paint colours: Platinum, Golden Purple, Metallic Red and Scaly Green.

The download technology is provided by digital distribution firm Metaboli, so everything should run smoothly. A spokesperson for the publisher told Eurogamer that Dawn of War II will be the first of many titles THQ will release this way.

Head over to our Dawn of War II gamepage for our extensive coverage to date, and expect a review soon.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (16) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Dizzy #1 3 years ago

    This could be great... sadly I can get DoW2 collectors on Play.com for 25% less money. Who is running these download services? Monkeys?

  • DFawkes #2 3 years ago

    GAME stayed at £35 for a couple of days. Then someone who wasn't a moron noticed that everyone else was selling it for £25 and dropped the price. Is not having to put the disc in £10 worth? I think not, and the download stuff isn't relevant as both Play and GAME give you something too.

  • lewiep #3 3 years ago

    Or you can get it for £22.99. Way cheaper than Steam.

  • hiddenranbir #4 3 years ago

    Um, does that say bonus content for first 100,000 only?!

  • Sunyavadin #5 3 years ago

    So not content with forcing us to log in to TWO third-party online systems to play it, they want to offer it through TWO digital distribution methods, which may require users who get it that way to log into THREE services for authentication just to be able to play?


    And yeah, I preordered my boxed copy, with extras, for £20.


    Anyone else miss the days when boxes came with all the COOL SHIT, like the Homeworld technical manuals? AND STILL COST LESS THAN THESE RIPOFF DOWNLOAD SERVICES?
    Edited by 1 at 05/02/09 @ 12:26

  • FooAtari #6 3 years ago

    When will they learn...

    They have less overheads with digital distribution yet charge significantly more than the shops.

    Fail.

  • RageBoy #7 3 years ago

    It doesn't help when the advert on this article is for Dawn of War 2 for £22.99 at ShopTo.

  • skillian #8 3 years ago

    @FooAtari: As far as i know, this sort of thing is usually the retailers' fault. They threaten to refuse to stock the game if digital distribution prices are significantly lower.

    Digital distribution has come a long way, but PC game makers aren't in a position to lose all traditional retail sales yet. As shops seem to be giving less and less prominence to PC games, hopefully the time is coming soon when devs/producers can tell briocks and mortar retailers to piss of and they can set the prices themselves freely.

  • Sunyavadin #9 3 years ago

    Well the simple solution there is to play up in the hard copy the peace of mind that comes with having a hard, physical copy. preferrably which requires NO ONLINE CONFIRMATIONS TO RUN.

  • TriggerHippie #10 3 years ago

    WTF is it with these idiots and their bonus content. They're just confusing the punters. You're fired!

  • rowsdower #11 3 years ago

    If you buy DoW2 at retail, it's just GCFs anyway and will install directly to Steam like any other Steam game. Save your money and buy retail.

  • Sunyavadin #12 3 years ago

    Exactly. Buying it online is simply pointless. If they're going to have us pay more online there should be a tangible benefit. As it is, I'd be happy to pay MORE for the RETAIL version, since I get the peace of mind of knowing that if their online verification system goes down I'm just a third party crack away from being able to play it. Paying LESS for this version, well, it's the best of both worlds.

    Leaving me with ZERO incentive to use their online service. Shame really.
    Edited by 1 at 05/02/09 @ 14:33

  • penhalion #13 3 years ago

    I like my solid media. Especially in these recession ridden times.

  • GreyScale #14 3 years ago

    There is a great benefit of buying digital - you don't have to get off your fat arse to walk to the door where the postman has just dropped it off.

    ...if anyone thinks of any other benefits, let me know please. Thanks.

  • skillian #15 3 years ago

    I like my solid media. Especially in these recession ridden times.

    If stuff didn't come one optical discs I might agree with you.

    But as our current storage medium can be scratched and forever ruined with a slightly overstitched cotton thread I tend to think most of these digital distro companies will last longer than your average CD or DVD.

  • sneetch #16 3 years ago

    @GenBanks
    I'm seriously confused now, they are making such a complete mess of their launch.

    Agreed, this is turning into an absolute joke, I'm seriously tempted to cancel my pre-order for this altogether at this stage, playing the MP beta didn't exactly "sell" the game to me: even with more units than they allow you in the campaign the tactical options in the game are somewhat limiting.

    If you buy it from the THQ download service, it will still be linked to your steam account right? Because it says on the THQ site that it requires a steam account to play.

    So if you buy it from the THQ website what is the point in downloading it from them if it's going to be on steam anyway?? After you give them your money, won't you just download it from Steam on all future occasions when you want to install it?

    I don't believe so, Steam will allow you to register it with Steam (baffling to see we need Steam in the mix in the first place as it's a Live game) but I can't imagine Valve would be too thrilled about providing downloads or patches for another games service, so I'd imagine you'd have to redownload from metaboli, log into Steam and Live and slowly go insane.

    And WTF are they thinking giving a multiplayer map as bonus content? Why split up the community like this?

    Aye, more insanity, a map you can play against maybe 1/10th of the community is worse than useless.