It's always difficult to step back to a previous version. So, having tasted what the Dawn of War II beta had to offer, I'm doing my best to give Dawn of War: Soulstorm, the latest stand-alone expansion for Relic Entertainment's Warhammer 40,000 RTS franchise, the benefit of the doubt.Anyway, once you get into the game's campaign mode, you're presented with a view of the Kaurava system - four planets, plus associated satellites. This is the game's turn-based strategy map - a feature from the last expansion, actually, although this time spread over numerous planets (not that it's really any bigger in game terms).

The introduction, though, seems to think it wise to take this supposed justification, and spread it as thin as possible over several minutes. But by the time the Tau and the Dark Eldar wandered into the fray, the whole setup had become rather ludicrous (and yet oddly lacking in any moments of stock Games Workshop humour).The opening movie is inauspicious, to say the least. There is (in the typical manner of these things) perilously small justification for the Imperial Guard, Sisters of Battle, Space Marines, Orks, Chaos Marines, Necrons, Tau, Eldar, and - just for good measure - the Dark Eldar, all converging on one system to blow each other to smithereens.