Relic: Dawn of War 2 campaign more than 20 hours

Focusing on one race resulted in 'higher degree of fidelity'.

The Dawn of War 2 campaign will last gamers "more than 20 hours", developer Relic has revealed.

Only one playable race's campaign, the Space Marines, will be included in Dawn of War 2, the hotly anticipated PC-exclusive RTS. Although unconfirmed, it is expected that non-Space Marine campaigns, including the Eldar, the Orks and the Tyranids will be supported by future expansions.

PC developer Blizzard suffered a barrage of complaints from gamers for employing a similar strategy with upcoming RTS StarCraft 2, which will divide the single-player campaign into three separate products reflecting the game's three races - Terran, Zerg and Protoss.

Speaking to VideoGamer.com in an interview to be published tomorrow, associate producer Jeff Lydell explained its decision to follow Blizzard's lead, saying it allows the developer to pay more attention to the included campaign.

He said: "Really it comes down to how much focus you want to give to each campaign. If you're only doing one, you can give it more attention. We've seen a real trend where the games that focus on fewer hours are doing quite well.

"We have a fairly long campaign, as it turns out. We didn't expect it, but we ended up with more than 20 hours, as far as we can tell. But by focusing on one story with one race, you're going to be able to deliver it to a higher degree of fidelity - and that's what the audience ultimately wants. Good entertainment."

When asked about Relic's plans for non-Space Marine campaigns in future expansions, Lydell remained tight lipped, saying: "We're talking about that. We obviously know that the community wants to buy those races: it's the biggest question that we get asked whenever we announce our games: which races are in it, which races are in it?! The Games Workshop fanbase all love their own race, whatever it happens to be, and they want to see it done up in that form. So yeah, we're looking at it."

You can check out our hands-on preview of the game, which includes single-player and multiplayer impressions, right here.