How about "two handed warhammers and axes aren't pole-arms"?
I imagine polearms to be weapons longer than a person is tall, meant primarily to fight in ranks primarily as an anti-cavalry weapon. what the it had at the end be it axe blades, hammer heads or odd shaped blades like the chinese Ji would be irrelevant for the purposes of whether its a polearm or not. The length would make it too unwieldly for anything expect thrusting or using the haft for blocking.
2 handed weapons would be much shorter, short enough to be effectively used in swinging and slashing strokes
Fair enough, but the question is whether PC Gamer was using "polearms" along those lines.
It does fit with Todd's comment that "spears in the classic sense" aren't in the game, but I still get the feeling that these "polearms" will behave pretty much like two-handed axes. :shrug: