"War hasn't been this much fun since the original."

Back in 1995, Westwood wrote gaming history with the release of Command & Conquer. An instant classic, two sides fighting for their beliefs of right and wrong, high tech military weapons, an alien substance with unlimited potential, a mad but charismatic leader named Kane and one of the most memorable soundtracks ever for a strategy game. It did everything right.

Zoom forward to 2007 and EA is doing it again. And behold, the result is glorious.

Plot
The year is 2047. The war between GDI and The Brotherhood of Nod has died down, replaced with the growing concern about the unstable and out of control Tiberium, which is rapidly degrading earth into an inhabitable planet. GDI has succeeded in halting the growth to preserve various Blue Zones where Tiberium is either under full control or non existent and where it's safe to live, whereas Nod has been hiding in Yellow Zones ever since the aftermaths of the previous war. Believed to be decaying and no longer a threat, Nod is left alone. This proves to be fatal one day when Nod resurfaces and launches a major attack upon GDI and the Blue Zones. This marks the beginning of the Third Tiberium War, one that is about to get a third side joining the fray...

I must take my hat off for EA. They really did a good job with the story. The setup, the presentation, the flow of the story, the twists and turns of characters, fantastic stuff. Even the alien faction Scrin is presented in a way that actually works and doesn't feel tacked on, but instead they become a part of the Command & Conquer universe that feels like it belongs. However, the star of the show is still the basic conflict between GDI and Nod.

The story is delightfully played out by the actors who take their roles seriously and still injects some humor into it. Yes, Joseph Kucan is back as Kane, and to make it clear, he's every bit as awesome as he ever was. The other actors are no slouches either, major headlights includes Josh Holloway as the likable Nod Intelligence officer Ajay, Michael Ironside as GDI's Jack Granger and Billy Dee Williams as GDI Director Redmond Boyle. Williams portraits Boyle with an air of authority and power that is exceptionally fun to watch, he looks like he's really enjoying the part.

All in all, the story is alot better and easier to follow than the far out Tiberian Sun, takes itself alot less serious but maintains a high level of professionalism throughout the entire campaigns.

Gameplay
I'm pleased to report that this is the most Command & Conquer since the first Command & Conquer. The game is fast and furious, very easy to pick up and play and yet challenging because of the exceptionally well designed missions. Much of the units are back to what they once were, and Tiberian Sun seems almost wiped out of the existence. There's no signs of hover tanks, cyborgs or cheap Star Wars ripoff Mammoths anymore. Mammoths are now proper tanks with twin cannons and railguns, Infantry looks like infantry again and the battlefield is filled with closer to real life units like Nod buggies, attack bikes and flame tanks. All these things helps making Tiberium Wars becoming the most Command & Conquer since the first one.

Back to the basics is a word often used with Tiberium Wars. And that's exactly what it does. Unlike newer Strategy games like Supreme Commander, Empire at War, Company of Heroes and so on, Tiberium Wars makes it simple, but improves the original formula and perfects it, creating something that is exceptionally easy to pick up and hard to master. Each side is roughly built up identically, but each unit and building on each side still has it's own twist that makes the three sides so different. They also got their strong and weak points that makes them very different in tactics, but since the game attempts to generalize the layout of structures, tech trees and units, it's very easy to learn how to utilize each side. A fantastic layout that unlike many other RTS games makes it easy to learn the game.

Popups explain the usages of units and buildings, so that you can always see what the unit you're building is strong against. It lets you easily see if you got enough power and cash to build and uphold that structure without building it first or comparing your powerbar. You can also see what each building can upgrade, making it even easier to decide on the fly if you need that exact building or not (Going to use Mammoths? No need to build that Armory!)

Tiberium Wars has arguably the best interface in the series. Still using the sidebar, but now heavily improved to support multistructure and unit selection and building. It's faster and easier than ever to on the fly build exactly what you want when you want it without going back to your base, and have full control of it. Units can also be set to various degrees of attitude, everything from a hold ground attitude which keeps makes them stay within a small area and defend it, to aggressive pursuit which makes them automatically follow units who attack them. They can be ordered to move in various positions to utilize the units in the team as well, for example to reverse move while firing or keeping the heavy armor in front to take the heat. It all works very well, except for a few AI issues now and then.

As previously said, each side is vastly different in tactics, but pretty similar in layout. They all got their strong against infantry units, strong against vehicle units and so on, but the individual strength on the units are very different based on the whole of the faction. Very shortly, GDI is the powerhouse on land, Nod is less powerful head on but extremely deadly if utilized properly with their stealth units, and the Scrin has major air power.

GDI is basically the United Nation's Global Army. They have the technology, they have the power, the experience and they're well equipped. Unit versus unit, it is the most powerful side. A full scale attack from GDI cannot be stopped head on without major causalities, even if you attempt to stop them in your base with base defenses backing you up. Attempting to attack the GDI head on out in the field will usually end up fatally for the other side, as most GDI units are so powerful that they will win any 1 on 1 fight with a similar enemy unit, unless it's a Mammoth tank who can take out countless smaller land and air units alone. To put it this way, if you can gather up 10+ Mammoths, no base will stand afterwards. Heroic Mammoths can instantly kill many other Nod and Scrin vehicles, and just a few Mammoths can flatten any building or defensive structure in a short time. But Mammoths are not the only powerful unit GDI has. They have a fantastic long range artillery vehicle called the Juggernaut who can stay at safe distance and bombard enemy bases, very heavy infantry units like Zone troopers who can take out both Infantry, vehicles and structures easily and jet pack around the map(for example, straight into the middle of a base behind the defenses), decent air support with the help of Orca and Firehawk Bombers and other more typical standard units.

The GDI's weakness is that their air force is the weakest of the three sides, the high cost of their units and the ineffective base defenses. GDI excels when they're amassing Mammoths and Zone Troopers toward an enemy base(at that point, it can already be too late to stop them), but can suffer very heavily if they're taken by surprise something Nod excels at.

The Brotherhood of Nod is a whole different game than GDI. Nod doesn't have official funding like GDI to support their cause, but they got some very high potential if played correctly. Their units are weaker, can neither deal as much damage or take as much damage, but they're faster, cheaper, more versatile and they can stealth. They also got better Air Force. Not to say Nod doesn't have power, as their Scorpion tanks can do well against normal enemy vehicles and their Avatar unit can take quite abit of beating and can really turn the tide of the war. With the help of their fanatics, they can easily puncture many enemy attacks quickly and safely(especially if the attack doesn't include anti infantry), and their Shadow Teams can hangglide stealthed into bases and blow up buildings. It becomes pretty clear when playing the two sides that different tactics have to be applied. A well planned surgical strike from Nod can leave any well defended base powerless, which allows them to use their weaker units more safely. Nod has also a fantastic base defense, possibly the best of the three sides. Each defensive system is built up with one hub and three turrets. The turrets will automatically repair themselves if they go down as long as the hub is intact saving you alot of repaircosts, and confusing both players and AI's alike with four targets instead of one. The Obelisk of Light is as powerful as always, and a few of them can stop a small group of Mammoths. (Note, a small group. Any bigger group, 8-10+ is able to at least take out 3-4 Obelisks alone easily)

Nod's weaknesses have already been covered, they're unit versus unit weaker than GDI, and even 5-10 cheaper Nod vehicles can be crushed in a matter of seconds by 2 Mammoths before hardly touching them. As long as you can keep the other side in check and preventing them from massing up Mammoths, you can gradually wear out the other enemies. But if you see a group of 10 Mammoths heading your way, you better hope for a miracle. Even an atomic bomb detonated on your doorstep to stop them will ultimately cause your base to suffer less than that amount of Mammoths if they're allowed to break your defenses.

And finally, there's the Alien faction Scrin. I must admit that I haven't played with them much except for a few skirmish runs and their campaign, and they are certainly not my cup of tea. Most alike a combination of Protoss and Zergs in Starcraft, they're unit versus unit pretty weak, and they can't take much punishment. However, they got some pretty spaced technology, and they are superior in the air. Some of their Air units will simply take you down fast and ugly if you're not prepared, as they can stand out of range and take out any base defense unharmed. Mobile anti air is highly recommended against them, or once again, Mammoths. The Scrin has several other strengths. They're by far the best economical side, having buildings that directly increase the growth of tiberium to ensure they don't run out and no need for silos. Their units are pretty cheap, and their strength on the ground lays in numbers. They do got a very powerful War of the World type Tripod unit though. However, it is very rare to see a full ground assault by the Scrin as they will be slaughtered by a well set up base defense. So Air is the name of the game for them, which can soften up both defenses, vehicles and key structures. They got some pretty powerful shielding technology that can make their units invulnerable to harm for a little bit. They also got the single most powerful unit in the game, the Mothership. It is as powerful as it sounds, an extremely slow flying unit that has tons and tons of health. If it is allowed to reach whatever destination you send it to, it's game over. They also got some serious base defenses, both their anti infantry and their Stormspire buildings can take out any unit extremely quickly.

Their weaknesses are easily the very weak ground units. Except for their Tripods, they are completely overrun on the ground if facing GDI. Against Nod on the ground they're alot more even, but Nod will find it more bearable to fight them head on than GDI. While their most powerful attack air unit, the Planetary Assault Carrier can easily take out the best well defended base, they're taken down brutally easy by Mammoths or other mobile Anti-Air. This can be a serious blow to any Scrin assaults as if they are unable to weaken base defenses, they won't get far. The mothership is also not unstoppable, and their heavy base defense can easily be taken down by GDI's Juggernauts leaving them very vulnerable.

Phew. A long section this. It all sounds very complicated and like alot to think about, but that's exactly what the game does so well, with all the tactics, strengths and weaknesses it manages to balance it. Nod and Scrin is not supposed to let GDI turtle up and build an army of Mammoths, if they do they got nothing to stop it except their superweapons. But if GDI is halted, their power is shut down, their base defenses slipped past, they become very vulnerable. Both Skirmish and Campaigns demonstrate both the advantages and disadvantages of each side and forces you to redo your tactics.

The game is split up in various gameplay modes. You have the campaign which lets you choose a side and then follow the story on various missions. Then there's the Skirmish, and Multiplayer. The campaign is highly entertaining and fantastic well designed with some fiendishly tough missions. Not without it's faults though, some missions seem almost unnaturally hard compared to others, even early missions. One Nod mission is also partially based on luck and is very frustrating, and another GDI mission which has some of the hardest and most stressing moments in the game comes very early on and leaves too many players frustrated. These two missions could use a little fine tuning for a less frustrating experience, but other than that, the campaigns are excellent, and takes a long, long time. Some missions can be done in 10-15 minutes, others can become long slugfests for over an hour. Yet they never become boring and they never feel like the same. Most of the missions are unique and different as well, constantly giving you new challenges and avoiding the typical "Build your base and destroy everything" mission that plagues many of these games, and whenever those missions arrive they're welcome breathers where you can often slow things down and play it your way.

In Skirmish and multiplayer you can gather up to 8 players for a huge slugfest and prepare for some of the most intense battles in any game. It is an experience with very few comparisons. Since the battles are fast and furious, the focus is on the units and tactics and not overpowered superweapons and superpowers, it makes each battle alot more fun than Generals. If you're not feeling up for fighting humans yet, you can train against various kind of preset AI's, by choosing if you want them to be a turtler, a rusher and so on.

I must admit I have not tried multiplayer that much. Much because my primary focus has been the campaign and skirmish for now to get appropriate training, but also because the game has been somewhat unstable online. This will be improved through patches of course, and is in my opinion not enough to lower the score. All games can have bugs, all servers can have problems. Once EA fixes it and it becomes stable online, it will give ample opportunities to try it out more properly.

And luckily, you can no longer build up tons of superweapons like in Generals. You got one superweapon on a long cooldown, and it can be temporarily stopped by shutting down power. This goes along way to prevent extreme turtling. In fact, with the power of the Mammoth and Juggernauts(Base defenses just doesn't help and anything you send as unit at the Mammoth is killed), the Mothership or the ease that Nod can paralyze a base, turtling is alot more risky, and eventually a dangerous move that can brutally backfire.

All in all, Tiberium Wars is so exceptionally fun to play, with two great campaigns and one bonus campaign that lasts you a long, long time. It is generally stable although I have had a few crashes in Vista.

Graphics
It doesn't look quite as impressive as the initial screenshots would indicate, but it is a dream for any pyrofreak. Lasers, explosions, flames and rockets are flying all over the place, almost without ever dropping the framerate. It runs very smooth, even in Windows Vista. Units, structures, vehicles, environment, it all looks alot better than Generals. Infantry now looks good. The only complaint is that it can actually be quite hard to see your infantry at times.

The cutscenes are also of excellent quality. The briefings are top notch, sharp and rich in color. GDI has a blue, toned down atmosphere in their headquarters that fits with their more strict military scenario, while Nod is bathed in warmer red color that really radiates their aggressive attitude. Now and then you'll see some cutscenes that show various TV shows and interviews, these are all done with the type of look you'd expect, complete with interlaced lines for either nostalgic effect or to simulate a TV picture. This is intentional I think.

Sound
Well, to get it out of the way. The music is a far cry from Klepacki's work. You'll hardly ever find anything memorable. Not to say the music is bad in any way, because it's not. But where the C&C series had a fantastic combination between industrial mood and rock and Generals had a more traditional Hollywood score for each side with quite memorable songs, Tiberium Wars lacks either. There are times when you can hear traces of Klepacki's work, certain buildups in some of the songs where you can feel his presence, but just as soon as you hear it it disappears again. There's unfortunately no single track that stands out like the older games. Mechanical Man, Radio in the Night, No Mercy, Hell March, Trenches or Lone Trooper and so on..you'll find nothing in Tiberium Wars that compares. It's a shame, a big, big shame as part of the C&C feeling has always been the music, right up there with the action on screen. Not only in the background, but enhancing the battles and the tension.

Unit voices are good, but as always with C&C, pretty standard and free of humor. You get your military style voices from the units and it all sounds pretty convincing, but just like the music it fails to become as memorable as the older units were, like Tanya and the old Commando. The new ones are pretty good, but they doesn't quite sound as crazy as before.

One thing that has to be mentioned though, all honor to EA for bringing back the old death screams from the first Command & Conquer. It should give any nostalgic fan a kick each time they hear it.

Summary
There's not much to criticize in Tiberium Wars. The presentation is top notch. The game looks great, it plays great, it lasts a long, long time, the story is excellent, the actors are believable and it's always hilarious seeing well known faces step into the Tiberium War. Billy Dee Williams and Joseph Kucan are the two definite highlights. One should not forget the others as well, they're all doing a great job, each and every one of them. Skirmish and Multiplayer is fantastic fun as always, and the addition of A.I styles can make even normal Skirmish battles seem more like a mission instead of a generic skirmish. Scrin is amazingly well built into the story line, and well balanced too, both very powerful if played correctly and vulnerable as well.

If there's anything I have to criticize, it's that some of the missions are frustrating and could use a little toning down in order to make the campaigns a little more enjoyable, at least for ordinary players. The music is also not really memorable but it does the trick. That's about it though.

Who would have thought EA was able to turn Tiberium Wars into such a fantastic game? This one deserves nothing but praise. Grab yourself a copy, take a few days off to enjoy it and then start toning your skills in Multiplayer and Skirmish and wait for the almost guaranteed expansion. War hasn't been this fun since back in '95.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/02/07, Updated 04/03/07