World In Conflict

World in Conflict: Soviet Assault
$59.99
World in Conflict: Soviet Assault PS3

World in Conflict Collectors Edition
$29.99
After I first played Gun Gontrol some years ago, I was hooked on Strategy games. Then GC II totally cemented me into the RTS genre and now after World in Conflict, I'm totally captivated. The graphics/ sound effects are awesome, the missions keep you on your Ps and Qs and they keep flippin on you; so much so that you always have to be on the ball.

My only disappointment was that there were not more missions where one had full access to all weapons. When I played it for the first time I became familiar with the strengths and weaknesses of my arsenal at the end, by that time, the war was over. Darn!

But this is a great game! Well worth the money! and should be in the library of any RTS game fan. Sierra continues to excel!

Men of War
$29.99
I try to keep this brief and to the point.
First I LOVE this game. I was getting totally bored with Company of Heroes, my buddies and I had sort of mastered Company of Heroes and the only thrill was the point about ? into the game were the tide might (just might) change and make it a little more difficult to win. Don't get me wrong COH is a great game but for me the time had come to move on.
Enter MOW and I fell in love. First off, it does require micromanagement. Sometimes the controls can be a little wacked, sometimes the AI doesn't do what you want it to do.
JOYS:
ability to steal stuff of dead guys and use it.
ability to use opponent resources against them (hijacked tanks and other vechiles)

sound effects - when your machine gunner opens up on a crowd of bad guys and you here the drum beat of the gun and the bullets ripping through flesh and walls and ...

Graphics - I am playing on a high end machine and OMG it is eye candy heaven. Explosions that will have you saying "That was so cool!!!" and it was your own stuff exploding.
Load times - this game appears to have a LOT more going on with it than most other RTS in terms of physics but it loads up extremely fast. And shuts down extremely fast
Stability - I am running on high end Vista 64bit and ... I am trying to think... it has never crashed on me... never had a problem with the game.
OK now the BAD Stuff
CONS:
Voice Acting is really really really bad. But this is such a minor point for when comparing it game play value and it is only during the cutscene where it is really bad, in game it not bad at all.
Multiplayer - once you in a game it is cool. But it is a pain in the butt to buddy up with people. I wish the Multiplayer lobby was a little cleaner and easier to manage.
Single player is Brutal - I mean brutal even on easy, you are going to get your ass handed to you. Some levels you are there is just a stream of bad guys - they just keep coming and coming and coming. It gets a little frustrating but when you do accomplish the mission it is rather rewarding to know you `finally' beat that level.
TIPS:
Allowing your team to move at the own will, they will move - sometimes not where you want them to go. So use hold move. I usually use free move when I have them running across the map, this way if they see any bad guys they will open fire but once there, I switch to hold move.
Sometimes it is better not to fire and stay hidden.
Don't forget to grab ammo and health packs off dead guys - nothing worse than getting into a firefight and realizing your guys are firing because they don't have any bang bangs.
Wishes:
They had a skirmish mode where you could play the computer on equal terms
Hope this helps - Oh there is a demo for the game, so be sure to check out the demo before you throw down you hard earn cash to see if you like the micromanagement aspect of it. For the voice acting just turn down the volume during the cut scenes ;)

Universe At War: Earth Assault
$49.95
it's a fun game...but you can only play the first part offline...the other half is online. so i only can review half of it... because i have dial-up.

it's like spellforce with a whole end of the world twist. now i like rts's and rpg's so for me this was a great game... but many people say it's bad... but that's probably because they never played a good rts.

the graphics are great, the music is kinda cool, the gameplay is super easy, and the story is pretty good.

overall a really cool game... if you like waiting forever to play it online.

i recommend the spellforce series if you don't have the fastest internet known to man!