There is nothing worse than a game that has all the potential in the world but due to one thing or another it just doesn't quite deliver. Unfortunately Universe at War: Earth Assault was one of these games; the game has everything - Soldiers, Aliens, Robots, and super beings - however they don't all mesh in a way that makes for a great game.

I find most of the best games have a simple storyline, "boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy finds girl" is a proven formula that has worked for years. In games it is generally "you have something, I want it", or "I've lost something and I need to find it". Universe at War: Earth Assault has a more convoluted story line. Earth is attacked by a planet destroying alien race - the Hierarchy - set on strip-mining the Earth for any valuable resources including organic life. The Hierarchy's weapons are far better than anything that humans have, so it is lucky that another robotic alien race, the Novus show up to help fight against the Hierarchy. The Novus were actually created for the sole purpose of fighting the Hierarchy by another alien race that was wiped out generations ago. Then enter the Masari, another ancient alien race who, after saving the Hierarchy many millennia ago, vanished and were believed to have died out, however they were living under Earth's ocean the whole time and had been influencing the planet as gods since ancient times.

Now - here is where it gets confusing. The Hierarchy attacks Earth. Lead by General Randal Moore, Earth fights back, saving the president and escorting him to a hospital. Moore is then are attacked by the Hierarchy's production walkers, which he has very little chance of beating. Luckily, just in the nick of time, the Novus appear lead by Mirabel, the only organic soldier in their ranks, who happens to be a humanoid female in a robotic shell named Viktor, which resembles something out of Robotech and has been ordered not to converse with the organic "humans" by The Founder. The Novus wage a war on the Hierarchy without the help of the humans, and eventually Mirabel ignores The Founder and talks to the humans, organising to use their combined force to fight against the Hierarchy commander Orlok the Eternal. Enter the Masari. Kamal Re'x The Abductor, the leader of the assault on Earth, focuses his troops as he goes on what can only be described as a power trip, wanting to be the one who finally wipes out the entire Masari race. Orlok the Eternal, the battle scarred Hierarchy commander, after watching all his soldiers being killed for Kamal Re'x's own self interest rebels and joins forces with the Humans and Novus, and now Masari. Orlok is then betrayed by his sidekick Nufai the Skinwalker, who goes back to Kamal and his troops. Kamal then kills Orlok, before the Masari go on to finally attack the Hierarchy forces with the help of the Humans and Novus.

Now if that isn't confusing enough, you actually play all of these races at different times during the single player game. Not only that, you switch teams, too! This was my biggest pet hate of Universe at War: Earth Assault: you spend the first few maps playing humans, then Novus, and then suddenly you are playing the Hierarchy under the leadership of Orlok the Eternal - fighting the races you were just playing. I found myself not wanting to attack the races I just spent time building up and getting to know. Eventually you do rebel against the Hierarchy force and you find yourself on the same team as your previous allies, but this really breaks the flow of the game, and makes it really clunky.

Earth Assault has many features that just don't seem quite finished and the world map that is introduced during the Masari campaign is no different, you find yourself with a large map, picking the locations you want to attack, but this is the only time during the game you can do this, and it only appears in the last third of the game. I found this unnecessary and all it really achieved was to make me wait 10 minutes before going back into the battlefield to play maps that were not nearly hard enough for being so deep in the game.

I also found that the units weren't quite as balanced as I would have liked, I discovered you could build an overly strong army by just using a couple of types of units. I actually finished the game sending in wave after wave of a single unit type rather than creating a diverse army to cover all my bases. I found this applied to all of the races played and I think it could have been easily prevented with some more play testing.

Technically the game looks up to today's standards for a real time strategy game, however like many games coming out recently it was riddled with bugs that caused crashes and lockups. I shouldn't have to play a DirectX 10 game in DirectX 9 just so I can get through a whole round without a crash - secondary to that, when I save a game I want to be able to play it when I go back to it, and I just wasn't able to on many occasions. There is nothing more frustrating the a game auto-saving at the end of a round only to lock up and wipe not only that auto-save but the auto-save that determines where you are up to in the campaign, I lost two levels because of this bug, but luckily one of my previously saved games did work so I didn't have to start from the beginning. Fortunately patches fixed many of the problems I originally experienced and the game now works quite well.

I'm sure by now you have worked out that Universe at War: Earth Assault isn't a masterpiece; however there are things I did like about it. Firstly it was the first game I have played that fully utilises Games for Windows and Vista, and allows you to obtain achievements points that go towards Live. I also enjoyed the gameplay overall, it just needed some balancing and maybe some better catch-phrases for the heroes: "Victory is over there!" just doesn't cut it when you compare it to some of the famous phrases from Blizzard and Westwood. I believe after a couple of patches and some good community feedback it could be a very successful multiplayer RTS. Each race has different strengths and weaknesses and after some balancing issues are sorted, it should be capable of competitive gameplay. I can only hope that they listen to community and make this happen, as without it I fear the game could go the way of the average RTS.


Universe at War: Earth Assault was a real mixed bag for me, there were some features about the game I liked, but due to the numerous bugs and the awkwardness of gameplay it really made it hard for me to enjoy the game. If you are looking for something to waste your time while you wait for StarCraft 2 then I would suggest giving it a go but if you are looking for the next great RTS, I suggest you don't say farewell to your Zerglings just yet, as this isn't it.