The Command & Conquer: Red Alert series has to be one of the longest-running popular real time strategy games that hasn’t been blessed by a Blizzard development team. Originally created by Westwood Studios in the mid-90s, the unusual storyline could only have been dreamed up by the last men standing at the end of a keg party, as they theorise over what would happen if history was turned upside down while trying to stand to make their way to the soft couch before crashing for the evening.

The original Red Alert posed the scenario where Hitler never rose to power, and Nazi Germany ceased to exist. Don’t celebrate just yet - this meant there was nothing in the way to stop Stalin from stretching his forces across Europe. Red Alert 3 takes this a little further. The Soviet Union creates a time machine capable of going back in time to 1927 to pay Albert Einstein a “visit”. With the pesky physicist out of the picture, the Allies’ technological superiority has been greatly reduced. The Atom bomb doesn’t exist and Japan has been left alone to advance its technology far beyond anything the Soviet Union and the Allies have ever seen and they’re intent on using it. Anyone who has seen Back to the Future Part II would know that travelling back in time can cause some huge problem with the space continuum, and this is no exception. Cherdenko and General Krukov return to the present to discover that it’s not just the Allies at their gates, but they now also have to fend off the Japanese from the East. They also discover that they no longer have the technical advancements that had been stolen from the Allies years previously to the current engagement, removing their most advanced weapon - the nuclear bomb - from the scene. Of course, if this storyline doesn’t suit your tastes you can also play the Allies or the Japanese to get a different perspective of the war. (The game does however recommend you play the Soviet Union first.)


Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 is the first of the series to feature 3D graphics and because of this, the traditionalists have been fairly vocal about the game having a different feel to the previous games in the series. However I found this not to be the case. Much of the gameplay felt similar to the previous games and excluding some more detailed scenarios, and much more detailed units they game felt like a worthy successor to Red Alert I and II. The environments were up to the level of most contemporary RTS, however compared to stand-out titles such World in Conflict, they still looked dated and unrealistic. The weapons performed as you would expect and most of you units where happy to attack when they were required. I didn’t have any time during the game when my units were having a tea party as their comrades were being attacked nearby.

The introduction of Japan into the conflict changes the way the game looks and feels quite a bit compared to the previous games in the series. I have been an avid player of the Red Alert titles, and although I have always thought that the storyline is ridiculously convoluted, I felt that the introduction of the Japanese units made the gameplay feel more like a Command and Conquer title rather than a Red Alert title. I won’t say that the addition of the Japanese was bad, however I didn’t enjoy it as the storyline didn’t mesh well for me. I couldn’t understand how a nation could suddenly move all these Mechs and hi-tech weapons without anyone noticing. After all, this is a nation without many natural resources set in the days of satellites - with the secret weapons that each side had, the factories that create these weapons would have been very, very hard to hide. Saying this, the storyline is already beyond far-fetched so I shouldn’t be too surprised.

There isn’t much I can say about the gameplay itself that has really stood out for me, If you have played Command & Conquer: Tiberium Wars you have a fairly good idea of what the game is going to look like and how it is going to play. If you have played any of the previous Red Alerts you have a fairly good idea what gameplay to expect. For everyone else, you can expect a RTS up to the same level as every other high standard RTS around at this time, and you can expect to mix it up between Mechs, tanks, planes, boats, infantry, bears, dolphins, and dogs.


By now you might have realised this wasn’t one of the stand-out titles for me. I’ve tried to enjoy it and I can see that a lot of work has gone into the storyline, but for me the single player mission is just a means to learn the weapons before you jump online to play against the real world. The ability to play co-op with another person in single player was a novel concept however I didn’t have much luck finding other people and the long waits for other players between each round took the fun out of it for me. This leads to my biggest issue with the game.

What is the point of having an online ranking system if you can’t use it? This is the first title I have ever played that actually got me to clean my room. That’s right - what else are you going to do while you wait for a broken bit of match making software to do its job. I have been counting how many times this has worked for me. I have played two ranked games in four days of trying. It has actually been quite good. I have had time to clean my desk, pat my dog, call my parents, wash the floor, even look out of the window (something I avoid doing). In fact, the only thing I haven’t been able to do is join a play a ranked online game. It actually makes me wonder why game companies keep using GameSpy. We have all seen game after game be let down when it comes to multiplayer because you can’t log in, your stats don’t update, the game drops out midgame, or no servers show up. Now we get to spend half an hour looking at a joining screen, waiting for it to work out if there actually is someone at the other end who wants to play a game too. These experiences plague other games like the Battlefield series, putting a bitter taste in many people’s mouths, and overall, it’s impacted negatively on my opinion of this title.


Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 single player is about what you would expect from the franchise. The storyline is suitably corny, and the gameplay will keep you out of the sunlight for at least a day. However, if you are looking to buy the game for a non-clan-related online experience to see if you are better than everyone else, you would want to make sure you have a duster and a broom ready. The only thing you will find yourself doing is dusting around your desk in the hope that those damn “Searching” stars will stop flashing and a loading screen will appear sometime soon. Or even a crash dialog box full of lines of gibberish, because that was a nice change too.