Not me playing; I'd be losing.

The RTS world has long been enriched by the Command & Conquer franchise, and the Red Alert series in particular seems to enjoy proliferating itself in various ways. The latest off-shoot is a spin off from Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3, entitled Commander's Challenge, on its way to Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 in the next few months and bringing with a series of fifty challenges to test the might of the most confident players.

All the usual features of a major release will be in place, from a new bunch of the famed live-action cinematics to a range of new units, but Commander's Challenge is not as story driven as its brethren, instead presenting a "gauntlet" of fifty scenarios the player must complete one by one in order to progress.

Nine different commanders take the field against the player in the toughest battles the series has seen yet - including a face-off with 16-time world champion Ric “Nature Boy” Flair. Assuming you're good enough to run the gauntlet without throwing your control pad against the wall and crying like a little girl, you can test yourself against the world's best by taking on the developer's suggested completion times.

Available exclusively via digital distribution, Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 - Commander's Challenge has not received a firm release date beyond "Autumn" (i.e., Spring for those of us in the Southern Hemisphere), nor local pricing - but North Americans will be looking at USD $9.99 on Playstation 3 and 800 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360, which even factoring for exchange rates and a price hike still looks like a pretty great price for a purported thirty hours of gameplay!