Developer: Westwood
Release Date: Out Now
RRP: $49.99, £34.99

I’m sure we all have fond memories of playing with toy solders in the back garden, spending hours lining the two sides up. Carefully positioning tanks and artillery, placing regiments of soldiers in a perfect formations and then standing back to admire your work. Finally to create a more realistic battle you lob a load of bangers on them and hide in good viewing bunker, (generally the kitchen window) and watch the mayhem, as bits of molten soldier get flung across three gardens and narrowly miss the Grumpy Old Mans greenhouse. Bugger missed it again! Ah those were the days, anyone have similar memories? No, oh its just me then.

The “Command and Conquer” series has been one of the most celebrated war strategy games that I have come across, but the unusual thing is, is its really as good as its hype and they keep getting better! Starting with the famous “Red Alert” (another brilliant result of the Cold War), you are given the opportunity to play as either, you guessed it, the Russians or Allies. The game play and story, if not a bit clique, defiantly made up for the games seedy graphics and oddly proportioned units. Giving the player the ability to create units and construct their very own base.	Buy from Amazon.co.uk!
This allowing you to eventually destroy any opponent with a wide range of vehicles and infantry. Finally the long awaited “Red Alert 2” then appeared in our high street shops, excellently improved graphics if not a bit “cartoony”, but not lost any of its superb game play and imagination. The story is similar, Russia attempting to invade America, but we soon forgot about the tiresome story due to the games detailed maps and new units. Now if you thought that Westwood had run out of ideas for a new Red Alert style installment, you would be right, they just decided to have a bit of an “up to dated” game for there next investment. Their new game mixes more modern issues with a lorry load of political incorrectness and a dash of…..China? Where did they come from?

Command and Conquer Generals is finally here after the stupid Beta that didn’t like my computer for some god forsaken reason. This game is astoundingly good, the graphics are awesome, the classic game play is as good as ever and they finally allowed you to build multiple working war factory and barracks!!!!! Now you can build several tanks, all at the same time!! (Depending on the number of factories and barracks you have of course). This time there are two completely different sides and Americans, they each come with solo missions and multiplayer mode. Obviously there is America, but the two new sides are China and a terrorist network called the GLA, hell bent on destroying the “western oppressors”, (America and China) and freeing their brothers. The Chinese are allies with America in the story when on solo missions.

Westwood have gone back to the first “Red Alert” for inspiration because when in playing against the computer in either story mode or in skirmishes they swarm your base with a constant stream of units in small groups as in the original. This can get bloody annoying at the beginning of the game when your attempting to establish a base but continues to p*** you off as they’ve made it hard to make a “bullet proof” base. But this just adds to the challenge of the game, as it was too easy in “Red Alert 2” to defend your base, just garrison all the surrounding building! Although they have made the game play a little harder, it should appeal to all the Command and Conquer die hards out there.

For those among us who judge a game on its graphics and appearance will find the maps and units in the game mind boggling! The maps especially, the amount of detail and how realistic they appear will make you forget about what you were originally doing, building a base and crushing all that lay in front of you. The opening menu is well thought out with a small battle scene constantly playing in the background setting an excellent intro for the game. But what makes this game so good is the little things that have been added like a little well maintained object of lust that you add small pieces to improves its performance or appearance. For example they've added a very useful function that allows you to rotate your camera position to see whose hiding over the edge of the hill or select units in those hard to reach places, rather like a back scrubber for the bath. One of the other tuning adjustments is a very close up and personal zoom ability, giving the player the ability to inspect the kool new units and admire the quality of graphics. The maps are what does it for me, they are truly awe inspiring, especially the solo mission ones, the detail and animation are superb.