[The tactical analysis was written after playing in excess of five thousand bouts online of the original Tiberium Wars under various aliases]

“…and so it is that my thoughts turn to CABAL, that which was my creation and is now, in a way, part of what I have become. In the end, the AI’s legacy was little more than wanton destruction, proof to the heretics that I am nothing but the madman they claim me to be. Yet, deep within that AI, within its very conception, there lies a spark, a light, a sign.

There is something there, something hidden, something…great. I must think more on this”

- Kane

Kane’s Wrath recounts the tale of the Prophet’s slow and painful recovery from his defeat at the hands of GDI and McNeil in a campaign spanning the decades from 2034 to 2052, functioning as both a prelude and an epilogue to the events in Tiberium Wars. You can’t keep a good villain down and the tenacity and unflinching self-belief of the defender of the downtrodden and dispossessed assume truly breathtaking proportions (in a less apocalyptic setting, the only audience Kane would find for his self-aggrandising fulminations would be fellow patients in a mental home, no doubt vying for their medication-dazed attention with a Napoleon or two).

Single Player Mode

Campaign

Synopsis

[Plot spoiler alert!]

With Nod hopelessly splintered into rival and mutually antagonistic sects, Kane sets about engineering his ascendancy with the patience born of absolute conviction in his mission. Weakened and wary of alerting GDI to his existence before his power has been fully consolidated once again, nobody is fully apprised of his plans, not even his most trusted disciples. Truly, the Prophet moves in mysterious ways…

Kane loyalist to a fault, Alexa Kovacs (played by Natasha Hendstridge) acts as the commander’s guide through the missions (the Prophet always did have a soft spot for attractive blondes). Kovacs was orphaned in what would become the Central African Red Zone. After surviving over a year alone in the burnt-out remains of her parents’ homestead, Alexa was discovered mute and near-starving by a patrolling group of Nod scavengers. Her piety coupled with her gift for cybernetics and AI led to her enrolment in the Nod Academy. Following graduation, her talents and religious devotion were recognised and she was quickly enlisted to work on the LEGION combat-AI project as an Abbess at the side of Kane himself.

In parallel with the quest for the ultimate AI killing machine, regaining possession of the Tacitus from GDI is Kane’s ultimate goal, as the alien device contains within it the key to Ascension. Unfortunately for the Brotherhood, however, it is kept secure in the Cheyenne Mountain Complex.

Until he has gathered sufficient strength to announce his survival to the world, a figurehead must be found to rule in Kane’s stead. At this juncture, we are introduced to charismatic orator Brother Marcion (Carl Lumbly, whose superb performance in an all too brief cameo leaves the viewer wishing that the production team has taken a little more trouble to flesh out his character), former leader of the Brotherhood’s religious wing, charged with spreading the gospel of Nod. His faith faltered, however, and he turned his back on Kane when the losses sustained during the Second Tiberium War became catastrophic, denouncing the prophet as a charlatan and withdrawing into the Australian outback.

Marcion was not alone in his disillusionment: his celebrated rhetorical skills and deeply ascetic lifestyle won him many devotees in what later came to be known as the Yellow Zones. Within a year of his break with Nod, Marcion had organised his followers into a disciplined theocratic army – the “new” Black Hand, dedicated to disseminating the “truth and purity of the Tiberium prophecy”. According to unsubstantiated rumours, Marcion may have been corrupted by GDI, exploiting the one chink in his impressive armour: his vanity.

With typical callous disregard for the lives of his foes (he proclaims that he will bring unity to the unbelievers, which he specifies as meaning “Unity in the arms of the Brotherhood, or unity in death”), Kane quite literally explodes back onto the international scene and the commander discover that he is not what he might have assumed himself to be…He is Legion and the Prophet himself sends him into a deep slumber.

Twelve years elapse before Legion awakens, its services required. Kane has successfully duped GDI into complacency concerning the threat posed by the Brotherhood and has devised a strike that will leave his enemy crippled, hinging on the theft of the Ion Cannon Network plans. Devious as ever, the Prophet has already determined that Redmond Boyle, whom he holds in justifiable contempt as an inept politician “as greedy as he is vainglorious”, should be appointed President by default, everyone in line for the post ahead of him having perished in the Philadelphia disaster.

Even the Brotherhood resurgent continues to be riven by internal dissent. Alexa suppresses her grave doubts about Legion out of allegiance to Kane, yet fails to conceal her jealousy-tinged loathing of Kilian Qatar, whom she despises for having wormed her way into his confidence (Kane praises Kilian as a military asset, author of the Philadelphia’s demise), for looking at the Prophet as if she were his equal. Although she would gladly shoot Kilian herself, Alexa claims that Kane has a more elegant solution that will expose her treachery without alienating her supporters. Legion is charged with the task of attacking Temple Prime in the guise of Kilian, committing an act of unpardonable treachery.

We learn that Alexa’s aversion to Legion is no mere irrational prejudice, but the result of the trauma of having seen her parents murdered by cyborgs under the direct control of CABAL. Like many of her fellow believers, Alexa feels dismay at Nod’s reliance on “soulless machinery”.

With Temple Prime razed to the ground and Kane presumed dead, Kilian assumes control of Nod. Alexa is astonished to learn that the Prophet has once again escaped unscathed, GDI having fallen for his ruse. Boyle, with the limited imagination Kane had attributed to him due to his chosen occupation had done exactly as predicted and was now being lauded as a hero, having eliminated Kane. To entice the Visitors to Earth, Kane sets off a chain reaction by firing the Ion Cannon.

Alexa dispatches Legion to Kampala, Uganda, a Yellow Zone in which the Scrin are using insidious mind control techniques to bend the populace to their will. She urges Legion to eradicate the invaders and defend the cities.

In the meantime, it emerges that Legion is far more than a mere neural network, that its designs originated from the Tacitus and that a unique bond exists between AI and artefact with the cyborg attuned to a signal emitted by the relic that nothing else can pick up.

Again, Kovacs voices her misgivings about Legion, afraid of its potential to evolve into something obscene when coming into contact with the Tacitus. She reveals the source of her discomfort, the cyborg army’s massacre of the innocents, praying that she will be proven wrong.

Legion ambushes the convoy evacuating the Tacitus by sea and upon return to Nod Headquarters Alexa introduces a virus into its system, refusing to usher in an age of machines and to be enslaved by them. Kane intervenes in the nick of time, ordering Kovacs’ interrogation as Alexa admits that she had instigated the attack on Temple Prime to prove to the Prophet how dangerous Qatar was. Kane is aghast to hear that Kilian, whose execution he had decreed, had not betrayed him after all. Alexa snatches a gun, which she aims at the Prophet before committing suicide.

When Legion is next aroused it is 2052 and Kane charges his AI progeny with the task of activating the Marked of Kane, a half human, half robot army, summoning them forth from their concealment in bunkers whilst GDI labours under the misapprehension that Nod has been definitively routed. The Prophet’s reluctance to place confidence in human beings whose fallibility and unreliability has been all too graphically impressed upon him makes sense against the backdrop of the disappointments he has endured. Kane reserves his most tender affection for his cyborgs, which, freed from the burden of autonomy, represent the living manifestation of his will, embracing a servitude they cannot perceive as such.

The Tacitus is tantalisingly within reach, having been tracked to GDI’s heavily fortified compound in the Rocky Mountains, secure behind an impenetrable wall of energy. Legion must raid the base, capture its communication centres and bring down the barrier before finally claiming the prize.

“Our fortitude was rewarded,” Kane smiles as he lays hands on the dangerously unstable Tacitus. Legion must fulfil its destiny and with it that of the Brotherhood by stepping into a wormhole, the planets of the solar system flying past at mind-numbing velocity…

Assessment

The campaign competently introduces the player to the new units and factions, which constitute the distinguishing feature of the expansion, seamlessly incorporating them into the narrative. The epic sweep of the storyline lends greater credibility to the effort, filling in some of the gaps and adding new twists into already familiar episodes (such as Kilian’s “betrayal”). My one quibble would be that the repetition smacks of lazy recycling of maps.

Whereas restricting the campaign to a single vantage point, that of Nod, as indicated in the title, does not amount to a fault in itself, putting in a little more effort (not synonymous with overloading it with extraneous detail) would have pleased not only the fans, but set it apart from its rivals. Personally, I enjoy the format with the cut scenes, the signature of Command and Conquer. In order to be able to compete with the gorgeous graphics of, say, Universe at War, however, the team ought to have played to the series’ strengths, the characters and back story, rather than assuming that every player has the attention span of a newt (no offence to amphibians hereby intended). More of Marcion would have been a bonus, or more information about Generals Mitchell and Renteria beyond a few cursory paragraphs in an in-game intelligence briefing. In many respects, Tiberium Wars has proven something of a let-down (the clearest demonstration of dissatisfaction the relatively modest number who play it online – in essence split into one of two categories, pros and noobs with precious few in-between) and Kane’s Wrath could have hauled it up out of the slough of despond by the bootstraps, but instead creates the impression of a half-hearted compromise.

New Units and Structures

GDI Units

Hammerhead

With very few exceptions, GDI commanders have shunned the Orca because of its relative ineffectiveness compared with the Nod Venom, notably its limited firepower and inability to retaliate against air attacks, preferring the more expensive Firehawk.

The distinguishing feature of the Hammerhead, a “direct descendant of the assault/transport hybrid attack choppers of the 20^th century”, is its massive supply storage capacity, allowing the aircraft to operate in the field for days at a time without needing to either refuel or rearm. Moreover, it can carry a Rocket Trooper, Rifleman or Zone Trooper Squad for extra protection (and ZOCOM can kit it out with ceramic armour), but its passengers will only open fire on targets on the ground.

Slingshot

Fast yet fragile, this anti-air hover vehicle is reminiscent of the old Hover MLRS (and the GLA Quad Cannon in Generals), except that it cannot target anything on the ground. With the Tungsten Shells upgrade, the Slingshot really does become a formidable opponent. Leaving a handful scattered about your base for defence purposes is a prudent course of action, preventing sneaky engineer drop offs when you are distracted in the heat of battle elsewhere on the map. Similarly, the presence of a few Slingshots in an attack force is only to be recommended, especially since it is less susceptible to Ion Storm interference than its ancestor.

Shatterer

I suspect that most players will refer to this vehicle by the more mundanely descriptive term Sonic Tank…Like a mobile Sonic Emitter it floats safely above the crystalline deposits on its cushion of air (the pleasing attention to detail prominent in the original game continues here, with dust clouds billowing beneath it when stationary). So slow that it could be overtaken by your average snail, the Shatterer is not suited for pursuit and needs to be accompanied into the conflict zone by a substantial force. If a radar scan reveals that the enemy has been careless in defending his base, airlifting in three Shatterers (or, even better, asking an allied Prodigy to teleport them) to the back might pay dividends, as its blast of sound waves quickly reduces buildings to rubble. Even if such a blow does not cripple the enemy permanently, it nevertheless has a value as a diversionary tactic.

M.A.R.V.

“Size matters”, boasts the Mammoth Armed Reclamation Vehicle as it emerges from the Reclamator Hub and indeed it is truly breathtaking to behold, completely dwarfing the Mammoth Tank. As if its standard weapon were not enough, the MARV can pack an even bigger punch if its full capacity is exploited. Sending a Rifleman Squad aboard equips MARV with a Gun Turret; an Engineer enables it to repair itself; Grenadiers provide a Grenade Launcher; Snipers a Nest for swift dispatch of hostile infantry and Zone Troopers a Railgun Turret. Friendly forces that in their bloodlust are foolish enough to stray across MARV’s beam will be cut down indiscriminately.

Originally the pride of ZOCOM, MARV can fairly vacuum up Tiberium and as it trundles inexorably toward the enemy base it can siphon off resources, depriving the foe of vital supplies for their war effort. Likewise, once said base has been wiped off the face of the earth, any remaining Tiberium can be appropriated.

MARV’s armour is virtually impregnable and the gigantic tank can be most easily put out of commission by a mixed force of Avatars, Rocket Squads and so on. Venoms alone are completely useless against it. I had 58 blasting away at it with laser upgrades and they were barely scratching the paintwork for what seemed like an eternity.

MARV (and the epic units for the other sides) can effortlessly run over Avatars and Mammoths, grinding them into the dust beneath its tracks.

GDI Structures

Reclamator Hub

The Hub’s primary function is to construct the MARV, but it also operates as a subsidiary War Factory, complete with repair drones.

GDI Support Powers

Sonic Repulsion Field

One of the most cowardly, irritating and commonly employed tactics online involves an engineer being ferried into the heart of your base in an APC to capture key structures, the Construction Yard naturally the most favoured target, although anything with a build area will suffice, as a barracks can then be placed to send battalions of his fellow schematics wizards to seize everything in sight, along with defences to thwart or at the very least slow down your struggle to regain control. The Defensive Sonic Field was clearly conceived as a means of frustrating such ploys, as the Engineer cannot pass through it, nor can Shadow Teams (the Shadow rush being another perennial favourite) plant their explosives on it.

However, in spite of its cost not being prohibitive (and it is certainly cheaper than a network of Watchtowers), as any veteran will attest, in most online tussles the focus tends to be on the fastest of the fast victories using the cheapest of the cheap units and the most underhand stratagems, which means that purchasing the field during the earliest possible stages (when it would be most advantageous to do so) becomes a risk to be weighed up carefully, undermining its utility.

Supersonic Air Attack

This support power is self-explanatory: several elegant delta-wings (a bit like Concorde on testosterone) perform an air-to-air strike against enemy aircraft.

Orbital Strike

A souped-up version of the Shockwave Artillery preceded by a laser-targeting beam, devastation rains down from the heavens, crushing any vehicles unfortunate enough to be assigned to guard duty at the time.

GDI Support Structures

Combat Support Airfield

Four handy additional pads repair and rearm GDI aircraft that limp home from their engagements the worse for wear. Not to be outdone, Nod has developed an identical structure (only the Black Hand have declined to avail themselves of this back-up).

GDI Upgrades

AP Ammo

A must for increasing the damage of all gun-based units, the bullet-spitting Watchtower’s performance is considerably enhanced by it.

EMP Grenades

Grenadiers hurl EMP grenades to disrupt the adversary’s forward progress (although this is not available for the Steel Talons), at least in theory. Thus far, I have spent my thousand credits on duds, an issue that urgently needs to be resolved in a patch…court martial those sloppy GDI logistics officers!

Hardpoints

These permit GDI aircraft to carry more missiles (but, logically enough, are not available for ZOCOM, whose Orcas make use of sonic as opposed to conventional shells).

Tungsten Shells

Apart from the boost this gives to the Slingshot, the Tungsten Shells convert the relatively feeble AA Turret to an AA Battery.

Nod Units

Harvesters

Following the same philosophy as conventional GDI, the Brotherhood has not seen fit to outfit its Harvesters with any deterrents to safeguard the vital uninterrupted cash flow. Indeed, Black Hand harvesters eschew the traditional stealth technology.

Reckoner

Nod’s answer to the APC (and the GLA’s Battle Bus in Generals), the Reckoner conveys troops to their “Final destination”. Despite its bulky and cumbersome appearance, the troop transport can outpace a Scorpion and be fitted with Dozer Blades to shred even the most resilient battle armour. As it can deploy only once, the shrewd commander will choose its set down spot carefully (it automatically digs itself in after suffering sufficient damage, but cannot be repaired). Once it has hunkered down, it can accommodate one further infantry squad, but be warned: until it has planted itself the soldiers on board can only plug their ears at the noise of the impacts or wipe their sweaty palms on their fatigues. Its transformation complete, it can neither be cleared like ordinary bunkers, nor targeted with explosives.

Spectre

Pilfering the GDI Air Corps’s catchphrase from Tiberian Sun “Death from above!” Nod’s Spectre stealth artillery tank alternates between two modes, nifty and invisible to the naked eye (except for those recruited to serve with the Black Hand, whose belligerent ethos leads them to eschew hit and run strikes in favour of full-frontal assaults), allowing it to slink behind enemy lines and revealing its whereabouts whilst launching its payload. When paired up with a Shadow Team, its range can be extended in a manner analogous to the GDI Juggernaut-Sniper collaboration, with the hang-gliding Ninjas infiltrating a base, placing an area bombard beacon and retreating to a safe distance. As the beacons cannot be deposited directly on a structure some care has to be taken over their exact positioning.

The Spectre is not only so nippy that it can run rings around the more ponderous Juggernaut, but has the further virtue of more than adequately compensating for Nod’s helplessness in a stalemate/siege situation where the GDI commander could sit back, relax and smugly savour the carnage from the safety of his highly fortified headquarters whilst the massive walkers fire lethal salvoes at will from behind a wall of Sonic Emitters, relying on his massed Predators and Riflemen to pick off Nod forces in the latter’s increasingly desperate attempts to break through.

The Redeemer

After Legion’s forces ambushed and eliminated the MARV during a pitched battle in the central African Red Zone, Nod’s scientists were able to pore over its blueprints and put together an appropriate response, equipping their mech with a tri-part laser and a Rage Generator, which unleashes a burst of subliminal waves to daze the enemy combatants into turning against each other.

“They are like ants” the Redeemer sneers contemptuously at its foes and the awe-inspiring sight of the four-legged robot being released from the scaffolding necessary to hold it steady during construction would surely suffice to convert the most obdurate of heathens. Snapping its puny shackles like King Kong on the New York stage, the Redeemer sets off on a killing spree, burning with the religious zeal of the Inquisition, ready to liquidate all those foolish enough to refuse to “Heed the Word!”

Unlike the MARV and Eradicator Hexapod, Nod’s ultimate war machine can only accommodate two add-on pods, the Confessor Cabal supplying a Gun Turret; a Rocket Squad a dual-purpose anti-air and ground turret; a Black Hand contingent a Flame Turret and a Saboteur carrying out instant repairs. Its other distinguishing characteristic in this respect is that it cannot gather extra resources from the battlefield.

Redeemer Engineering Facility

This pyramidal structure also doubles as a War Factory for standard vehicles with the repair drones to match.

Nod Support Powers

Laser Fencing

Homologous to GDI’s Sonic Repulsion Field, the fence can withstand quite a severe battering before shutting down.

Redemption

Reluctant ever to loosen his grip over those who serve him, Kane’s delusion of messianic status coupled with his scientists’ mastery of cybernetics has resulted in the ability to quite literally raise the dead, prolonging their enslavement beyond the grave. Any militants who lay down their lives for the Prophet upon the hideous, heaving, veined soil bearing an uncanny resemblance to putrefying flesh will be resurrected as Awakened, part men, part machines, yet stripped of all genuinely human attributes.

Tiberium Vein Detonation

Underground charges explode to shatter the precious crystals in an act of wanton vandalism that snatches away the opponent’s resources whilst simultaneously blowing up any Harvesters on the patch and demolishing (or at the very least inflicting serious damage on) refineries and other nearby buildings in a satisfyingly spectacular chain reaction.

Nod Upgrades

Disruption Pods
Vertigo Bombers drop stealth-emitting pods to conceal units from enemy view before smuggling them into the heart of enemy territory.

Quad Turrets
Trying to slow down an enemy incursion into a base or rid it of unwelcome intruders has always been tricky for the Nod commander as, irrespective of affiliation or uniform, the trespassers seemed to share one common trait: their uncanny knack for walking all over the precise spot where you want to place your hub causing a potentially highly detrimental delay.

My initial reaction to the upgrade was therefore tinged with dismay until I tried it out and observed that the extra turret sprouts from the hub itself.

Tiberium Core Missiles

Infusing warheads with the volatile crystal, the Tiberium Core imparts an eerie emerald glow to the weapons carried by Attack Bikes, Stealth Tanks, SAM Turrets and, for the Black Hand, Mantises, substantially enhancing their effectiveness.

Nod Support Structures

Voice of Kane

In similar vein to the Chinese propaganda speakers in Generals, this elegant graven image of the Prophet relays his sermons to the faithful on the brink of martyrdom, His uplifting words whipping them up into a frenzy of fervour, their spiritual strength translated into heavier armour and with their hands no longer trembling at the prospect of imminent death their re-load rate is also accelerated.

In equal measure to the succour it gives His followers, the sound of Kane’s dulcet tones saps the courage of his adversaries, inducing them to crawl along the ground on their bellies for cover like the miserable worms they are.

Scrin Units

Ravager

Its fleetness of foot ideally suits the shard-spewing Ravager infantry to execute hit and run raids on Harvesters, all the more so since they positively thrive on Tiberium deposits, which heal their wounds. The crystal provides them with sustenance and their intuitive understanding of its properties has endowed them with a special gift, that of Tiberium Agitation. Three or four squads can blast a Refinery apart in the blink of an eye as the Ravagers’ rays cause the harvest to vibrate until it becomes a volatile liability rather than an asset.

Mechapede

If you were to find a miniature one of these gross millipede-like creatures crawling around in your bathtub, you would be best advised to call in pest control immediately. Boasting more legs than a stageful of can-can dancers at the Moulin Rouge, the Mechapede is a truly slippery customer, snaking its way around the map in perpetually restless motion, driving enemy commanders to distraction as their units miss the target again and again (the lobbies have been brimful of players lamenting how it is impossible to stop it in its grotesquely multiple tracks, so a hint for the desperate: the Mechapede cannot squash infantry and does not react well to splash damage – Rocket Squads and Photon Cannons with Shard Launchers soon make them cease their wriggling. In extremis a Redeemer, MARV or Hexapod will likewise do the job admirably).

Diminutive and low in health when it re-materialises through the Warp Sphere, a maximum of eight further elements may be spawned from each Mechapede head section: the Disintegrator Segment is most deadly against vehicles and structures; the Disc Segment against air and the Toxin Segment against infantry as well as to patch up allied Scrin units. The foreman should gauge on the basis of reconnaissance whether to mix and match in individual Mechapedes or send in several, each with complementary abilities.

The Eradicator Hexapod

Lumbering over the battlefield, the Scrin’s harbinger of mayhem tosses its head to emit a blood-curdling roar guaranteed to strike terror into the most battle-hardened veteran. A mobile life form recycling system, the Eradicator Hexapod takes the injunction “waste not want not” to heart, salvaging enemy units obliterated within its radius in the form of extra resources. Like MARV and the Redeemer, the Hexapod can be garrisoned: Disintegrators fit it with a Laser Turret; Shock Troopers an AA Disc Turret; Ravagers a Shard Turret, an Assimilator can take care of maintenance whilst a Mastermind/Prodigy can teleport it (though not over enormous distances as it would otherwise be only too simple for a GDI ally to uncover the back of the enemy base and instantaneously transport the Hexapod

Warp Chasm

Analogous to the Reclamator Hub and Redeemer Engineering Facility, it too has repair drones and can produce standard vehicles as well as the Eradicator Hexapod.

Scrin Support Powers

Tiberium Infestation

Brisk and efficient resource-gathering has always been the key to victory in the Command and Conquer universe and the Scrin have resorted to sabotage to slow their adversaries down. A Tiberium Hive is positioned over the open vein scar in the same way as a conventional Growth Accelerator, a swarm of vicious buzzers dealing out damage to all the units coming within their range (light tanks are particularly susceptible to their slashes). The only drawback is the hive’s relative fragility (Attack Bikes for example can easily blast it back to its native dimension whilst remaining unscathed).

Ichor Seed

When the enemy digs in and puts up fiercer resistance than anticipated, a Tiberium boost can turn the tide in the player’s favour. Given their voracious appetite for the crystal, it is hardly surprising that the Scrin have a back-up for when the Growth Accelerators’ replenishment rate simply does not suffice. A green beam descends, like manna from heaven, seeding a small Ichor field to nourish the invasion force.

Overlord’s Wrath
Not quite an extinction-level event, but enough to leave a trail of destruction comparable to Tunguska, Tiberium-saturated asteroids come hurtling down from the skies at extreme velocity in a display of incandescent fury so impressive that all the other support powers pale into insignificance.

Scrin Upgrades

Attenuated Forcefields
Previously the prerogative of the Tripods, shielding has in the meantime been deemed appropriate for their more diminutive, nimbler fellow combatants the Shard and Gun Walkers and Seekers (though Traveller-59 consider them superfluous). Less expensive than the Tripod’s protective bubble, they are nevertheless capable of absorbing one EMP blast as well as causing the enemy ammunition to glance off impotently at least for the first few hits.

Shard Launchers
Seekers, Photon cannons and Plasma Disc Launchers launch corrosive spikes of Ichor, which ruthlessly tear through flesh and armour alike.

Factions

One of the most eagerly awaited features of Kane’s Wrath was the introduction of two new factions per side with a host of unique units to expand the tactical repertoire and liven up gameplay. In general, the undertaking has been successful in that it retains the tongue-in-cheek humour that was the hallmark of the original game. The developers have obviously taken pains to weave the factions into the lore so that the latter do not feel like they have been artificially tacked on for the sake of justifying the release (the Scrin being the weakest in this respect, as nothing more than the sketchiest detail is furnished by way of background, which undermines the credibility of the endeavour). However, the abiding impression remains that, having become aware of its more glaring defects, the team merely shrugged its shoulders and rather than embarking upon a time and budget-consuming radical overhaul that would address the multitude of legitimate complaints posted on the forums decided to cut their losses and carry out a few cosmetic improvements here and there rather than admit to the fundamental error of dumbing down, putting the quick fix instant win over more cerebral and measured enjoyment.

The Steel Talons

From the archived files we learn that the Steel Talons Experimental Warfare Division was born of scepticism about Nod having been definitively vanquished at the end of the Second Tiberium War: “GDI shifted its strategic goals from defeating Nod to the reclamation of those parts of the planet previously consumed by Tiberium. The vast majority of GDI’s research and development budget was repurposed to further that goal, bringing to a close the period of rapid technological development that had characterised GDI’s military over the previous several decades.

Needless to say, there were several within the military who questioned this new directive – notably general Joshua ‘Mitch’ Mitchell, a decorated veteran of the Second Tiberium War renowned for his youth, aggressiveness and tactical innovation. Mitchell contended that while Nod may have been defeated, it would be foolish for GDI to assume that no successor would rise from the dispirited populace of an increasingly Tiberium-stricken earth. Therefore, he argued, funds allocated towards Tiberium control should instead be earmarked for the research and development of new combat technology, in anticipation of this next potential conflict.

After a lengthy, volatile hearing, Mitchell emerged with a partial victory. While GDI refused to divert a significant part of its R and D budget to the General’s cause, they did agree to fund a new experimental combat technology division under Mitchell. Dubbed the “Steel Talons” by Mitchell’s admirers – notably famed war hero Nick “Havoc” parker – this elite, unconventional combat battalion quickly rose to prominence in the splinter faction skirmishes that followed Nod’s implosion, becoming known both for their ruthless efficiency on the battlefield and for the shroud of secrecy they maintained at all other times”.

I have a hunch that the Steel Talons are most probably the first of the new factions that any long-standing fan will try out, as it evokes fond memories of battles past, allowing them to bask in the warm glow of nostalgia.

Combat Engineer
The Steel Talons positively bristle with aggression, which extends even to the traditionally least bellicose of GDI recruits, the engineer, to the extent that even the breaking and entering hot-shot seems bemused that he has been issued a pistol and body armour along with his hard hat: “They gave me a gun?”

That this goes against the grain is amply demonstrated by the fact that, whilst he can take down his unarmed Nod rival in rather ungentlemanly fashion, the Combat Engineer’s firearm-wielding skill is no match for the humblest professional soldier and he ought to stick to what he does best: employing subterfuge rather than brute force.

Behemoth
Understandably frustrated by the Juggernaut’s defencelessness against enemy aircraft and infantry (which could quickly reduce the expensive walker to a smouldering wreck as it attempted to retreat), the GDI Engineering Corps jury-rigged a pod to help overcome its limitations, dubbing the result with a suitably robust nickname: the Behemoth. The modified Juggernaut can put up a Rocket Squad to fight off aircraft and tanks or Riflemen to clear its path of harassing Militants.

Heavy Harvester
General Mitchell is nothing if not consistent in his obsession with armour-plating every vehicle under his command and this includes the Harvester, which, in emulation of the Behemoth, can garrison infantry to fend off the depredations of Attack Bikes and Seekers (rather than putting faith in the standard-issue machine gun). This represents a tacit acknowledgment of the most serious flaw blighting the game and leeching all the fun from it: Harvester killing. Now that Nod’s Attack Bikes can launch their rockets from an even greater distance and rev up faster for an even quicker getaway this no-brain tactic is likely to become more popular than ever. Strictly for those who have abandoned all pretence of sportsmanship or curiosity about testing their opponent’s mettle in a fair fight in favour of climbing the ladder and piling on the psychological pressure with the win/loss ratio as recorded for all to see in their statistics, the drearily unimaginative, nay, downright mindless focus on eliminating Harvesters separates the so-called “pros” from the average player. The best policy is to assume that it is almost inevitable that the enemy will try his hand at it in the early stages of the match and prepare accordingly (as Scrin, for example, a few Disintegrators on a Tiberium deposit are difficult to spot and can make short work of Bikes).

Wolverine
Proud to belong to Mitchell’s elite (“Steel Talons Rule!”), this old stalwart hardly requires an introduction, frenetically mowing down any platoons that enter its sights (AP Ammo is definitely a worthwhile investment). If they had a bumper sticker it would read: “When I grow up I want to be a Titan”, but its stature should not be confused with deficiency in the pugnaciousness department (try the Bloodhounds to test this out: for the Steel Talons, Wolverines replace APCs).

Titan
The star of the show, the Titan can trample lesser vehicles underfoot in keeping with its motto “Ground and pound!” Subjectively, however, the walker for all its retro charms (and the Steel Talons overall) seems underpowered, even with its upgrades. If you pit a group of Titans against the 200-credit cheaper Predators, the latter always come out on top, even if the Titans are packing Rail Guns and the tanks are not…The Titan has a rather affecting limp when “injured”, which becomes more pronounced as its health deteriorates, barely able to hobble back to base for repairs.

Mobile Repair Transport
“Who needs some polish?” enquires this APC, which has traded its offensive capability for repair (beware, though, as it can still smuggle engineers to take advantage of a momentary lapse in concentration). My one gripe is that it can be quite fiddly keeping vehicles within reach of its soldering arm. Otherwise its strategic value in prolonging the battlefield lifespan of an attack force is immediately apparent.

Steel Talons Support Powers

Railgun Accelerator
The augmented re-fire rate comes at a price, with units taking advantage of it losing health.

Steel Talons Upgrades

Adaptive Armour
Apart from Railguns, the Titan and Mammoth Tank can benefit from some welcome additional bulk.

ZOCOM
ZOCOM’s origins lie in preserving the integrity of the Blue Zones before purging the Earth of the menace of the alien contaminant altogether: “With a post-Nod GDI shifting its focus to the reduction and eventual elimination of Tiberium, it was natural for the council to establish a branch of the military tasked with the enforcement and execution of that goal – Zone Operations Command, or ZOCOM. Their peacetime mission was threefold; to improve GDI’s military capabilities within areas of high Tiberium infestation, to establish “beachheads” within such areas allowing reclamation to commence, and to protect existing reclamation operations from any attacks, be they terrorist or mutant in origin.

Command was given to the eminently qualified C. Elena Renteria, a decorated war hero and one of the first women to rise to the rank of General within GDI. Beyond her reputation as a smart, no-nonsense battlefield commander, Renteria’s unique upbringing provided insight into the task at hand. The daughter of Mexican nationals, the General spent her childhood in the Tiberium wastelands of Central Africa, while her parents, both GDI scientists, attempted to understand and contain the deadly crystal. After witnessing first hand the devastating effect of Tiberium on the human population of those areas, Renteria dedicated the rest of her life to its elimination; first focusing on the systematic and ruthless dismantling of the Brotherhood of Nod, and then later through ZOCOM’s Tiberium control and reclamation operations”.

Rocket Harvester
Venturing into Nod’s Yellow Zone strongholds was never likely to go unchallenged and General Renteria possessed sufficient foresight to commission a Harvester with a rocket-turret to hold Kane’s outraged militia at bay until backup had a chance to arrive. If a clutch of Harvesters is engaged in mining one patch they might collectively be able to force a small raiding party to pull back, but their weapon would need a substantially bigger range to function as a genuine deterrent.

Zone Shatterer
Given that it was conceived of as a means of pushing back Tiberium encroachments, it makes perfect sense that ZOCOM should have the mother of all Shatterers at their disposal, kitted out with an Overload beam to fire an extra devastating shot. The energy surge does have the drawback of draining the hover vehicle’s reserves, leaving it powered down and helpless for a few moments afterwards.

Zone Raiders
More agile than the Zone Troopers, for whom bodybuilder physiques were indispensable for lugging the Railgun into combat, ZOCOM’s less encumbered Raiders have lighter armour that is both Tiberium-resistant and can detect stealth. Indeed, the Raiders’ ability to strike back against aircraft gives them the edge over their more muscle-bound rivals.

ZOCOM Orca
With Tiberium-smashing sound waves as their speciality, it is only logical that the Orca too should incapacitate the enemy by perforating their eardrums, each capable of volleying six Sonic Shells before re-arming.

ZOCOM Upgrades

Ceramic Armour
This self-explanatory improvement reinforces the standard factory cladding without slowing the aircraft down, as well as providing them with more of a sting.

Tiberium Field Suits
To minimise injury and losses due to exposure to the strangely beautiful but deadly crystal, ZOCOM have invested in the ultimate in protective gear for Riflemen, Rocket Soldiers and Grenadiers, enabling them to avoid time-consuming detours where the direct route would otherwise be impassable to all but the alien invaders due to the presence of a sprawling Tiberium patch (and they can shack up in similarly inaccessible buildings without needlessly incurring casualties). It is a blessed relief from constantly being compelled to guide your troops around the edges of Tiberium fields because they do not possess common sense enough to skirt them on their own initiative, triggering the warning “Tiberium exposure detected” and the flashing engagement symbol on the mini-map.

The Black Hand
According to an expert on Brother Marcion, the flame-worshipping sect is a hotbed of internal strife: “A cult within a cult, the origins of the Black Hand date back to soon after the founding of Nod itself. Initially established as a form of religious police and tasked with enforcing adherence to the teachings of Kane, in the ensuing years the Black Hand saw their purview expand significantly. By the time of the Second Tiberium War, the cult had become Kane’s chosen wardens of all things religious, of his prophecies while also maintaining spiritual discipline within the Brotherhood…by force if necessary.

The Black Hand maintains a parallel organisation within the Brotherhood, with political, religious and military wings.

Yet, for all their power and influence, until recently the Black Hand had managed to maintain a surprisingly low profile, shrouding their rituals, beliefs and, to the world beyond Nod, their very existence in a veil of mystery and obfuscation. However, as the Second Tiberium War drew to a close, all this would change, with Kane’s ‘death’, Anton Slavik, a respected military leader, rose to become leader of the Brotherhood of Nod – and revealed himself to be a Black Hand prelate, raised from childhood within the cult. Needless to say, Slavik’s ascent drew significant attention to the Black Hand, attention that was not always welcomed.

Unsurprisingly, many within the Black Hand chafed at the cult’s new public profile, with internal dissent quickly escalating into a series of impassioned public confrontations between Slavik loyalists and those who claimed the Nod leader to be a traitor to the Back hand’s true purpose. From within the anti-Slavik ranks there soon rose a figure who could stand toe-to-toe with Slavik, an impassioned and popular preacher by the name of Brother Marcion. With leaders chosen and battle-lines drawn, what had started as a doctrinal disagreement had quickly escalated into a schism that threatened the very existence of Nod itself.

Despite the Inner Circle’s repeated attempts to heal the rift, the situation soon spun out of control, leaving Slavic dead at the hands of an assassin and Marcion and his followers retreating to self-imposed exile in the Australian outback. These cataclysmic events splintered the remainder of the Brotherhood into countless sub-factions, each claiming to follow the “true” word of the prophet, with, ironically, Marcion’s new Black Hand serving as one of four surviving links to the Brotherhood’s storied past.

Now claiming himself to be the one true Prophet, and, in turn, branding Kane a heretic and charlatan, Marcion sets forth to make his own mark upon the world”.

Confessor Cabal
Marcion’s desire to project an image of himself as the guardian of the true faith, unsullied by heresy encouraged him to do away with ordinary conscripts altogether, replacing them with warrior priests decked out in swishing gowns. They not only stir up nearby comrades into greater zeal during the fray, but can lob their hallucinogenic grenades at hostile foot soldiers, throwing them into a state of confusion so that they massacre each other, cleansing the world of the scourge of unbelievers.

Mantis
Like the Slingshot, the Black Hand’s Mantis-droid is the bane of pilots everywhere, all the more lethal when equipped with Tiberium Core Missiles. However, when armed with the upgraded projectiles, Stealth Tanks deliver greater firepower.

Purifier
Once again, the chronicler of the inferno adepts waxes lyrical about the Black Hand’s imposing mechanoid: “A significantly more primitive precursor to Nod’s Avatar, the Purifier was inspired by Brother Marcion’s first hand urban combat experience during the Second Tiberium war. After using an improvised flamethrower to rout entrenched GDI forces, saving the rest of his regiment from certain death, Marcion was declared a hero of Nod and saw his very presence have an inspirational effect on the Nod Militants that surrounded him.

The Purifier was developed to recreate that experience, representing Marcion on the battlefield in the iconic form of a hulking, flame-toting humanoid, one equipped with a subliminal projection device that would enhance the morale and righteousness of the Black Hand troops surrounding it. While by no means as advanced or flexible as its successor, the Purifier is an effective combat unit in its own right, especially when accompanied by infantry it can ‘inspire’.

Ironically enough, upon its initial deployment, the Purifier was the subject of no small amount of controversy, with many Black Hand hardliners decrying the use of a “soulless machine” within a religious army that otherwise stood opposed to such devices. Marcion, seeking to prevent further schism within the Black Hand, remedied the situation by requiring each machine to be blessed by a Black Hand abbot before entering the battlefield”.

As it strides undaunted through cities swarming with holed-up enemy soldiers taking pot shots at it, the Purifier automatically incinerates them before unleashing a conflagration that leaves nothing but ashes behind.

Black Hand Support Powers

Power Signature Scan
This temporarily reveals the location of all Power Plants on the map (they flash in the semi-darkness without lifting the fog of war).

Decoy Temple of Nod
In theory the opponent will concentrate on eradicating this most intimidating of threats, particularly if the Nod commander is prudent enough to wait until its construction is convincing (the normal asking price of five thousand credits means that a Temple is not likely to be constructed in the opening stages before the cash flow has been properly established). The fake timer counting down may well be indistinguishable from the real thing, but one fatal flaw allows the enemy to detect instantly whether the Temple is a mere mirage: it invariably faces in one particular direction. Honestly development team, what do you take us for??? The market segment aimed for is admittedly pubescent boys, but even so…The only suggestion I have is to make sure that when you position the genuine article you lull your adversary into a false sense of security by mimicking the bogus structure’s orientation.

Black Hand Upgrades

Charged Particle Beams
Shredder Turrets are tweaked with a rapid-firing green laser also issued to the Confessor Cabal.

Purifying Flame
Although blue might have connotations of coldness, the high-octane fuel contained in the on-board cylinders of Flame Tanks and Purifiers has been specially refined to burn more intensely.

Black Disciples
Black Hand flamethrower troops will rally to their brethren, leading them into action.

Marked of Kane
The culmination of decades of clandestine experiments, the Marked of Kane represent the perfect expression of the Prophet’s quest for infallibly loyal instruments of his will, who would neither hesitate in executing his orders, nor be tempted to depose (and succeed) him by means of assassination: “As the First Tiberium War drew to a close, pervasive and disturbing rumours began to emerge from the Tiberium wastelands of central Asia and the Russian Steppes. Nomadic travellers and Nod separatist colonies alike have shared tales of Nod bunkers hidden deep beneath the earth – laboratories where cultish techno-fetishists perform horrific rituals upon the corpses of the Brotherhood’s fallen – the goal? Nothing less than raising the dead.

Needless to say, Nod has continually denied all knowledge of such acts, and even those within the Brotherhood believe these necromantic tales to be little more than the mutterings of frightened outcasts. The truth, however, is far stranger. In the aftermath of his first defeat at the hands of GDI, Kane spent long days pondering how it was that Nod had been defeated. Ultimately, he formulated a unique hypothesis – the humanity of his soldiers had been their undoing. Thus, the prophet concluded, to achieve victory he would require an army devoid of free will – of love, hate, fear and regret, of both conscience and consciousness, a legion that would willingly and unquestioningly obey his every command.

To that end, Kane initiated the development of an army of emotionless, endlessly malleable cybernetic warriors that would do his bidding without question. Knowing that such research would cause dissention within the ranks of his existing army, the Prophet sequestered this work in the hinterlands of Russia and China, where few would stumble across the project and even fewer would be believed if they shared such tales”.

The Awakened
The merging of body parts with steel and circuitry means that these cyborgs can withstand more punishment than their flesh-and-blood counterparts before finally shutting down. Unburdened by such irrelevancies as fear and pity, which might interfere with the implementation of Kane’s directives, the Awakened are immune to suppression, devoid as they are of a self-preservation instinct.

Their EMP Blast might not be quite as efficient as that of their bigger brothers, the Enlightened, but can be extremely useful in knocking out defences and crippling clusters of hostile Raider Buggies, APCs or Gun Walkers just long enough to put them out of commission for good.

Tiberium Trooper
“Baptise these heretics!” shout the Tiberium Troopers as they sprinkle the infidels not with Holy Water, but a far more noxious substance, corrosive Liquid Tiberium. Cowering in abandoned houses for shelter will not save them, as the spray nozzle disperses the toxin through windows. A further property of Dr. Giraud’s concoction is that it mires the tyres and tracks of vehicles, hampering their advance.

The Enlightened
“Our souls are Kane’s”, the Enlightened declare, as if to prove that there is a ghost left in what would at first glance appear to be nothing but a machine. Whilst these missionaries of the Prophet do not buckle under the onslaught of a Mammoth Tank, the legacy of their biological extraction becomes noticeable when they step onto Tiberium, which, instead of healing them as it did the earlier model of Nod cyborgs, does them considerable harm.

Marked of Kane Support Powers

Magnetic Mines
In much the same fashion as the Limpet Drone of old, Magnetic Mines attach themselves to vehicles, eating away at their chassis.

Marked of Kane Upgrades

Cybernetic Legs
Reminiscent of the Protoss leg enhancements in Starcraft, the speed of Tiberium Troopers, Enlightened and Saboteurs is practically doubled and is an absolute must for improving battlefield mobility.

Supercharged Particle Beams
These searing white-hot rays melt metal and make life miserable for the medics charged with the task of identifying corpses (obviating the need for body bags, the charred remains can be scooped straight into funerary urns). Venoms, Shredder Turrets and the Enlightened are elevated into a different league by the upgrade.

Traveller-59
That the Scrin should venerate Ichor as a source of sustenance is but a recognition on their part of the extent to which they depend on the seductively shimmering crystal, their entire evolution centring on exploiting it.

Traveller-59 have perfected the arts of mind-control and enslavement, reflected in their preference for subtle penetration and attrition over the battering ram approach.

Prodigy
Years of in-breeding bore fruit in the form of this grotesque parody of the Mastermind capable of possessing not just single units, but entire groups. It can blink-teleport to the edges of a base and hijack any forces foolishly left idle by their superiors. Like its spindlier relative, the Prodigy can teleport allies and capture and sell any structure. Nothing is immune to its telepathic persuasions, not even the Redeemer, MARV or Hexapod. Even if the Prodigy is felled by a Sniper, the unit is has possessed does not revert to its former allegiance.

Cultists
Just when the hapless abductees thought that nothing could be worse than the ordeal of the anal probe, they found themselves press ganged into the service of the invaders by having the spawn of the prodigy implanted into their cerebral cortex (here someone on the development team has decided to pay homage to the Star Trek mythology, drawing inspiration from another work with the word wrath in the title, namely The Wrath of Khan – although players will already have figured out that at least one closet Trekker was involved as soon as the Redeemer thundered: “Resistance is futile!”).

Their DNA permanently altered by the parasite, Cultists mutate into disfigured hybrids, plodding laboriously beneath the weight of a heavy carapace. Like Yuri’s Initiates in Red Alert 2, they are rewarded for their (in this case involuntary) sacrifice with limited mind control powers, feeble in comparison with that of the Prodigy, but adequate enough for purposes such as bankrupting the enemy by making off with all his Harvesters. Its brainwaves are not equal to the challenge of taking over buildings, the more sophisticated high-tech vehicles nor can they reach skywards (and the best means of disposing of them is with aircraft).

Their expendability in the eyes of their masters probably has something to do with an unarticulated revulsion towards their inferior human ancestry.

Traveller-59 Support Powers

Temporal Wormhole
A slightly flattened-out version of the Stasis Shield, the Wormhole can buy precious time to permit additional defences to be laid or an ally’s forces to come to the rescue by slowing down the rate of fire and speed of everything underneath it.

Traveller-59 Upgrades

Advanced Articulators
Disintegrators, Assimilators, Shock Troopers, Ravagers and Cultists can easily outrun their pursuers after this limb modification and could probably give Steve Austin himself a run for his money.

Traveller Engines
Devastator Warships and Planetary Assault Carriers veritably surge forward with this new drive installed, although the vessels cannot support both afterburner and shields. The Traveller-59 fleet can therefore mercilessly hunt down slower Scrin rivals, or turn tail and disengage, now standing a better chance of living to fight another day.

Reaper-17
The fanatical extremes to which this cult takes its worship of Ichor is inscribed on their bodies, their repeated massive infusions leaving them grotesquely deformed (much like the spice-addicted Navigators of Dune). The viciousness with which its members set out to subdue the populations that stand in their way can be traced back to their belief that they have been vested with a divine right to cleanse planets of any troublesome and potentially dangerous life forms.

Far from impairing their combat-effectiveness, however, their religiously motivated self-mutilation confers superior martial prowess.

Shielded Harvester
Revelling in chaos and bloodshed, the cult’s acolytes thrive on being in the thick of conflict. Recognising that their calling cannot be fulfilled without a steady stream of income, Reaper-17’s leaders have sought to compensate for the flimsiness of their resource-collectors by providing them with a Tripod force field in miniature.

Shard Walker
The Gun Walker’s ungainliness, fragility and limited rate of fire meant that it could all too easily be overwhelmed and it rapidly fell into disuse. With customary tactical acuity, Reaper-17 decided to embark on a research programme to overcome its deficiencies, appreciating its versatility as an escort, with its pin-point accuracy against infantry and aircraft.

The Shard Walker incorporates Ichor into the very fibre of its being, spitting chunks of the crystal at the unfortunate foe with devastating speed.

Reaper Tripod
In its eagerness to grind the enemy into submission, Reaper-17 has all but abandoned traditional air support in favour of heavy ground units, the pride and joy of which is its colossal Tripod, the living manifestation of the delight the cult takes in brutality. Like the Devourer, the Reaper Tripod can glut on Ichor to supercharge its beam.

Reaper-17 Support Powers

Shock Pods
Several veteran squads of Shock Troopers provide reinforcements at the targeted location.

Reaper-17 Support Structures

Growth Stimulator
A Growth Accelerator on steroids, it both replenishes the Ichor fields and doubles as your own private spike with a trickle of extra credits. The Reaper-17 commander can, whilst acting in enlightened self-interest, gain a reputation for generosity by donating Accelerators to allies.

Reaper-17 Upgrades

Blue Shards
That rarest and most highly-prized of commodities blue Tiberium lends enhanced potency to the weapons wielded by Seekers, Shard Walkers and Ravagers.

Conversion Reserves
As if the Tripod (and Devourer) were not fearsome enough, this capability boosts the Conversion beam’s storage capacity even further.

Global Conquest Mode
Global Conquest mode allows the player to pit his wits against the game’s AI (and he can choose between the same personalities and grades of difficulty as the original game) in a contest for world domination spanning every continent.

The strategic parameters are simple enough: to achieve victory you either wipe out all enemy bases or meet the alternate conditions (for GDI you must acquire 33% of the land mass under your Area of Influence; for Nod, bring 24 cities to boiling point and beyond, as indicated by Red unrest level and for Scrin construct nine Threshold Towers). You must pay close attention to the level of unrest in cities as well as their numbers of inhabitants, take control of as much territory as possible (to maximise resources) and build up strike forces to engage the enemy.

Although the feature has surely been included in imitation of other RTS titles it feels like an afterthought, tacked on simply because Command and Conquer was the odd one out in not catering for players who yearned for a little bit more depth. Yet the entire concept of turn-based contemplation runs counter to the hectic, wham, bam, game over sucker mentality fostered since day one and, as such, seems redundant.

Compared to skirmish mode, the AI is extremely aggressive – if you choose Real Time as opposed to Auto-Resolve, it will throw everything it has got at you within seconds, even on Easy setting. Whereas this could hypothetically be useful in preparing you for rushes carried out by human enemies, the odds are often so stacked against you that your strike force is obliterated without you having had the remotest opportunity to test out a new build order or hone any of your other skills. Result? Annoyance rather than amusement.

The real action always has been and always will be online and Global Conquest mode will be ignored by hard-core fans. Since a skirmish can teach the rookie more about what might be in store online, the obsolescence of the innovation is painfully apparent. On a dull and rainy afternoon the jaded professional might extract a few hours of entertainment from it, but otherwise it is a non-starter.

Multiplayer
I have already alluded to many of the frustrations of online play where the focus tends to be on the cheapest of the cheap and swiftest of the swift victories. This means that you can forget trying out (much less discovering the strategic potential of) the gleaming new units in Automatch because you will have had the stuffing knocked out of you long beforehand by players who couldn’t care less about fun, but whose sole concern is burnishing their statistics. One player complained that the game should be renamed Spike Wars as entire matches can hinge on whether you resort to truly unimaginative (some would contend inspired) ploys such as selling your first power plant for the sake of the Rifleman/Militant/Buzzer Squad that can ensconce itself in a bunker and butcher the enemy engineer. It is a sad indictment of the game that if you fail to secure the spike-capturing bonus you will not be able to recover.

Similarly, certain units and abilities might as well have been omitted for all that anyone ever uses them (the Orca Sensor Pods, for example) in the mad scramble to notch up another win.

Switching to Gamespy was not the most fortuitous decision ever taken by EA. I lost count of the number of times that neither myself nor my regular team mates could log on because the server was down – chauvinistically, this never happened when demand was likely to be at its peak in the States, only European enthusiasts had their weekend gaming schedules left in tatters. Admittedly, this problem has not occurred for a while now, but the bitter aftertaste still lingers.

Server instability has been exacerbated by connection problems. Rather than see their “perfect” records marred by a defeat, many opponents will deliberately desynch the match, leaving the honest player fuming and with an undeserved loss in their stats.

These problems are further compounded by several old bugs and exploits rearing their ugly heads yet again (does the invincible unit exploit ring any bells?). There is quite simply no excuse whatsoever for errors of this kind.

Tactical
A certain trade-off is involved in a player’s choice of faction, for example, Reaper-17’s air capability is limited exclusively to Storm Riders; the Steel Talons cannot put up Sonic Emitters, or recruit Zone Troopers or Commandoes, whereas ZOCOM can enlist all infantry types (Zone Raiders substituting for the Troopers), but cannot buy the railgun upgrade.

Structures such as the Nerve/Operations/Command Centre have assumed greater strategic importance now that certain upgrades can only be procured through them. As such, they are more liable to attract enemy attention than before.

The Engineer/Saboteur/Assimilator no longer captures instantly, if you spot him kneeling down fiddling with the lock, you have a split second to foil his plans.

Husks self-detonate if left lying around for too long – if you want to recover them you cannot afford to be complacent.

The anomaly of Planetary Assault Carriers and Devastators remaining oblivious to the detrimental effects of EMP blasts when their shields are down has been rectified.

Defence Towers (neutral structures) have an enhanced range of fire. If two are in reasonably close proximity you can prevent the other from being taken over by the enemy. They can still be taken down by putting a small unit, such as a Disintegrator Squad sufficiently close to the base.

My overall rating of six (out of ten) is not so much an indictment of Kane’s Wrath itself as a damning verdict on the shortcomings of the original game, which the expansion has not been able to erase.

Some husbands bring their spouses chocolates or flowers, but the Hungarian knows only too well what his beloved craves: a full-sized image of the Prophet from the Leipzig Games Convention, signed by Kane’s own fair hand.