NORAD COMMAND: For the past several years, we have been relying heavily on supercomputers for much of our defense work. Through a top secret project, we have reprogrammed the WOPR to create intelligent weaponry that will enable the military to take the human element out of war. Unfortunately, our security has been breached. Intruders have gotten past the firewalls in place at one of our covert operations, Protovision Systems. The intruders in question believe that they are playing a high-tech military simulation for fun.

The WOPR doesn't believe it's playing a game.

Welcome to Wargames, a new RTS C&C-type game from MGM Interactive. Well this one I've got to say is NICE. All you little gamers just sitting back there waiting to get your hands on C&C 2: Tiberian Sun and growing mindless waiting and waiting for it finally come out, well have I got something for you. Get your skills back up to snuff with this rather well-done RTS.

It's got nicely done 3D graphics (about the same caliber as Myth was) which is done well in both the D3D and Software Renderer. From the startup screen, I was interested. When you hit the main menu, you first hear a digitized voice say "Do you want to play a game?" from the movie Wargames. This is a well thought-out RTS although other than the impressive graphics it really doesn't have a real lot to set it apart from other ones.

It follows the standard C&C clone RTS. Build a base, collect resources, and build units. Collecting resources is kind of interesting. There aren't mines, there isn't any ore. All you've got is Computer Centers and you send your hacker in to hack the computer for money. A little different from the scavenge metal/gold/ore, so kudos there. You also have the ability to upgrade your armor/firepower/speed and degrade your opponents. The ability to research degradation to your enemies is interesting, so another little goodie point.

The game feels a bit like Total Annihilation. Since one side is robots, it does seem similar in the unit aspect. You have the ability to build land, air, and sea units and since I like lots of units, ding! -- another bonus point.

Graphics 18/20

Though the graphics look like Myth, we haven't seen them in many RTS games since. The software renderer is quite good, though it's a little ragged. The D3D is nice and smooth with the explosion graphics you'd expect. I noticed a couple of graphic errors when units were on bridges with the bridge showing over the top of the unit. You do have the ability as in Myth to spin around the battlefield and zoom in and out. My one complaint is that explosions of buildings take 10-15 seconds. It does NOT need to take a half hour for a building to explode. It's rather annoying.

Sound 14/15

I loved the intro message! Wargames was a good movie and MGM pulls some audio from it. The humans have pretty good sounds. When you get a message from your uplink, it uses a slightly modified "You have Mail" sound like the AOL New Mail wav, which I thought was quite humorous the first time I heard it. The units all respond to your mouse clicks. The robots were so-so, but that's what you'd expect, just mechanical noises and digitized voice.

Gameplay 20/25

It's pretty straight foward click, click, click action. No sidebar however. You need to right click on units/buildings for special options like building. You have good camera movement, just hold down the right mouse button and move your mouse. Real easy to use. A couple of AI glitches, units can get stuck behind fences/buildings and you'll have to manually help them around. The firing system is 3D so if you're trying to fire at units behind a building, it'll hit the building instead of the units. Good control with a few minor bugs.

Fun Factor 18/20

It's about time a semi-decent RTS C&C clone came out. I'm happy and you should be too. WarGames is pretty fun, the background plot is interesting, and it's based on a great movie. It's as replayable as any other good RTS and it has a decent multiplayer mode.

Multiplayer 5/5

It's your straight foward RTS multiplayer. TCP/IP, IPX, Serial, and Modem are all supported. It is nice in the aspect that it keeps track of your rankings and gives you a rank based on your performance. The downside is that it only supports up to four players.

Packaging 4/5

Overall Impression 9/10

Well I can wait a little longer for Tiberian Sun because this one will definitely keep me entertained until it hits the gaming world. Nicely done, looks great, full of options, lots of units. MGM looks like it can be a good game publisher with this release and what I've seen of its upcoming releases.

OVERALL RATING: 88%