Command & Conquer: Yuri's Revenge

The Good
There was a big fuss about "Red Alert 2" and I was more than eager to get my copy of a Collector's Edition, but once I started to play the game I noticed Westwood slipped the crack on it a bit, more to the fact endings are nowhere near as interesting or greatly directed and thought of like in their previous C&C games. On top of that, there was barely any cinematic if you don't count the opening cinematic. Gameplay was fun, but something was still lacking... and until this add-on came out I had no idea what.

Yuri's Revenge took the term "add-on" one huge step forward, as giant as Firestorm in its own time. The game's story is nothing special, but it's compelling and briefings and cutscenes are much better than in the original. Seems like they put more effort into this one which by far could not be sold in as many copies as the original. Guess Westwood saved the day... which is unlike to what later happened with "C&C: Generals" that was fully under EA Pacific's hands.

I generally don't find traveling through time concepts to be executed ever too well, but this game did a magnificent job, not meddling too much with the fact itself and thus getting a brilliant comeback. Barry Corbin's back and the scene of president Dugan seeing him again in priceless. The general script for this game is way above RA2 ever presented us with. On top of it, there are tons and tons of cinematics and briefings that appear in-game on the radar screen which add dynamic feeling to the title and a fine touch of dramatic to the battlefield.

News structures are simply amazing, they took a lot of effort into adding as much new stuff as they can, and this time, added an entirely new side to play as, if only in multiplayer. Something we (and by that I mean I) heavily wanted in Firestorm add-on. Again, both campaigns are to play as Allies or Soviets, and third side consists of Yuri's mind-bended followers. His entire arsenal is new and that includes structures as well as units. Some are rather cool if I do say so myself, and abilities to use soldiers to enhance power output, produce clone units for the price of one, grind enemy tanks to get money out of it, use submarines equipped with long range water-to-surface missiles, take down enemy crafts with high velocity gattling guns, are just a tip of the iceberg.

The Bad
The game is addictive, highly playable, fun, devastating, and better than the one it's a mission pack for. Furthermore, fixes all the buggy stuff that occurred in RA2 and deploys a high level of fun, something that was really lacking in RA2 as it didn't seem inspired enough. As far as add-on go, this is by far the best one I've seen, on par with "Lord of Destruction" one for Diablo II.

Alas, can't say I'm too happy with the fact this was the last C&C RTS Westwood had worked on :(

The Bottom Line
What I expected from the original "Red Alert 2" is to be at least this good, instead, had to wait for an add-on. No doubt, well worth the wait, it's a blast as far as isometric real-time strategies go.