Now the PC market seems to be dominated by RTS games these days, I’m sure it at least holds over 40% of the entire gaming range!  We’re not saying it’s a bad thing but it makes it quite hard for a RTS game to stand out amongst the crowd, and Universe at War does exactly just that. Petroglyph, creators of Empire at War and Sega are behind this super armed sci-fi warfare!  But should it really stand out or should it lay dormant!  Let’s investigate!

In Universe at War earth is attacked by a violent unknown alien force!  ( if you haven’t already guessed )  The year is 2012 and its mayhem everywhere due to the Hierarchy assault!  Just as it seems the alien's have us beaten, another race of highly advanced life forms(The Novus) enter the fray in the name of all things good and beautiful!  Woohoo!  But hold on yes... You awake a sleeping ancient race which lie within earth and it all becomes one big epic war between the three factions!  The Hierarchy, The Novus and finally the Masari!  Instantly the game has a lot of the content due to the fact it has three full factions with a wide array of units for you to utilize, and each race is different in so many ways! 

 
The Hierarchy are a metal geared behemoth which moves in great numbers. Their walkers are the size of city squares while they also use animals and mutants to devastate the land.  The walkers also can operate as your factories to produce units and vehicles!  The Novus are a highly advanced race of bioengineered robots!  They have mastered the ability to move throughout power links which allows them to spread throughout the map in an instant.  Then finally we have the Masari!  The Masari are quite a unique race as their main strong point is their defence,  Building a well connected and defended base will usually lead to their survival!  All of their units also have a light and dark form!  Each race is very well designed and offers a whole lot of experimentation to be done.  Oddly enough even though each race is different it all oddly balances out!  This especially shows in online matches but we will come back to this later! 

To begin with you can either begin the one campaign to lead you throughout the massive story of the war, Or you can jump straight into action via the skirmish or online modes!  The story is good and cinematics are quite immense, but this is all let down due to poor voice acting especially during tense and emotional moments of the game!  The music is very stylish and fits perfectly with the action sequences of the game but unless you really have the sound turned up you may not notice it, so I just whacked it to full!  You will be fighting all over the world!  The game resembles a game of risk when you’re not in conflict as the world is split up into different territories for you to control!  But it would have been nice to see a bit more noticeable land marks! 

The game play is pretty basic it follows the standard rules of any other RTS!  You build your base and your production facilities!  You then need resources so you order your harvesters to go gather resources!  In Universe at War resources can be found almost anywhere!  Especially in the wreck of fallen comrades and enemies!  But a lot of interesting unit functions help set it aside from other standard RTS games!  Each faction has three heroes!  Each all different with unique abilities to help you gain supremacy!  For example the Novus have a mechanized super solider which tower above the rest that can fire missiles from its shoulder pads and charge a super shot which can take most units out in one!  It also has a stealth unit which can travel almost anywhere and act as a link to the power connectors so all of your troops can teleport to his location!  Great for surprise attacks!  You also have super weapons!  ( What game would miss out on the super weapons! )!  Black hole generators and other crazy devices can be used to completely annihilate your enemy’s base!

Graphics are superb but for some reason at some points frame rates prove a real problem!  Even running a high end PC!  Even on the 360 version we also encountered some slowdown!  We don’t see why this is maybe just sloppy programming but it’s not needed at all!  The PC version does support DX 10 but the difference is minimal and doesn’t really reward you for the extra processing power!  A lot of the environment is destructible which is very cool!  Especially watching a scene where a brigade of tanks move across a town in retreat crushing everything in their path!  But for some reason a lot of the textures on buildings and land are pretty bland!  But the sheer size of the Walkers and detail makes up for all of this!  One very annoying issue is the sloppy camera angles!  You have very limited zoom amounts and you cannot set the camera in any 3d angle what so ever!  You can rotate the camera but you are stuck in an overhead view of the map!  Which can be quite annoying due to the fact you cannot see trouble come and a lot of the Walkers will disappear off the side of your screen!  To be honest if it wasn’t for the god awful camera this game would have soared in our charts!

 
Enemy intelligence is average but during the single player they are all easily out thought!  But! Multiplayer is quite immersive!  You can play other players in basic 1v1 or 2v2 or more ranked and unranked matches!  But one special feature is "conquer the world" mode!  You have to progress through conquering other territories from other players!  As you do this you will gain awards and medals!  But the only real problem is to play online you will need Xbox live!  To play the conquer the world mode you will need Xbox Live gold!  That’s fine for the 360 users but Pc users may be a bit annoyed having to fork out the extra monthly fee!  But the multiplayer aspect of the game is truly brutal and amazing!  So many strategies can be used to your advantage to overcome your enemy!  Even in some of the direst settings! 

After you’re first few games and as you march your way through the campaign you will lean back and take a break... During that time you will say to yourself!  "Man this games pretty damn cool!"  Universe at War is a very strong and stable experience which many RTS fans will love!  The unique races and impressive visuals will keep you coming back for more!  If you can set aside the annoyance of a pathetic camera angle you will do fine!  If you play online you will love it even more!  But due to its poor camera implementation this Universe at War isnt as big as it could be...