A Review: Command And Conquer: Red Alert 2, PC 2000

Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 is a real-time strategy game that was released for Windows on October 24, 2000, as the follow-up to Command & Conquer: Red Alert. Red Alert 2 picks up at the conclusion of the Allied campaign of the first game. Its expansion pack is Command & Conquer: Yuri's Revenge, released a year later, in 2001. Red Alert 2 was principally developed by Westwood Pacific in collaboration with Westwood Studios. Command and Conquer: Red Alert 2 contains two playable factions, the Soviets and the Allies, which both previously appeared in Command & Conquer: Red Alert. The single-player campaign is structured in an alternate-ending mode as opposed to a progressive story mode. Like its predecessor, Red Alert 2 features a large amount of full-motion video cutscenes between missions and during gameplay, with an ensemble cast including Ray Wise, Udo Kier, Kari Wuhrer, and Barry Corbin.
 

For me, I found Red Alert 2 to be a definite improvement over the first game. I can remember hours and hours of playing this game just for the skirmish mode alone; I don't think that there was a single map that I did not play and beat. I loved the Cold War alternate history and found that the plot was just as well written and scripted as the other games in this series. I liked the improved units and new additions, and I loved that there were faction-specific units that could be employed. Each with their own bonuses and buffs, it really helped to diversify the factions and separate them by more than just colour and allegiance. The Westwood cheese of the FMV sequences was just gold, and I really liked that they had become a core component of the C&C series by this point. The AI has been improved, as has the pathing for the player, with units remaining grouped together for the most part now rather than breaking up and arriving late to the party. I really liked the ability to garrison structures and found it a wonderful way to bring the maps to life; it made the backgrounds a key part of your tactics and really made you think about how to proceed. The new buildings and such were great, and I loved that their animations had been improved and added to. The super weapons and unique units were a nice touch and added even more to the variety of tactics that the player could use. Landmarks and other real-world locations were a nice touch, and I really liked the ability to either defend or destroy these various structures. I was glad to see that Westwood didn't break and pander to the various focus groups and anti-gaming organisations of the time. The naval and air force components received improved functionality and actually seemed to be viable options, with some missions heavily focused on them. I felt that was a solid move and elevated play above simple ground-based wars of attrition. The audio and soundtrack were also a big improvement, and some of the songs in this game are absolute bangers. I didn't like that the plot alternated depending on your faction choice though. No matter who you chose in the first game, it didn't mean a thing at the start of this one. I would have liked a way to carry over your choices from the first game, or perhaps having a way provided to set how you ended Red Alert, so that you could carry over those choices into this game. I also found that some of the faction bonus vehicles were a little overpowered and needed some more balancing. The British Sniper was a key example of this, as it could wipe out your troops and gave the computer an unfair sight range, in my opinion. Another thing that bothered me was the fact that this game felt shorter, unless you chose to play both campaigns one after the other. I don't know if that was true, but it felt that way to me, possibly because you could alter the game's speed. I don't really know, but it certainly seemed that this game was shorter than the first to me.  

 

Visually, this game has also been vastly improved from the first game. The world environments are very nicely rendered, and all have much improved textures and compositions. The trees and other fauna are much better too, with different colours and variations added to them. The buildings and structures looked great and had a lot of depth and detail to them. Shadows and lighting effects were improved, with some of the larger buildings casting shadows that actually affected the models of your soldiers and tanks. The animations for the various base buildings, troops, and vehicles were all much better than in Red Alert, and the user interfaces were also much more attractive. Overall, this was a much prettier game than the first one.
 

I very much liked this game but felt that it was also disappointing in the ways that I mentioned above. Still, I do believe that Red Alert 2 was an improvement over the first game and is more than worth a play either way.

7/10 – Nearly There!
Signed Off – Leonardo – PSJ