Review of Total Annihilation

You've probably heard of (or even played) other strategy games like Starcraft or Command & Conquer, and they were great fun, so why should you get this one? Because after playing Total Annihilation (TA for short), you'll never go back. (120 unique full-3D units battling among acid lakes and abandoned cities intrigue you? Read on.)

The story isn't really important here (basically, you fight as Arm or Core to rid the galaxy of the other guys in a 4000-year blood feud), but the giant robots, tanks, etc. allow for some spectacular explosions and heavy weaponry. A nuke's explosion annihilates everything on an 800x600 screen, unless your opponent has missile defenses, which are vulnerable to a strategic bomber strike, unless your opponent has flak cannons... and that's just the beginning!

TA's most important feature is its impeccable balance and rush defense. Instead of starting with a single construction unit, you have your persona, the Commander, the most powerful weapon on the battlefield. Your Commander can take down nearly anything the opponent sends at you for ten minutes by himself, meaning no early-game rushes will win you the game. And once you can defend yourself, you'll see that neither of the sides has the upper hand. There are no game-breaking units, because everything has a delicate speed/power/cost balance; during the course of a typical game you will use over two dozen unique units!

TA also stands out for its amazing realism. Warfare among the trees can start forest fires, which damage units around them and spread according to the same wind speed and direction which turns your turbines at varying speeds. Explosions produce shrapnel which arcs realistically and damages units hit by it. Every weapon has an area of effect, and shells often miss fast-moving enemy units and crash into hillsides or even your own troops! Aircraft act like real planes: bombers can take out several targets at once, but then have to swoop around for another pass, fighters do barrel rolls to avoid enemy fire, and seaplanes run along the surface until they have the speed to get airborne.

For seasoned strategy veterans, you'll be happy to know TA has over TEN DOZEN unique units. That's more units for each side than all the races in Starcraft have combined! Instead of researching new technology, just build a different factory to access a new slate of units! Your options include two levels each of vehicles, robots, aircraft and ships; free downloads on the company website give you everything from hovercraft to minelayers to resurrector units to underwater fusion plants.

The maps in TA are bigger than any of the competitions (up to 63 by 63 screen lengths), allowing for full-scale, 4-6-hour epic battles. Players routinely run into the 500 unit limit! To control all this, the interface is amazingly easy: just hold Shift to queue up unlimited orders for anything, from factories to infantry to construction units. Want your guy to repair this building, move to that area, build a radar tower, and then patrol the area? Would you believe five clicks? (Not just waypoints, but a starting target, repair order, and patrol route direct from the factory!)

In conclusion, there has never been a better time to pick up the "best game of all time" (PC Gamer magazine). For ten bucks, you can find more fresh gaming experience than you can in the forty bucks you'd pay for the latest two-dimensional Warcraft knockoff with 30 guys that all look the same. And when you're ready, you can check out the still-active fan following (over 300 players every day on the MSN Gaming Zone).



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