The first Command and Conquer is one of the greatest videogames ever made. It has everything. It looks great, the soundtrack is fantastic, there's the perfect blend of high-action and cerebral strategy, and it's endlessly replayable. Red Alert is brilliant, too - even now, some 28 years later, I can still hear the sound of Tanya's manic laugh, and that wonderfully gung-ho "cha-ching!" Officially, C&C has been quiet for a while now, but the spirit of the best RTS in history lives on thanks to Fractured Alliance, a gorgeous new military strategy game coming to Steam.
Narrow your eyes and sit slightly back from the screen, and Fractured Alliance looks almost exactly like classic Command and Conquer - even the soundtrack is reminiscent of 'Act on Instinct,' 'Hell March,' and other Frank Klepacki classics. An RTS and strategy game by independent developer Tense, it combines all-terrain warfare with aerial combat and base building, and just got an impressive new trailer which you can see below:
Compared to Tiberian Dawn and the rest of Westwood's opus, gameplay in Fractured Alliance has a couple of extra details. If you want to keep production at a high, you need to capture and hold resource nodes, creating another front for you and your enemy to battle over. There's also a tighter focus on narrative, as you compete against different generals and commanders all with their own back stories and individual styles of combat.
There's a campaign, skirmish mode, and you can play either competitive or co-op multiplayer. Victory in Fractured Alliance also means taking advantage of the landscape. Clifftops provide perfect positions for artillery, while dense forests are the ideal staging posts for surprise infantry ambushes. You can even develop a superweapon that lets you change the weather, so if your opponent has an especially strong air force, you can keep them grounded with hurricanes and maelstroms while you advance on foot.
We're still waiting for a release date for Fractured Alliance, but you can already wishlist it over on Steam.
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