Success in the two campaigns is also attainable for most average RTS players. The game offers four standard difficulty settings, and while no training mode is available, the first few missions of both campaigns do a relatively adequate job of getting you up to speed. The pace of the single player mode is fair, but does get quite difficult in the later missions. Luckily you can save at any time, a feature absent in some of the titles competing with Dark Reign 2 this year. Winning in the instant action mode or online against human opponents is another interesting aspect. Dark Reign 2 offers an instant-action mode which can be customized to fit any style of play. You can select maps, amount of AI players, turn on and off in-game features and determine the amount of resources available. The same sort of options are available in multiplayer, in which up to 32 players can join. Either through Sierra's Won.net or direct TCP/IP, Dark Reign 2, like Total Annihilation achieves its greatest success in multiplayer mode.

The features that make the single player aspect so good also add excellence to the online experience. Nicely balanced but unique opposing forces represent the same quality that has made Blizzard's Starcraft such a huge success. Multiplayer is also one of Dark Reign 2's strengths, because it's not impacted by the game's shortcomings in artificial intelligence. As I mentioned earlier, I really liked the original Dark Reign because it was the first RTS title I played that gave players control over a specific unit's AI -- how it would react in certain situations, whether it would return fire when threatened, or at what point it would return to base for repair. Pandemic has maintained the trademark for the prequel, and even expanded on the amount of control per unit.

Unfortunately they've not included a number of other features that veterans of the RTS genre have now come to expect. Though it's desperately needed, Dark Reign 2 offers no way for players to put units or squads into formations. While you can make platoons out of your infantry and tank squadrons, there's no way to control the formation in which they fight, move or align themselves. Myth introduced us to the power of this feature, and recent offerings such as Shogun have established it as a necessary feature in all RTS releases. The terrain in Dark Reign 2 is so complex that not having the ability to position your units creates the need for a lot of micromanagment -- something the unit-specific AI is supposed to do away with. Couple the lack of formations to the suspect pathfinding and you've got a potential disaster. Bunched up units are frequent visitors of canyons and narrow passages, making them prime targets and overly susceptible to aerial attacks.

Another aspect that really frustrates me is the lack of control you have over movement. A really cool feature is that all of the units in Dark Reign 2 move at different speeds, depending on the type and slope of terrain they're on. What sometimes makes this an annoying feature is the lack of control you have over squad or platoon movement. Give a large group of units the command to move from point A to point B and the one thing you can guarantee is that they'll invariably move out in single file. The problems this causes, especially when the line encounters resistance, are many. In order to avoid your army of twelve being annihilated by a group of six, players are forced to micromanage. While this is acceptable in early campaign missions, the later scenarios and even multiplayer games are hampered by this shortcoming.

Still, in the end, I really enjoyed my experience with Dark Reign 2. I love being able to build a few infantry scouts, give them exploration orders and then concentrate on getting my base set up so I could conquer the world. Also, I've come this far in the review and not mentioned the graphics. Well, chalk it up to saving the best for last. Not since the original Myth has a strategy game come along and made this sort of impact to the world of computer graphics. I would normally leave this sort of praise for the first-person shooter genre, but Dark Reign 2 is absolutely stunning. Pandemic's newly created engine blows away anything the strategy genre's ever seen, and easily positions itself as one of the best looking games of the year. Three dimensional, undulating terrain will never been the same. Dark Reign 2 looks incredible and while there are some issues with its interface and artificial intelligence, it plays fairly well.

Dark Reign 2 is a massive improvement over its predecessor, especially in terms of the way it looks. It is without a doubt the best looking RTS title to date, and with its super camera system is destined to be the benchmark which other forthcoming games in the genre look to for guidance. Dark Reign 2 includes a vast array of other features that will prevent it from becoming outdated any time soon. It sports excellent online play with tons of play styles, and has a developer that is committed to continued support of the product, providing weekly downloads to enhance the playability; it even comes equipped with a nice editor that should prove a big hit with the mod community. Overall Dark Reign 2 is a positive example of why the RTS genre should embrace the third dimension. Despite its somewhat inadequate interface and flawed AI, Dark Reign 2 delivers a high-quality experience. If you're trying to decide which of the latest 3D strategy offerings to buy, Dark Reign 2 is a good choice. It's not quite as polished as Sierra's heavily tactical Ground Control, but it's as good or better than anything else, including Earth 2150.