I'm a huge fan of RTS games and have been for a very long time (I used to play the hell out of Dune: battle for Arrakis aka: the first RTS ever). But the RTS genre has been becoming rather tired. Clone after clone of solid RTS, with good game play, but little innovation. More or less, it was the same game, with new paint job. So when I first caught the trailer to R.U.S.E. around the time of E3, I was rather excited, which by the way is an understatement. And since it was being demoed at the Ubi Soft showcase I had to check it out. You could say I was compelled by some dark RTS magic or perhaps the ghost of General Patton.

First of all, the version I got my hands on was on the XBOX 360. I’ve played some RTS games on their controller, and while Microsoft’s developers have made some headway in making menu systems easier to use on a consol, R.U.S.E. is the first game I actually enjoyed playing on an XBOX. The menu system is simple and streamlined, which doesn’t much get in the way of game play. The camera glides smoothly over the battle field and rotates with ease. Another nice feature allows you to zoom from high above the battlespace, down to the nitty gritty of combat, with detailed environments and units slugging it out across muddy, crater pock marked fields or burned out towns and villages. Sadly the XBOX version I saw, was not as pretty as the PC version, which was possibly suffering from some resolution issues.

Graphical issues aside, the game is extremely addicting, and fun. Ruses let you create false offensives, dummy bases, or can let you force your men to fight till the death, cloak their movements, or reveal your enemies movements or even orders for a time.

Something that must be mastered in this title is the use of combined force with these special abilities. WW2 was the first war to use combined forces in dynamic configurations, and R.U.S.E. lets you do just that. For example, by creating a false offensive you can draw off your enemy’s defenses. Then employ radio silence on your forces and move them towards the supply depot you really want to hit, while using bombers and fighters to harass any resistance. Bring up artillery and anti-air emplacements and pound the returning forces once the opponent realizes what’s happening, and you have a taste of what this game offers in terms of tactical genius.

I put the controller back in the hands of the nice lady who showed me the ropes (And probably could kick my ass in this game) moments before my army’s demise, and promoted her to field marshal. But before long, I returned to play till the very end of PAX. After that, I downloaded the open beta which is available for another 7 days on STEAM. It’s taking a lot of willpower to stop playing and write this review, so you get the idea. R.U.S.E. is going to be an awesome addition to the RTS world, and an addictive source of entertainment for the tactical minded.