Commanders: Attack of the Genos

The second game to hit Xbox Live Arcade this week, Commanders: Attack of the Genos is a turn based strategy game based in an alternate history. In this timeline the secrets of the atom have been discovered by the start of the 20th Century and by the mid 1920’s the human genome has been cracked and a genetically enhanced race, the Genos have been created. Unfortunately racial division soon arises and the Genos are forced to flee and after a number of years eventually retaliate and attack.

On a basic gameplay level this is an Advance Wars clone, albeit using a 3D engine rather than a top down sprite based approach. The mechanics of the game are very similar with both movement and attack handled using an underlying grid based system and a selection of unit types available to command which have inherent strengths and weaknesses against other unit types. For example scouts are strong versus infantry but weak against anti-armour units.

Unlike Advance Wars however each unit has a number of action points which can be spent on movement and attack rather than just a fixed movement allowance followed by an attack. This should give a bit of flexibility as you could time your movement to allow a couple of attacks or alternatively forgo an attack altogether to move further during a turn, but in reality this means you have to constantly check the number of action points remaining and in this sense it loses some of the fluidity of movement that Advance Wars has mastered.

Commanders: Attack of the Genos looks quite good, the landscape isn’t particularly interesting, it's functional at best, but the 1930’s art deco style of units and buildings is nicely done and makes a change. The story unfolds using 2D static character portraits with the obligatory speech bubbles when characters converse and although they would seem to be in contradiction to the 3D game engine they work quite well, it's just a shame the portraits are a bit bland and aren't more interesting to look at.

Although Commanders: Attack of the Genos isn't on a par with the the game it pays homage too, I found the trial game to be entertaining and it's good to see another turn based strategy appear on Xbox Live. The full version costs 800 MS points to download and features 15 campaign missions and support for off-line and on-line multiplayer.