Like other entries in the best-selling Command & Conquer series, Red Alert 2 is based on all-out war between the Allies and Soviet Russia. Allied forces rely on their technology and firepower, whereas Soviet tactics emphasize their investigation into paranormal and psychic warfare. But the differences are actually subtler than brains vs. brawn or honor vs. terror. Where the Allies use spies, Soviets use terrorists. Where the Allies use Harrier jets, the Soviets launch Kirov zeppelins. And where Soviets unleash terror drones to infiltrate machinery, Allies send out dolphins to patrol the ocean blue.

What's really intriguing about the units is that the balance isn't as critical as it has been in earlier C&C versions. Every unit doesn't seem to have a single, checking counter-balance. Thus, unleashing certain weapons will completely tip the scales in your favor. Kirov zeppelins, for example, are very heavily armored. They can withstand quite a few hits from flak cannons and Patriot missiles while they rain down powerful bombs. Kirovs are slow, and you can spot them a mile away if your spy satellite is deployed, but don't be fooled -- if the Soviets can get five or six Kirovs over an undefended enemy compound, the game can will quickly.

Likewise, five or six Allied aircraft carriers can annihilate an opponent in short order. What's great about carriers is that they never run out of planes. So once you camp offshore and start directing sorties against someone's base, victory is near, even if you have to take out anti-aircraft defenses one by one before you can get to the strategic buildings. The only counter is that carriers can't hit targets deep inside a continent.

What Westwood has apparently done is emphasize faster gameplay over balanced action. According to published reports, they fine-tuned the Tiberian Sun engine quite a bit. In older RTS entries such as Dune 2000, once somebody gained an advantage, the next two hours could turn into a predictable grind. Postponing the inevitable was common. But Red Alert 2 gives each player multiple opportunities to turn things around, putting the suspense back in.

Besides, superweapons aren't the only interesting features. For example, it might not occur to some players to place a few German Shepherd guard dogs around their perimeters. Man's best friend pants and barks nicely, and has a tendency to sit and scratch fleas. Great touches. But it turns out that guard dogs are incredibly effective against infantry, can stop spies and will even take on giant alligators.

That's just one clue to the intricacy of Red Alert 2. Another is the importance of engineers. They're not just good for taking over enemy buildings — they can repair civilian structures, take over neutral energy production and repair bridges. They're vital in some scenarios. You can load up a Blackhawk helicopter with four engineers, fly all over and take over four different energy-producing structures in a short amount of time. Slam down a refinery at each location and the money will flood in. You don't need mobile construction yards to ponderously pace across the prairie — you can control the map in minutes.

There isn't really room here to discuss every new unit and feature, and it will add to your fun as you discover many of them for yourself. Nevertheless, a few of the more outstanding additions deserve mention. One great touch is the improvement in both harvesters. Soviet harvesters are armed, so they can defend ore patches, while Allied harvesters use time displacement to speed up production.

I also liked the way Allied soldiers could dig in, building little sandbagged foxholes to fortify their positions. They can still get run over and destroyed, but it takes longer. When playing with paratroopers, I enjoyed deploying them above cliffs, letting them dig in and watching them blast away at enemy patrols that wandered along below them.

One of my favorite new units is the she-warrior Tanya. This new unit is part Lara Croft, part Dark Angel. She has a menacing cackle for a laugh, is fearless in the face of danger and places demolition charges with abandon. Tanya is a crack shot, capable of devastating a squad of soldiers one by one. In fact, it's amazing to watch her stand her ground in the face of 10 infantry soldiers bearing down on her, only to dispatch them in order.

The scenarios in Red Alert 2 are well-paced. Just when I was getting a little tired of starting out yet another level with power generators, ore mining and barracks, the mission was to sneak Tanya into the enemy lair and blow up a key building. There were a couple tricks to master, but it was a nice break from the routine base-building.

To mix up the action, players can skirmish against forces from Cuba, Libya, Korea, etc. These are shorter rounds that you can control. The computer can scramble up a new map, or you can increase the difficulty and add superweapons. It's a great way to keep the game evergreen, adding variety.

Multi-player adds a whole new dimension after crushing the computer. The first thing that surprises you is selecting your side in a game. It isn't Allies versus Soviets, it's Libya vs. France, or Iraq vs. England. Like the skirmishes, you can choose options for superweapons and crates when you set up the game.

Unfortunately, the massive amount of lag hurts gameplay over a modem. Units could not react to commands in time. Commands like "move until a unit appears" or "guard when moves" are useless, because the unit won't start attacking until the target is past. I once had 50 (yes, I counted) conscripts devoured by a single guard dog because they didn't react fast enough.

The same sort of thing happens when attacked by terror drones, a kind of mechanical spider that wrecks machinery. The drones go inside a tank or harvester, wait a while, then blow up the unit and move on to the next target. They're also very fast, scurrying across the terrain. In modem games, tanks don't have enough time to attack the terror drone. It's very frustrating and only a LA N game escapes these physics.

However, the multiplay definitely brings more spice to the game. Westwood introduced something called the World Domination Tour. You log on to the tour and then pick your side, Allied or Soviet. You are taken to a map where you can view how many countries are controlled by your side, how many are controlled by the enemy, and which countries you can fight for today. Each day, four countries are up for grabs, and you can go in and fight a battle with someone from the other side in order to tally up a win or loss. At the end of the day, whoever has the most wins in that country gets to keep it. Thus, you become part of something greater than newbie games. A big plus!

All in all, the Westwood team deserves a huge round of applause for their attention to detail, especially in the design of their human interface and their training and documentation. Not only is the manual suitable for reading cover to cover, it serves as a good reference. After playing for just a little while, I found myself going back to the book to see what I was missing. I also appreciated the tripod-shaped quick reference card, which displays keyboard shortcuts and explanations of multi-player tactics.

I liked the video cutscenes between levels. The actors had fun with their vignettes and seemed to keep in mind that they're not producing epics, they're spicing up a video game. The U.S. general is played by Barry Corbin, the gruff old ex-astronaut from Northern Exposure, while Tanya is Kari Wurher (from VH1's Out of Sync). Yuri is Udo Kier from Armageddon. They all add a nice touch.

Credit has to be given to the opening tutorials, which were excellent. Any trepidation I felt about starting to learn a complicated game was quickly dissolved. I was up and running in no time. I really appreciated that. I also appreciated the speeded-up gameplay, and the ability to queue up unit production. I once had 30 different motorized units coming out of the heavy machinery factory while I was off admiring Tanya's work. And by adding a rally point, the units didn't just pile up around the inside of the base.

There are very few nitpicks to harp on, but here are a few. I wasn't always sure if I was advancing through the levels correctly when I first got started. I seemed to get stuck in the early rounds and repeated a couple. On a general note, it seemed like there should be more of a punishment for mowing down unarmed civilians — I kept expecting them to mobilize into a partisan army. Harvesters still have a bad habit of driving straight into enemy territory to find ore, when a plentiful supply is nearby. And there are still times when perfectly good weapons will be busy doing nothing while an attack occurs right next to them.

There didn't seem to be many missions — only around 20 total. Maybe the online multiplayer tournament makes up for that, but I expect there will be many expansion packs to beef up the scenarios. I'd like to do some of that "expanding" myself, but there's no map editor.

In a game that uses giant squids, Crazy Ivan and weather machines, it's hard to predict what new units will surface in subsequent releases. Motorcycles? Humvees? Phased plasma rifle in da 40-watt range? Sure, that's it — a little Terminator running around would be great. He could even say "I'll be back" as he leaves on a mission.

U.S. General George S. Patton once declared, "Compared to war, all other forms of human endeavor shrink to insignificance." Maybe that's why real-time strategy games, when they work well, are so entertaining. Blasting away at criminals, vehicles, and assorted forest wildlife is fun, but it gets old after awhile if there's no point. Likewise, simulations are kind of intriguing as you build more and more complicated communities, but the threat of war puts a real charge into your decisions.

Nothing like saving the world to while away the hours. Plus, I could click on the dogs and the dolphins all night, just to hear them acknowledge me. I guess I miss those old Lassie and Flipper re-runs more than I thought. Woof!