Rating: 
Summary: Adequate Opposition
Review: Ground control was a truly amazing game.
Overview:
Two groups, the government millitairy and religious cult that saved a large part of the population of the world during a nuclear war. Alien artifacts are later discovered and you must fight the religious group to reclaim them. The religious group talks about them as some sort of "god's cleansing". The plot is very interesting, although involving the overused 'alien artifacts on earth'. Here is a rating of this game on five characteristics. Mechanics and Physics: 4/5
Graphics: 5/5
Sound and Music: 5/5
Difficulty: 5/5
Multi-Play: 5/5
Customation: 4/5 The mechanics are near perfect. Sometimes, you will see some terrain that seems to be of passable but really isn't. Also, a large part of the game is positioning your units so the artillery or weak units don't get attacked or hiding spies where they can't be seen. Scouts/spies are often hard to hide, even when you hide them in a forest on top of a hill. The easiest way to position them is below eye level in a valley or behind a hill. The graphics are astounding. From the blasts of the infantry to the beams of the hovercraft, you will find yourself completely lost in it. Bombers have nice fuzzy plasma bombs and the artillery makes great blasts. Also, you can heal units and even the healing 'beam' looks great. Sounds and music are average, nothing special... but none of them are even partially annoying. The game is relatively difficult. The easiest missions consist of seeking and destroying. Protecting units and defending areas are often harder, providing that you can't step back and recoup from the battles. No problems in this section. The multi player is great fun. The objective is to destroy the enemy APC or commanding unit. Reinforcements are delivered every so often. There are also maps that have plots and pre-configured scripts for variations on play. Lastly, the game is greatly configureable. You can make maps, which account for much of the customization. If you are expecting customization on Unreal Tournament's level, don't look here. The editor is above average and is a great feature. Hopefully this review helps you lean favorably towards buying this game.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting, if uncomplicated
Review: Just bought the game, and have to say I like it. It isn't a traditional RTS, as you have no economy, gather no resources, and build no buildings or units. Instead, you just start with some units, and go kill stuff. It's pretty straightforward. Before each mission, you can customise your squads and dropships however you like. You have several basic types of unit:
infantry
tank ("terradyne")
floaty tank ("hoverdyne")
flying thing ("aerodyne")
and heavy weapon ("rocket terradyne", Anti-Air, Artillery) Each of these units comes in several flavors, such as "scout" "medium" "heavy." You can further customise each squad as "Offensive" "Speed" "Defensive" or "Balanced." Defensive means the squad is equipped with additional armor, etc. The in game controls are simple. The camera is easy to control (arrow keys to move, mouse to look around, pgup and pgdown do zoom in/out.) You kill stuff. Simple, relatively fast gameplay. You can find it cheap, and with the settings cranked up, it still looks good. All you could ask for from ten dollars worth of game.
Rating:
Summary: Blow the dust off and enjoy Ground Control again
Review: I just recently found an old PC Gamer magazine demo disc with Ground Control on it. I loaded it up and played the 3 level demo and was hooked. I purchased the full version and was so sorry that this one passed me by when it was "new". The camera control and angles are so awsome and extremely easy to use, perhaps a tip some of the other design houses could incorporate. The story is good and just when you think it's the same old run of the mill plot it will throw you a curve and just have you enjoying it even more. The unit control is very interesting, being that you control squads not just one person or vehicle at a time. I guess to sum it all up, this is just a great RTS and right now be it that it is one of the old ones... Getting a good new game is fine, re-disovering a great old one is even better.
Rating:
Summary: Ground Control
Review: After having played trough Ground Control twice, I can safely recommend it to any RTT lover out there. If you are looking for realism, read on. For starters, the Swedish Armed Forces shows up in the list of people contributing to realism. Having the Army help you out in making a war-based game should be like the White House helping you set up a school student Democracy (provided they remove Bush, of course). Put shortly, Ground Control is more like the Sudden Strike genre than the Age of Empires genre: Yes, you have an army, but you don't build it; instead, your forces are dropped by dropship from orbit into the mission area. The storyline in Ground Control starts like any other RTT cliché: You are to perform various missions to conquer territory held by the enemy, in this case the planet Krig-7B. You are a major in the Crayven Corporation, fighting the religious corporation named the Order of the New Dawn. Early in the game, however, the plot takes an interesting turn: It becomes clear that the planet has hosted a huge war millions of years ago. Left behind are some strange pillars, some of them 10 storeys tall, impervious to weapons fire, the symbols on their sides radiating some strange red glow. Additionally, a defecting Order Bishop, dying from the wounds inflicted on him as he fled from his own unit, warns you of some project the Order is carrying out, linked to the pillars. As you progress, you'll encounter many life-like (behaviour-vise) and characters that gives the game world a more realistic feel. Second of all, the interface. Name one other game that has all the information about a group of units (unit type, hotkey, formation, movement type, aggressive stance, and hit points) squeezed into a transparent little box smaller than your thumb? Name one game where all the interface buttons are transparent and take up less than a tenth of your screen, and can even be hidden (and I mean completely hidden, not "hidden with only some small tabs indicating where they used to be"-hidden. And name one game where camera movement is easier than Ground Control's "move your mouse to the edge of the screen to rotate and pitch and press Page Up/Down to zoom in our out or to pan". You don't have to memorize 6 buttons to move the camera: Knowing how to use a mouse and the location of the Page Up and Page Down buttons has you all set. The third and fourth points, which should in hindsight have been the first as they are what most players look for when buying a game, are the game's graphics and sound: Both music and graphics in the game are awesome. You can see the empty shells flying from the soldiers guns as they fire their weapons; small birds buzzing around in the tall grass, and The creators of the game have done their best to interpret sound as a realism element. They have succeeded: Move your camera close to some tall grass and you can hear the buzzing insects. Move it up over a mountain-top and hear the howling wind. Move it up close to a tank and the engine roar grows louder. Add to this the spectacular music that is triggered by the game (in one mission, the music starts when you initiate your attack on an enemy base), adding a feel of emotion, and you've got a great job from the developing team. The game plays fairly like chess in some ways: Before a mission, you'll be issued a set number of squads, with each unit type having its own abilities and weaknesses. For example, if you are issued an infantry squad, you can choose between the anti-infantry Marine or the stealthy Jæger. Aircraft squads are divided into Scouts, Fighter, Assault, and Bomber "Aerodynes". Tanks are divided into Scout, Light, Battle, and Heavy "Terradynes". Heavy units are divided into anti-tank Rocket, Anti-Air, and Artillery Terradynes. Once you have customized your type of squad, you'll be able to customize the behaviour of the squad: Balanced, Scout (or Speed for some units), Aggressive, and Defensive. Then, you can customize the units' special weapons and equipment. In Ground Control, units are not moved individually, but in squads. This has three purposes: First of all, it increases realism, as units in real life are also divided into squads. Second, it reduces micromanagement, as you can move for example move all your artillery units at once without having to drag-and-drop select them every time you want them all moved. Third, it greatly helps the experience/reward system: If you have played games like Force Commander, you'll know how much micromanagement went into individual experience. In Ground Control, it's more like "my Marine Infantry gained experience", instead of "two of the six stormtroopers I brought into battle gained experience as they fired first". The size of a squad depends on the type of unit: Infantry squads have as many as 4-6 units, tanks have four units, and artillery/AA is comprised of a single unit. There are two campaigns in the game; the Corporation campaign and the Order campaign. The corporation campaign is played first, followed by the Order campaign, where you get a whole new range of units (which are still divided into Tanks, Aircraft, Assault, and Infantry for you to make the transfer easier) and a whole interface colour skin. GC's two-side campaigns could end up being played like Force Commander's "conquer the galaxy in the Imperial campaign, then defect and liberate the same scenarios in the rebel campaign" plot, except it is brilliantly saved from that fate by the mysterious/spooky alien pillars
Rating:
Summary: Saturated with Strategy
Review: This game is amazing. Although it is old, the 3D grapics are phenominal. Control of the camera has never been easier, or less restricting. Pathfinding is flawless, clipping is consummate. The storyline is also very engaging. The rendering of people during the pre-mission breifing is not so hot, but it is also completely unimportant.
The best part of this game, which sets it apart from other RTS games, is the pure, unadulterated strategy aspect. It is squad based, so there's no micromanaging individual units. You are left with a realistic amount of control over your squads, free to focus on tactics. The formations and positions you choose to maintain in this game are crutial. And you get a set amount of customiable units for each missoin. One must actually think stategically, unlike many "build up fast and rush in a mellee" RTS games.
Dont let the price tag fool you, folks. I've never played a better RTS.
Rating:
Summary: A compelling game
Review: This game is one of the best. It has been out for nearly 2 years and it still is a strong contender for packing action into single player, and more importantly, multiplayer. This game allows you to to come out "running hot", no resource building, just pick from a multitude of units and goto the game , either as a lone wolf or as a team. A really neat feature is the 3D camera that allows you to pan everywhere, birdseye view to underneath your own units. The Ground Control community is active and vibrant, clans abound, map makers introduce new maps all the time. And most players/clans are willing to help all up and over the learning curve. This is a very fast paced game. For the price it may be your best buy.
Rating:
Summary: Lost Gem
Review: Ground Control is pure action and strategy with the most inticing graffics and sound you will ever see or here! The camera views are astounding as you move about the action or pan in and out. This is how SC should have been made!! Truly an (AWSOME) piece of work.
Rating:
Summary: Get out of that SCV and FIGHT!
Review: There aren't very many real time strategy games that don't use resource management, and of the few there are, most of them redefined the term 'bomb.' This is one of the few that did not. Let me point out the merits of not having resources, for all you StarCraft maniacs out there. Instead of sitting in your base like a coward, building your defenses so you'll survive that next rush the enemy is sending at you, it's just one big fight straight to the death. This gets great when you have more than two people playing, as you can have engagements that make Omaha Beach look like a one-on-one pistol duel. Oh, and by the way, rushes don't work. The gameplay is much like one of the older, similarly excellent games out there- Myth 2. The camera works in similar fashion, and you have a fixed amount of units at the start of each mission. In multiplay you can either have a one-time drop or periodical reinforcements. The difference between the games, other than the obvious change of setting, is that you have finer control over your units. You can select equipment and special weapons, all of which are quite tempting and will make a big difference in battle. The game includes 30 single play missions and a tutorial that will get any seasoned strategy gamer familiar with the interface in under ten minutes. For the first 15 Crayven missions, you play as Major Sarah Parker, whose voice might be a bit familiar (think Planescape Torment). For the second 15 New Dawn missions, you lead as Deacon Jared Stone. Surviving squads in each half of the game carry over to subsequent missions, accruing experience along the way and becoming more effective depending on how many enemies they kill. The plot really is quite interesting, and the missions should be challenging for even hard core strategy gamers. For the StarCraft players who can't live without the security blanket of their base, there's always the 'easy' difficulty setting. The graphics and engine are top-notch, and definitely one of the reasons this game deserves high marks. Even now, the models and effects are very impressive, and especially when compared to the other RTS games. Stability is not an issue- I have yet to see a single crash after about 24 hrs of gameplay, which is better than I can say for most of the games I've played. Even at a higher price than this, Ground Control is a steal. If you haven't played it yet, and are even remotely interested in real time strategy, get it while you can!
Rating:
Summary: freakin awesome
Review: to start off this game has incredible graphics... it just cant be equaled when you send a group of fighters in to duel with the AI's fighters while your tanks duke it out on the ground and you can see every minute detail of the battle from the casing spewing out of the machine guns, to the shells popping out of the tanks, to that beautiful game winning scene of a nuclear blast wiping out the enemies defenses... to finish this incredibly long sentence and review i must say
BUY THIS GAME!!!
Rating:
Summary: the best Strategy game ever
Review: its one of the best game I ever played or maybe the best one, it change the history of the strategy games , its completey 3D you can go with the camera where ever you want ,under tank ,above clouds,its magnivesant, the about the graphic,in this game you dont have to build all you have to do is fight and fight and fight, you feel that you ar in real war and each solider is very very expinsive, all I can say : YOU HAVE TO PLAY IT ,ITS VERY CHEAP MAN.
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