But bear with me while I look over my notes to remind myself why I was going to not like Red Alert 2. Ah, yes, here we go. The storyline is only part of the problem. The overwhelming success of Westwood's RTS series has led to big-budget video shoots for between-mission cutscenes. Of course, "big budget" doesn't ensure it won't be cringe inducing. Red Alert 2's cutscenes consist most notably of Kari Wuhrer prancing around in a belly-revealing tank top and bending over low tables at every opportunity. This is interspersed with footage of fairly well-known character actors trying in vain not to embarrass themselves. There's nothing even remotely compelling in this story, which is little more than a threadbare excuse to link missions. I suppose it might be entertaining on a "it's-so-bad-it's-funny" level, but I stopped enjoying that kind of thing after my umpteenth Chris Roberts game.

My biggest problem is that it seems Westwood has never looked at what other RTS games are doing. There's no other explanation for Red Alert 2's lack of basic RTS amenities. Given the game's pace (and a lack of a speed setting in single player games), why on earth would they make it so hard to move around the map by stubbornly refusing to incorporate any sort of right click controls? Are those guys programming with some sort of one-button Apple IIe mouse? And what good are these silly stilted wall building options? Speaking of which, what good is a "guard" function that doesn't work as advertised? The game won't let you jump to some important events. I can't imagine why Westwood would leave out unit formations, particularly since Red Alert 2 has such a strong emphasis on using combined arms. There's no warning when your units are attacked, which might not be so bad if they weren't simply inclined to stand around and let themselves get shot without returning fire.

Ah, yes, now I'm remembering why I was really supposed to hate Red Alert 2. The AI. With smart titles like Age of Empires II on the market, there's really no excuse to tolerate games that are dumb as a box of rocks. Red Alert 2 is really hurt by its bad AI. You have to meticulously baby-sit your own units, but this is offset by the fact that the enemy AI is incapable of making effective attacks. In the single player campaigns, heavy scripting can hide a lot of the AI's shortcomings, but this just leads to a lot of loading and reloading. For skirmish missions, the hardest level presents a moderate challenge, mainly because the computer seems to cheat egregiously by magically generating extra income. Otherwise, playing Red Alert 2 as a single player game feels futile. It leads to a sort of ennui in which you're just going through the motions and biding your time until your inevitable victory. It's gratifying to see your well orchestrated assaults pay off, but it's not very challenging.