Uncommon Peopleĭuring the course of Alexander, you'll encounter ever more exotic and deadly foes including Indian War elephants - ivory-tusked juggernauts which turn your men into mush as they butt and bulldoze their way through your ranks. With fortune favouring the bold, you immediately find yourself launching daring attacks on forces you know are vastly superior to your own, spurred on by pastethick jets of adrenalin as you first sweep aside Barbarian hordes, then march towards the bristling spears of the massed Persian armies, whose cities teem with gold. This is a pure, unadulterated cauldron of all-out war and conquest. Unlike Rome, there's no room or need for politics and diplomacy here. With no time to stop off and replenish your forces, you must drive your commanders on through the world, massacring populations to quell uprisings and to raise the instant funds needed to amass a mercenary army as you travel. You can also forget about auto-resolving anything but the most one-sided of battles. Forget fortifying, consolidating or pausing Alexander is a relentless drive towards victory, a blood-spattered surge through hordes of enemies and overwhelming odds in order to reach one seemingly impossible goal. With the clock ticking, every move becomes critical to completing your objective.
With just two small provinces under your control on the far western corner of the world, you must sally out on a bold, unwavering campaign of conquest. Off With Their Headsįrom the moment the luscious 3D turnbased strategic map swells onto your monitor, you're hit by the sheer enormity of your task. In just 100 turns, you must sweep across the land like a typhoon and capture 30 provinces, including ten key enemy cities, which you must then hold on to and protect from rebel armies and hordes of Persian and Barbarian forces intent on reclaiming their conquered lands. Seriously though, could we, sons of bank managers and shop assistants emulate this man's incredible feats of conquest? Would you like to find out? Well, here's your chance.Īlexander - a downloadable expansion pack to the PC's greatest ever RTS game Rome: Total War - places you firmly in the sandals of the great leader himself and charges you with matching Alexander's incredible feats. Especially if we hid his mouse, cut off all his fingers and unplugged his monitor, before distracting him with a hoax call from the office while we laid waste to his leaderless armies. Of course, if he was alive today, any one of us could trounce him at a head-to-head in Rome: Total War, right? No problem. In his short yet glorious life, this young Macedonian king swept across two-thirds of the known world and united it under one banner, often leading his armies to victory against overwhelming odds.
There is, however, one accolade Alexander held that cannot be disputed: military genius. All of these titles and legends have at one time or another been attributed to the mighty congueror Alexander The Great - admittedly some by me in this very review.
A man whose empire stretched from Hungary to India, a warrior who stood 10ft tall (OK, more like 5ft) and fired lightning bolts out of his arse. Ukrainian resistance has been fierce and there have been multiple Russian equipment and logistics failures.Son Of Zeus. A few takeaways that I can share:ġ/ Confirmation that the Russians have fallen behind their timeline. This is likely a further step than Putin’s inner circle anticipated.Ĭhris Murphy leaving classified briefing on Ukraine crisis. and allies are coordinating to not only freeze the assets of Putin and his oligarch allies, but to seize those assets as well. The fight for Kiev will be long and bloody and Ukrainians are rapidly preparing for street to street combat.Ĥ/ The U.S. There is no way for our national security agencies to be nimble enough to support Ukraine if they are operating on the 2020/21 budget.ģ/ The ability to keep supply lines running to Ukraine remains alive, but Russia will try to encircle and cut off Kiev in the next several weeks. 2/DoD and DHS are pressing hard for Congress to end the continuing resolution and get a budget passed.