Expansion packs are a tricky bunch, especially when it comes to games in the real-time strategy genre.  RTS games are all about balance, about making sure there’s a pro for every con, a counter effect to everything.

Expansion packs give me the heebies.  Prequels, more so.  I know many gamers, myself included, have been burned by one too many expansion packs where a developer is just trying to cash in on the success of an original title by throwing out new content that isn’t quite worth the money, and feels completely tacked on.  And the success rate for prequels, in any format, is slim enough that the mere mention of the word to spook a lot of people.

So I walked into EA Los Angeles expecting a mishmesh of ideas out of Command & Conquer 3: Kane’s Wrath.  If I explain it to you using its base concepts, you’d probably think the same.  It’s an expansion pack that’s introducing new subfactions (along with their related units) to game that’s been through several balancing acts, it serves as both a prequel and a sequel to Command & Conquer 3, and it’s trying to be more than just an expansion pack.  It tries to be definitive; it wants to be more than just a $30 content update that will help bring in the dough.

Hit the jump.  We’ve got a full report on Kane’s Wrath.

Kane’s Wrath, the follow up title to Command & Conquer 3, serves as an expansion pack of sorts. It begins immediately after the events of Tiberian Sun, following the aftermath of the Firestorm incident.  It covers the events of the Brotherhood of Nod in the period between Tiberian Sun and Command & Conquer 3, then elaborates on that further by progressing into the timeframe post-C&C3.  Our hands-on experience with the game was limited to skirmish and multiplayer modes, while elements of the single player campaign and storyline were demonstrated to us in non-playable form.  The game is mostly feature-complete, with additional steps being taken to polish the experience visually, as well as balance the units to ensure that nothing is too overpowered.  The majority of our playtime was presented on the PC, with a few glimpses at the Xbox 360 version.  

For starters, let’s talk about the brief glimpses we had at the single player campaign.  Taking a page from Command & Conquer 3, Kane’s Wrath presents its story in a highly cinematic model.  Joseph Kucan reprises his role as Kane, the leader of the Brotherhood of Nod, and he’s back in full style here, practically tearing up the scenery in Shatner-esque style in some of the cutscenes.  Kucan is joined by some serious Hollywood talent.  Carl Lumbly (Alias, Cagney & Lacey, Battlestar Galactica) plays Brother Marcion, a member of Nod that goes astray.   Natasha Henstridge (Species) plays Alexa Kovacs, a mysterious follower of Kane.  

The single player storyline has quite a bit of surprising detail attached to it.  Without going into anything specific (hey, we don’t want to spoil the surprises!), fans of the C&C series will find some serious payoff here, with a few twists in the story that are going to surprise both the dedicated fans and the uninitiated players.

Kane’s Wrath is taking the already rich gameplay model and expanding upon it by introducing six new subfactions, two for each of the three main factions.  GDI is being enhanced with the Steel Talons and the ZOCOM, the Brotherhood of Nod will grow stronger with the Black Hand and the Marked of Kane, and the Scrin will find their ranks enhanced by Reaper-17 and Traveler-59.  

And with each new subfaction comes a new series of units. Some of these tweak existing units to bring new gameplay concepts out, like ZOCOM’s Rocket Harvester (which works just like it sounds) and GDI’s Hammerhead (an aircraft with garrison slots).  But it’s not all minor upgrades here.  Some of the units are being created from the ground up.  

Take the Scrin Mechapede for example.  It all starts with building the head of a mechanical centipede.  Once it’s completed, you’ll build modules that attach to the head, in order to customize it to your liking.  You can build a Mechapede that focuses on anti-infantry combat, one that specializes in vehicles, or build one that’s all purpose.  

Elite units come into play as well, and even those manage to be more than just basic units.  Typically requiring massive amounts of construction time, power, and Tiberium in order to develop them, Elite units are the best of the best. But Electronic Arts’ development team is taking things a step further by putting letting you deck those out. GDI’s MARV tank is the perfect example of this.  Although it’s the largest tank available in the GDI arsenal, you can garrison units into sections of the tank, and the visual design of the MARV changes as you garrison troops.  It also changes depending on what kind of troops you’re garrisoning.  So if you’re about to enter a Red Zone with heavy anti-aircraft defenses, you’ll want a MARV with plenty of missile troops locked away inside.

So how does it play?  Surprisingly well, all things considered.  While some balance issues were evident during our hands-on playtime, the game doesn’t just feel like it’s adding units for the sake of getting your expansion money.  Each of the subfactions plays differently than the others, and the unique units in each subfaction really help give each of them an identity, rather than making them all feel like a knockoff of one another.  

At the same time, this is still Command & Conquer 3 on the PC in the areas where it counts.  You’re not going to need to re-learn the UI, and things aren’t going to be radically different here.

The Xbox 360 version is still being worked on, and EA intends to have it available for simultaneous release with the PC version.  Our look at the 360 edition of Kane’s Wrath was limited, but we did get a chance to look at the game in Skirmish mode.

The most obvious update is the new Radial Wheel, shown above.  It’s designed to give you access to your build queues and commands from anywhere on the map, at any time.  Pulling the right trigger brings up a context sensitive menu, accessing a building’s build queue if you have a structure selected, or allowing you to access any building’s build queue when you’re out and about on the map.  Navigation between menus is done by using the left thumbstick to pick an option on the menu, hitting A to confirm, and pressing X to switch back to the top level.

It sounds confusing when you write it down.  In reality, it’s surprisingly comfortable.  So much so, in fact, that after I sat down with the Xbox 360 version of the game, I had figured out the Radial Wheel in under 20 seconds.  That’s not a mark of my skills as much as it’s a testament to the design structure of the wheel.  It’s easy and comfortable, and replaces the clunky queue/build system in the original Command & Conquer 3 on the Xbox 360.  And that’s coming from someone that found Command & Conquer 3 on the Xbox 360 to be unplayable.  After years playing Galactic Battlegrounds and Age of Empires casually, I found the initial release of Command & Conquer 3 on the Xbox 360 to be prohibitive against my instincts.  It just felt wrong.  But the Radial Wheel… it feels much, much better.  The Radial Wheel made me feel like I had a chance to play competitively, even if I’m ultimately going to lose to players with far superior skill.

The Radial Wheel is still undergoing some design tweaks and customization, however.  Most unfortunate is the Construction Yard’s button layout when starting the game, which has "Pack Up" as the default option.  It’s also lacking any ability to group units from it, and since the old L-trigger/D-Pad command structure is completely removed in Kane’s Wrath, this left us without the ability to group units.  We voiced our concerns, though.  Plenty of notes were taken on the issue and the developers assured us that this would be given serious consideration prior to release.

The Xbox 360 version of Kane’s Wrath looks and plays in a similar manner as the original title.  Electronic Arts plans to ship the Xbox 360 version as a standalone retail disc, but still intends to keep it at an expansion level price.  There are no plans to release the game as a DLC update to the original 360 release of Command & Conquer 3

Kane’s Wrath is shaping up to be a pretty substantial expansion pack.  With a Spring 2008 release schedule, the team at EALA has their work cut out for them, with fans eyeing their work intently.  Between a story-focused single player campaign that has a heavy cinematic bent and a multiplayer experience that’s introducing new subfactions, units, and maps, it’s obvious that Kane’s Wrath is prepared to pony up. Personally, we can’t wait to see this when it hits retail shelves.