Epic conclusion? More like epic fail!
While some fans overreact and call C&C 3 along with its add-on, Kane's wrath, rubbish, it really wasn't. It caught at least some of that dark tiberium universe spirit and had mostly good unit design and enjoyable gameplay. The only problem it had was not patching the game properly. Shame. But then along came C&C 4 and I decided to give the game a benefit of the doubt, since I've played the beta and well... It wasn't disastrous. I was however keeping my hopes up for single player. Let's brake down both. First up, multiplayer:
it can be really fun and enjoyable, but DON'T go in and play 1v1. The game simply isn't made for that. Team play really shines here, and with a good team you'll enjoy the game. For a VERY short time that is. With no bases and forced economy, things can become VERY boring pretty fast. Some people like the no base system and I'm not going to bash those, because that can be fun. But it isn't very well done in C&C 4. It feels rushed and half-baked. The second problem is, once you reach level 20, you have nothing to play for. All the units are unlocked and there are no surprises left. So while multiplayer can be fun, it is only so for a limited period of time.
And now single player. The mode I was expecting very much of. The epic conclusion to the saga. Does it deliver? Not even in your most pleasant dreams. First dissapointment is the number of missions. The first three tutorial missions are the same for Nod and GDI. After those missions you chose your faction, and you're treated to a small number of missons per faction, which don't last nearly long enough to justify their number. With the limited crawler system the missions are boring and too repetitive. I've finished the WHOLE game in roughly 5 hours, and that's on hard difficulty. The cutscenes are dissapointing too. They are supposed to be driving the story, but the script is just awful. Kane is back of course and Joe Kucan is amazing as always, but limited by storywritting which isn't on par with any of its predecessors. I'm not going to spoil the ending for anyone, but let me just tell you this: the final cutscene in both endings is a joke and it is not epic at all.
For all Scrin lovers, they are not featured in the game, not even as a non-playable faction.
So, what's the best thing in this game? The music. The soundtrack is really good, and has some memorable tracks. Sadly though everything else lacks.
Final words:
I'm sorry I've spent money on this one. I shouldn't have preordered it at all. Word of advice for every serious RTS player: don't buy it, unless you like teamplay so much, you're willing to look beyond the repetitive gameplay.