Command & Conquer1995

Travel to an alternate universe where dark experiments have permanently altered time. Or have they? Soviet tanks crush city after city while Allied cruisers shell bases. Spies lurk, landmines await, and strange new technologies aid both sides in the struggle for ultimate control. In this parallel reality, the mighty Soviet Empire has begun to “liberate” all of Europe. Cities fall and countries collapse before the overwhelming might of the Red Storm. The Allies are scrambling to meet the onslaught, but they have been caught by surprise. Red Alert puts the fate of the world in your hands!

Metal Gear Solid is a stealth game created by Hideo Kojima which follows the MSX2 video games Metal Gear and Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake. Despite a transition to 3D, Metal Gear Solid's gameplay remains similar to his predecessors. The game utilizes a traditional top-down view and the player must navigate the protagonist Solid Snake through the game's areas without being detected. Detection will set off an alarm which draws armed enemies to his location. Conversations with Snake's allies and cutscenes are used extensively to advance the plot and gain more insight into it. Metal Gear Solid is regarded as one of the greatest and most important video games of all time, and helped popularize the stealth genre and in-engine cinematic cutscenes.

X-COM: UFO Defense is a strategy game that combines tactical combat with base management and global defense. Players lead an international organization tasked with defending Earth from an alien invasion. The game unfolds on two levels: a global view where players manage resources, research alien technology, and intercept UFOs, and a tactical combat mode where squad-based battles occur. Players recruit and train soldiers, build bases, and develop new weapons and equipment based on recovered alien technology. Missions involve turn-based combat against aliens in various environments, with permadeath adding tension to each engagement. As the alien threat escalates, players must balance research, defense, and offensive operations to protect Earth's nations from panic and alien infiltration. X-COM: UFO Defense's blend of strategic depth, tactical combat, and atmospheric tension creates a compelling gameplay experience in the face of a global alien threat.

Just because this battle fits in the palm of your hand doesn't mean the stakes are small. On the contrary, this all-or-nothing fight will have you accessing guns, grenades, launchers, and weaponry of all sorts. Players assume command of an army that's out to reclaim a world that's been broken up by warring factions. The battle map is essentially a grid, and moving units is like moving chess pieces on a board -- each of the units can move a specific amount of spaces within this grid, and can only attack at a certain distance from specific enemies. Advance Wars features more than 115 maps, a map editor, head-to-head play via link cable, and an easy-to-understand tutorial mode for beginners.

Building on the foundation of Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter, the sequel is a near-future warfare masterpiece. Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 for the PC screams tactics, and you'll need to bring your best to bear if you are going to get the Ghosts past their latest challenge...

It's 100 years since nuclear warheads totalled the Earth, 40 years since the militant Survivors crawled from their underground bunkers to struggle against the mutated Evolved for control of the surface. With a victory for either side seeming doubtful, many people from both sides fled the conflict 40 years ago and have spent the time regrouping, licking their wounds, and planning for the next assault. Now the New Survivors pour out of the ground, trying to retake the surface. The 'Further Evolved' ride mutant beasts to defend the surface once again. But now there's a whole new factor no-one's accounted for. From a line of dust on the horizon, the Series 9 robotic army, once farming robots, whose purpose in life was lost when the farmland they were built to protect was burned in the nuclear annihilation, and now with revenge in their crazed visors, storm across the land killing anything they can find. The War of the Three Armies is getting underway. Pretty scary huh?

The war continues... X-COM: UFO Defense brought you to a galactic battlefield. X-COM: Terror from the Deep brings the alien terror into a totally new dimension. Seeking to take advantage of a weakened Earth, X-COM's deep space foes unexpectedly change strategy and launch a powerful second front against planet Earth. In the dark depths of vast oceans, long sleeping forces are awakened by reanimation signals sent out across the galactic silence by their interstellar brothers and sisters. Slowly but surely, an army of hibernating alien sea creatures awakens. Your combat now extends to the strange new worlds of the deep where superior alien technologies threaten the very survival of your planet earth.

Dune II is often considered the first mainstream modern real-time strategy game and established many conventions of the genre. Even though set in Frank Herbert's famous Dune universe, the game is only loosely connected to the plot of any of the books or the films based from them. Controlling either of the three Houses, the player must fight a number of battles against the other Houses. In the early levels, the goal is simply to earn a certain number of credits, while in the later missions, all enemies must be destroyed. The single resource in the game is the Spice, which must be collected by harvesters. The spice is converted to credits in a refinery, which are then spent to construct additional buildings and units. There are two terrain types: buildings can only be constructed on stone, while the Spice is only found on sand. However, units moving on sand attract the large sandworms of Dune, who are virtually indestructible and can swallow even large units whole. As levels progress, new and more advanced buildings and units are made available, including structures like a radar station, a repair facility or defense turrets and, for units, various ground troops, light vehicles and tanks. Each House can construct one unique special unit, and, after building a palace improvement, can unleash a unique palace effect.