Review by: Brian Clair

CyberJudas puts you in the role of a newly-elected Shadow President. You rule the United States through a high-security virtual reality chair and computer network aided only by your cabinet. There is no Congress, no gridlock, no partisan bickering, just you and, the CyberJudas. One of your cabinet members is a traitor who wants to destroy you for an unknown reason. Well hidden within the Shadow Network, the CyberJudas has managed to take control over some presidential decisions such as assassinations.

Your duty is to rule the country and to some extent as the most powerful leader on earth, the world. Your second, and foremost duty though is to stop the CyberJudas from destroying you and dragging the world into war. The game helps you by giving you a special operative known only as Tracer to help find data and evidence to stop the CyberJudas. Sound easy? It’s not! The CyberJudas will also be trying to stop you by destroying your reputation and popularity which leads to impeachment or by convincing a world leader though his/her actions to have you murdered. It’s a tangled web the CyberJudas weaves, are you up to the challenge?

CyberJudas (the game), is the most detailed and in-depth strategy game I’ve played in years. You must be able to handle every nuiance, every aspect, of the game and quickly! As I mentioned above, not only must you be President of the U.S. — creating fiscal budgets, worrying about re-election, etc. but to a large degree you must rule the world. You have the power to start wars, regulate trade, and more. Nations can rise and fall by your command if you so desire. To help make the game super-detailed, Merit has integrated the 1993 CIA World Factbook. Everything in this game is accurate and real to the year 1992 and will unfold, if you let it, just as history did.

A nice thing about CyberJudas is that it doesn’t just throw you into a super complex game, it has 3 distinct levels of play. The game comes with a detailed 79 page manual with describes all the aspects of the game, but if you want to jump right in, you can play: The Presidentail Simulator or the Cabinet Wars. The simulator doesn’t include the CyberJudas, you simply run the world. The Cabinet Wars includes everything from the simulator but your Cabinet will take an extensive role, vying for power against each other and you. Once you’ve gotten the hang of things and read the manual (a must in this game), you can start on the real game – the CyberJudas Gambit. The Gambit includes all the other elements but adds in the CyberJudas and a much more active world to deal with. This is the real game and challenge.