Review by: Jonathan Houghton
Published: February 24, 2001

Many genres in computer entertainment have gone through a process of evolution from their roots in the mid- to late 80′s. Adventure games were conceived many moons ago with the first Zork, and now the genre has advanced to give us such masterpieces as Escape From Monkey Island and The Longest Journey. Other genres have had similar success in the years that they have been gracing our screens. Real-time strategy is a genre that has advanced a great deal, despite early indications that it would be filled with nothing but clones of early groundbreakers such as Warcraft 2 and Starcraft. Developers gradually showed us that definite improvements could be made on the original formula, many times to such a radical degree that only the most basic concepts would tie the games together in the same genre. Regardless of the seeming innovation-without-end, there are still companies who come up with games that tend to closely follow the roots of a genre without really doing anything new. German developer Planet4 has released just such an entry into the strategy realm with Thandor: The Invasion.

As with so many other strategy titles thrown at the world market these days, Thandor falls into one of the two primary categories, which can classically be defined as medieval fantasy or science techno-fiction. Thandor follows the latter of these two, preferring to use ion-cannons and machine guns over halberds and battle-magic. The storyline in Thandor weaves a tale of typical galactic destruction at the hands of a despicable warlike race called the Golraths. Human worlds banded together, forming a great alliance to defend themselves against the brutality of the Golraths, who were apparently quite keen at exterminating or enslaving most anyone who got in their way. Eventually the Golraths were defeated by the Alliance, ending a potentially interesting chapter in the Thandor saga, and leaving players with the leftovers. In short, the once proud Alliance began to fracture after a measly ten years, with bickering and infighting becoming commonplace. Eventually, what few troops remained loyal to the principles of the Alliance banded together, determined to bring their wayward brethren back into the fold — one way or another.

You will take up the persona of an alliance commander, set with the task of carrying out your orders in this civil war. Through a combination of Diplomacy and direct warfare, you will use every resource in your power to bring all planets back under the firm, but loving hand, of the Alliance. In the battlefields of the future, warfare has naturally evolved to include technologically enhanced versions of land, sea and air warfare; basic man-to-man combat has been all but eliminated. Your command will consist of a small economy to support your troops and a firm military presence to wipe out enemies and accomplish objectives. Normally you will be given a very generic set of orders to carry out. These orders will often consist of things like securing different areas or clearing a sector of all enemies. When you complete your objectives, or are destroyed in trying, you will be presented with a video depending on the level you have reached in the single player campaign. To stand any chance of succeeding in your missions, you must first grasp some of the fundamentals behind Thandor’s gameplay, much of which is identical to other titles in the genre.