The tiberium is the answer!
Seeing the Tiberium universe is a welcome reunion. GDI and Nod are still battling it out but this time they have to contend with a new alien Scrin faction. These guys have a large presence in the game though their personality isn't as strongly developed as the GDI or Nod. Along with the large campaigns for Nod and GDI, you'll get the chance to play a bonus four mission Scrin campaign after completing the other two.
Also back are the famous live-action cutscenes that fans love so much. EA stayed true to the original series with a campy, cheesy, silly sci-fi plot and we're plenty happy about it. There are a surprising number of TV and movie actors playing roles here and while their acting talent isn't exactly put to the test, they're still pretty fun to see in roles like this. Who doesn't want to see Billy Dee Williams and Michael Ironside on screen together? It's like a B-movie bonanza. The Scrin campaign cutscenes had to take a different tack since I don't think anyone wanted to see a guy in a foam rubber suit gurgling like an alien. Thankfully it's awesome and effective in its simplicity fitting perfectly into the overall cutscene structure while maintaining a definitive alien perspective.
The campaign structure progresses well. Locations range across globe on three different types of terrain. Missions themselves usually involve either base defense or destruction of one kind or another. While most missions were fairly predictable, creativity wasn't totally absent, especially in the Nod campaign where missions were designed to highlight their stealth capabilities. There's also a good variety of secondary missions on every map granting plenty of gameplay objectives. The campaign AI rarely forces your hand, allowing players to sit back and relax aside from some ramped up and difficult later missions.
Once done with the campaigns, you'll be able to sink into skirmish and multiplayer. Each of the factions has enough differences in the way they behave to keep gameplay interesting. The Scrin, for instance, are better at harvesting tiberium and aren't affected by its radiation. GDI can't send infantry across tiberium, but have some of the strongest armored units and have mobile repair bases. Nod, on the other hand, employs greater use of cloaking technology making them better at quick strikes. Each faction has a distinct feel through form and function that players will appreciate.
Whichever side you choose, gameplay can be furious. While some players might want to sit back and enjoy the relative safety of a fortified base, giving an enemy time to expand and tech up can have disastrous consequences. The design here doesn't force players into the battlefield as a game like Company of Heroes does, but it also becomes pretty apparent, especially when fighting against hard or better AI, that turtling is a poor choice if you want to win. Late game units are so powerful that letting any enemy get the drop on you is practically suicide. Pushing the action and taking over new resource points is really the only way to counteract the mad amounts of units a fully funded army can pump out.
The thing to remember is that teching up goes quick, which means that somebody is going to get a leg up pretty quickly depending on the strategies taken. As a result, those of you looking for a game you can get in and out of relatively quickly should be very happy with C&C 3. The average time for skirmish or multiplayer maps is between 15-30 minutes.
While we've found the game to be fairly well balanced in the case of most units and abilities, there are balance issues that eventually can create problems, most notably the cost vs. reward of Nod's Avatar Warmech, which basically dooms Nod in late game battles. It also seems a little odd that Mammoth Tanks can't be captured by the enemy when Tripods and Warmechs can. The GDI Juggernauts can be captured, but are barely worth the effort when the game has gotten that far. Nod gets EMP upgrades for their buggies and other nice abilities, but compared to the brutal strength of the all-purpose Mammoth Tanks and combined assault of Carriers and Tripods, Nod has nothing we've found that can stand up to a proper direct assault. That Raider Buggy EMP ability should have been the ultimate equalizer, but the EMP range is so small that it can only take out units in a short distance which makes them almost completely ineffective against a cadre of upgraded Mammoth Tanks that can destroy them before they ever get close enough to set off the device. EA has already told us that they've got balancing changes, including some to Nod's Warmech coming down the line in the 1.2 patch, but we can't comment on how much those changes will affect Nod's late game viability.