Great idea, interesting storyline, graphics are good, but it does have some flaws.
Each faction is unique and well done. The flooding thing with the aliens in entertaining and can provide a good challenge. The terraforming is also fun to use and its nice to see it carried on from their previous game. The worst part about the gameplay is the pathfinding which is horrible. One thing that to be perfectly honest is the collision detection boxes, which are no longer used (basically big boxes around units where things can't pass through), instead today people either don't use any collision detection between units because it can be a major pain, or people use the new collision system where you use a collision box that is built right into the skin of the unit. That is one cause of the pathfinding but also the AI can be rather dumb. The third person shooter mode is nice but it isn't as good as the one in Rise and Fall: Civilizations at war which did a good job with it, once again the problem lies in pathfinding and collision detection. Sound: The sound really needed to be redone, the voices when issueing orders is stupidly repetative along with any other lines, though the alien heroes were quite ammusing like "I'm going to kill the next person who makes a joke about uranus." or "I may be telepathic, but I still can't win the lottery." or "You have made me angry, very angry, very angry indeed." The heroe's voices were nice though. The sound of footsteps could have been improved.
Graphics: Can't complain, they work well on low end computers like mind which is what companies need to focus on and realize that most gamers can't spend $10 000-$50 000 on a state-of-the-art computer.
The game was good except for the path finding and the collision detection.
It is a good game but could have had more time spent on certain technical aspects. All these problems can be fixed by mods though. Also, new maps would be nice aswell.