A very nice strategy game with some minor flaws
positive
The graphics are very nice. Bushes and trees move in the wind. Tanks destroy tree while approuching an accupied town and artillery leave marks on the battlefield. Explosions look very nice too. It is the only game (besides c&c generals) where I 'm not dissappointed with the explosions. They leave a big bang and dirt is flying around (or parts of a building if you hit a building). Explosions destroy trees, bushes and almost everything what is on the battlefield leaving a mark of war behind you. You can zoom in quite (unfortunately not as close as in warhammer 40k dawn of war) close so you can see how well the animations are for the soldiers, tanks etc. When a mortar hist a couple of soldiers 2-3 times you can see them flying through the air. If they get hit behind them they fly to the front (and the other way around) which leads me to the ragdoll within the game. Yea there is a ragdoll engine within the game. Not as detailed as you expected but quite nice. When a tank explodes you can recognize, that some pieces of the tank fall of differently everytime you destroy a tank which looks nice. If a mortar, artillery hit a building some pieces fly through the air and bounce of the ground which looks guite nice too. The zoomfactor of the game is good. Would be good to zoom in even closer but it is alright so nothing to complain about and zoomout is enough to keep an eye on your army (would be good if you could zoom out a bit more but it hardly gave me problems). The water looks fantastic. There are also some minor blood effects in the game. Not a big deal but better than nothing like in a lot of games nowadays. There are sequences after or before every mission which have been done in ingame graphics but a bit improved and it looks very nice. It gives kind of movie atmosphere.
negative
Having all this sunshine here and there I come to the negative aspects of the graphics. The water looks fantastic and the rest just looks very good. There is still some potential within the graphics. The game sneeds a very fast Pc to run. I have a AMD 64 3500+, 1gb of RAM, Geforce 6800gt with 256 mb. My resolution is 1024x768 all details on maximum except shadows I disabled them completely (but they look nice too and the graphics engine offers self shadows.....guite impressive) and I sometimes I got problems with the speed of the game. You think the screen has to be crowded with people and tanks to slow it down. No. Let's say a quite good troup, a bit more then a screen cleared from the fog of war and a hand full of enemy soldiers slow the Pc down quite a lot. It is a bit annoying but it happened only a few times for me. Still. Where are we heading if games get better but the necessary hardware rises way to much everytime a good game comes out. I cannot effort a new graphics card every year or one and a half year.
Sound:
positive
The slightly better than the graphics. Everything sounds superb. The artillery hit brings a great bang and some of the guns don't sound so unrealistic from their real counterparts (I play Red Orchestra and this game has lot of accurate sound). The sound is a bit more accuarte than the graphics. When an artillery hits the ground, then you can also hear dirt flying around and hitting the ground (what the graphics engine doesn't show) A good bang also shakes the camera if you zoom in. The mix between camera shaking and the great sound give a really nice effect. (the camera only shakes if you zoom in enough). It always makes me zoom in very close to see another explision here and there. Every country speaks their language so germans speak german etc. which has been made very well so the voice actors are quite good too. The sound for the sequences before or after every mission is even a bit better (voice actors are well chosen).
negative
I didn't recognize any negative aspects for the sound.
Gameplay:
positive
Gameplay is great. The mission design is good enough to keep on playing the game. Sometimes you have to prevent that german troops take over a few factorys, destroy german ships or take over a train. There are usually more than one main mission objectives (which are important for succes of the mission), more than one optional (which are just for fun) and also special mission objectives so you never get really bored during a mission. You can usually keep all the units you train during a mission (except you have way too much). Your units gain experience during fighting. There are 3 ranks for each unit and everytime your unit levels up it gets more effective during a fight. The units are great. The russians for example have a political officer who has a double ration of vodka which improves the moral of nearby soldiers. Officers are special units on the battlefield which have special skills. Some of them are quite interesting. Tanks have different hitzones like front, back, left, right and bottom which adds to the strategic atmosphere. The AI is good. Enemy tanks always take out your supply trucks first which provide your tanks with ammunition and repairs. Multiplayer offers a lot. It has normal modes (like deathmatch or team deathmatch) and it also has coop and modes where you and your enemy are given tasks which every single one has to fullfill but the others have no idea so try to hide your objective and try to fool your enemys.
negative
Now I come to the negative aspects for the Gameplay. Codename Panzers 1 and 2 (the prequels to Rush for Berlin) had a different unit system. Once a unit died it was dead and couldn't come back which made you really care after your troops which good experience and rank. Rush for Berling works different. If a unit dies (like an officer) then you will be resurrected for the next mission. This time it is time which is important. The longer you take the less points you get. In my oppinion this is not good because the old system made the prequels very good why didn't the stick to it? The AI can be sometimes a bit buggy. The pathfinding needs some improvement because units sometimes get lost or stuck. One negative aspect is also that you have to start with the Russian campagne and the rest will be unlocked piece by piece while you advance in the campagnes. The Multiplayer had some small bugs and slowdowns so Stormregion has to work on that. A game sequence missed the plot once. A german tank drives through the streets of a russian town. A strong one (Tiger i think). Nothing can stop it. It got stuck within a broken building a a russian soldiers says:" It is going to get difficult to crack the faschist nut open) but the mission wasnt really about the tank. It was a main objective but I didn't have any problem destroying it so I think it missed the plot a bit in that mission, because the rest of the mission were more challenging. No big deal but still strange.
All in one Rush for Berlin is a very nice strategy game with some minor flaws. I recommend it to everyone who likes Strategy games. I think people who played panzers 1 and 2 will be pleased too.
I hope you liked my review. If you do then call Gamespot and tell them that I rock and I want a job as an game tester at Gamespot ;=)