While the game is clunky in a few areas, Urban Assault ultimately makes up for it with some intense gameplay.
The basic story is that a human-induced world-wide disaster called "The Big Mistake" occured and ruined Earth as a whole. So now the survivors are forced to live within domed cities to protect themselves from the now poisonous atmosphere. Unfortunately, the survivors have also split into opposing factions in a struggle for Eaerth's remaining resources. Put not one, but two alien invasions into the mix, and we've got a set-up for the single player campaign. You play as SDU 7, the last hope for the Resistance which consists of the last survivors of the human faction that want to re-establish a democracy on Earth. Hmm, sounds like a worthy cause to fight for eh? So your basic goal is to conquer every territory on the campaign map, and eventually make your way to Parasite city, the HQ of the insidious alien Mykonians, who are busy finishing off the planet with their parasite device.
You'll have to get through a lot of tough battles in order to complete the game however. In each territory you chose to enter, your basic goal is always to destroy the enemy's host station before they destroy yours. Some maps will have multiple enemies for you to deal with. So in order to complete these objectives, you'll have to master using your own host station. Controlling the host station is really quite easy, and so is producing your essential combat vehicles. There is only one resource in the game, energy, and it used to produce new vehicles and help keep your host station alive (If you run out of energy at any time and for any reason, you die). You gather it simply by taking the map's power stations and putting your host station as close to them as possible (If not on top of them since your host station floats).
While producing vehicles and gathering energy is easy, things might get a little tricky for some when it comes to actually ordering and arranging your vehicles into squads. In order to do this, you'll need both the map and squadron manager open respectively. These unfortunately consume alot of space on your screen, so while using them its tricky to see what's going on in the actual 3D world. In fact, you might end up purely using the map to play its so dominant on the screen most of the time. Fortunately, its a reliable map most of the time, so its easy to use when you rely on it. This actually really doesn't sound as cumbersome as it does, (Though its still cumbersome mind you!) and just takes some getting used to. If you can get used to it, you should have no problem with controling your squads.
The single-player campaign will take you a while to complete since many of the scenarios will pit you against very difficult odds, along with some competent AI. The AI in Urban Assault is relatively basic, but it tends to use a fair variety of its race's vehicles, and use very large attack forces. They'll also build themselves new structures and turrets when their energy stocks allow. The actual scenarios however don't have much variety. Its always destroy your enemy by whatever means necessary, and then leave via the beam gate. There's some replay value here though, since there are multiple ways to reach Parasite City. So you might want to see what happens when you try each path seperately. The environments in the scenarios however do add some variety, so not all of the scenarios play exactly the same.
Urban assault also has some multiplayer options which allow you to play as 4 of the game's 6 factions (The other 2 are not included in multiplayer at all, probably for balancing purposes). You can play against up to 4 players online, and if you can find any matches, then the game can be quite intense. But right now, not much offering for multiplayer since the zone stopped supporting Urban Assault a while ago.
Graphically, Urban assault looks dirty all around, and not in a very good way. The vehicles all look good, but the environments are all the same or very similar to each other, and don't look very good. Sound wise, there are some repetitive, but well done gun sounds. There is also some voice acting for your vehicles, but its not very good and is very repetitive.
Ultimately, Urban Assault is rough in several areas, enough to drive some people away. But if you can get past the rough spots, Urban Assault can be a blast to play through.
Pros: Challenging Single-player campaign that is very rewarding for those who play through it. Good looking vehicles. Good race balance for multiplayer. Decent AI.
Cons: Single-player campaign gets repetitive very quickly. No option to face AI in a multiplayer skirmish. Interface is a little cumbersome. AI controlled vehicles have some pathfinding issues.
Recommendable for: If your looking for a strategy/action game that is fresh all the way through, Urban Assault is probably not for you. Urban Assault is best for those who are looking for some challenging strategy and combat.