Should You Play Universe at War: Earth Assault in 2024?

[@Arenumberg]

It was always wild to think the setting presents you, some poor conscripted guy in the end of the world fighting a giant crab robot when this Apple™ looking robot comes out of nowhere, looks at you, and then proceeds to blow the crap out of this enemy that's ending the world with absolutely no initial explanation. Then the Aztecs arise Atlantis style and are actually ancient aliens and you will fall in line.

[@flamingspartan]

When sega is involved in top down RTS lore can go bit haywire. DoW3?

[@CommanderBohn]

It's utterly criminal this game is held hostage by SEGA. Not to mention they are doing absolutely nothing with it. They don't even allow Petroglyph to update it for modern hardware and software. I'd love to buy it if it gets back on Steam.

[@Zade_95]

Yeah, at least give them the rights for it? Rather letting it rot with no intention of using it

[@CommanderBohn]

@@Zade_95 Aye. But this is the thing with big companies. No matter what. They will never give the rights to an IP they will never use. NEVER. They'd rather go bankrupt instead of doing this. Even if Petroglyph offered them money, SEGA would rather torch themselves instead of selling the rights to the IP.

[@jacksonmiller9331]

Humans were actually planned as a fourth playable faction, but were cut due to time constraints. There’s a lot of unused assets for them in the game files, which is why a lot of the most polished UaW mods center around adding playable humans.

[@goldenfiberwheat238]

They cut humans…in a game set on earth about it being invaded by aliens? What?

[@PeteOfDarkness]

@@goldenfiberwheat238 Budget & deadlines. They already cut corners with Masari campaign being bunch of skirmish maps tied with shoelace.

[@goldenfiberwheat238]

@@PeteOfDarkness probably should’ve cut one of the other factions then

[@517342]

What's funny is that due to their cut nature, the human units are heavily imbalanced. From what I've heard they always do full damage against enemies. As a result the Apache helicopters just shred through enemies with their autocannons, especially the large Hierarchy walkers. You can see it in the second tutorial mission when the walker arrives. You can't actually destroy it due to being immortal through scripting, but it's still kinda funny. It's a shame they were cut. They had so much finished content, including a lot of buildings that even had intricate construction animations.

[@blacktemplar7776]

Which mod?

[@Girder3]

I finally got around to playing Universe at War earlier this year. Quite a good game for what it was. A shame there was never a sequel or a proper re-release.

[@CrazyMattLine]

I feel like you've done a huge disservice to UaW by constantly comparing it to EaW rather than letting it stand on it's own. This feels less like an actual review from engaging with the game, and more like you've gone into it expecting it to be "EaW but worse" and just run with that without actually considering the game itself much. Frankly EaW and UaW, despite similar names, are pretty radically different and don't play much the same at all.

[@stallone9069]

Yeah it seems like Zade just wanted another Empire at War and was annoyed he didn't get it. I'm really bummed out he went this way with it as he's done great service to other RTS games he's reviewed, allowing them to stand on their own, and with this the continuous shade thrown at UAW compared to EAW just comes off with a bad taste. It's not a perfect game, but this didn't feel like a proper retrospective of UAW.

[@Arenumberg]

definitely feels clouded by the 18 years of support and content EaW has gotten from the community which no matter how hard one tries, does affect our judgement

[@CrazyMattLine]

@@Arenumberg Yes and no, he barely makes a sigle point in this without saying "but what if Petroglyph made a completely different game that i'd have wanted more". Barely anything is said about the actual game itself. Hell, he didn't even do an introduction for the Masari. Besides, the lifespan of UaW was cut short by the shutdown of Games for Windows Live, not because the game itself is bad, and even then it's got a good amount of community content.

[@armelior4610]

I'd never thought that Universe at war could be considered a sequel of Empire at war : despite their similar title, they have almost nothing in common otherwise. Except the battlecam but that's just a gimmick, and the stompy mechs having several different structures like the ships but that's just a couple of units for 1 faction (even though it is the most memorable part). The game plays more like C&C with 3 factions as different as Starcraft. I had never realized that it was the following Petroglyph game so the titles were probably so close on purpose, since EaW was pretty popular. Maybe it backfired for them

[@darkcyter]

This game had some unique faction ideas tbh

[@REgamesplayer]

Not sure why you are hell bent comparing to to Empire at War. I bought this game blind. Played it. Was quite okay. Had soul. Never finished. However, it never felt like Empire at War. You are probably fixated around specific points in big units which you can disable. However, I had seen it more as Company of Heroes with various chances of something going wrong in a vehicle and as a natural evolution of RTS. It was cool mechanic for a time which made big units feel big, but it otherwise played as a typical RTS of that era and I found it barren and campaign little bit boring. Though, it is one of those types of games which gets better over time, but I quit in mid campaign when it was better. I also loved story as humans getting caught in typical overwhelming alien invasion, but it turns out that it is actually two forces fighting against each other and humans are just collateral and then they teaming up with one side. That was a cool story twist.

[@UndyingNephalim]

I agree, other than some surface level features and obviously working with the same engine, this game is almost nothing like Empire at War. As an example resource collection is completely opposite compared to EaW. In EaW you have to capture points on a map and upgrade them, here you have to go out and collect with gatherers or if you are the Masari you build your generators. In EaW your bases were highly limited to pre-placed nodes on land, and just a single starbase in space, none of the factions here operate that way at all. Even the hardpoint system in this game works radically differently than in EaW, servicing as nodes for add-ons or buildings rather than just damage points.

[@InfoGuyGaming]

Petroglyph has been around longer than Westwood, oh man that gave me a little emotional damage.

[@FentonFor]

Yet they never came close to the greatness of Westwood creations

[@Zade_95]

Crazy huh

[@EvGamerBETA]

@@FentonFor As though the best people remained in EA LA

[@Lolomlas]

Is this a Universe at War review or an Empire at War one?

[@Zade_95]

yes

[@ZeroOne130]

Petroglyph is such a under-rated studio. They make amazing games and it painful to say they don't sell.

[@DarkZerol]

All their titles including Universe at War: Earth Assault isn't really all that good and failed to capture the essence of their previous C&C games.

[@ZaylidinOfficial]

This games music has stayed with me, the Masari Suite is beautiful. Didn't play it though, outside of the demo.

[@adamofblastworks1517]

I get why you keep bringing up Empire at War as it is their older masterpiece which many people are familiar with and are probably basing their expectations off of, but as someone who has never played it yet, I feel like the video brings it up too often.

[@Arenumberg]

"older" by only a year and a half, though, which is like, wild. Agreed though.

[@ozisponas1593]

Well then go play it with a mod its the best rts ever

[@Zade_95]

understandable thank you for the feedback!

[@lilyofdesire]

​​@@Zade_95 I also feel like it was brought up too frequently. I do think what you had to say was worth saying, but you ended up repeating yourself and harping on the point more than was necessary.

[@mightguy911]

Then, ignore those parts. Comparisons should quality. Talk about whining over nothing.

[@CaperNerd]

I definitely picked up this game because of its connection to Empire at War back in the day, but it's really a very different game with Empire at War being more of a 4x kinda game while Universe at War is more along the lines of Starcraft or Warcraft. Feels like a weird choice for a name too, Universe at War making it sound bigger than Empire at War while being set entirely on Earth.

[@CanadaMan6]

Great game. I actually put out the original Human Faction mod for it back in 2010. Glad to see the game still being talked about and I might have to take another look at it one of these days.

[@r.h.3637]

I actually have the disk for UAW sitting behind my monitor right as I type this. Man, I should play it again.

[@ChiefCrewin]

Man I remember having to choose between this game and Supreme Commander *on the 360* (I know I know, I was a kid). I had no idea this game was a pseudo spiritual sequel to EaW, that might've convinced me to give it a shot.

[@romanium365]

Not trying to be negative, but you mentioned Empire at War so many times, it became a bit annoying by the end of the video.

[@Chris_Tootoo]

I still have the physical 360 copy of this game, my friends and I loved this game because the three different factions ended up fitting our different play styles, I was a Hierarchy player and built walkers and Turrets in their front doors.

[@heylookitsbilly8407]

Do you know if the multiplayer for the game still works on the 360? If it does I'd absolutely be willing to play it with you.

[@Chris_Tootoo]

@@heylookitsbilly8407 pretty sure the 360 servers have been dead for a long while. Sadly.

[@asphere8]

I played a lot of Universe at War as a kid; loved it!

[@lolaldanee2743]

One of my favourite games ever. great campaign, absolutely amazing faction design

[@NuStiuFrate]

While the game itself wasn't really good, years later i can still remember how different the factions were. It makes starcraft look like age of empires in terms of symmetry.

[@orsai61661]

I remember playing this on the 360!

[@MaSTeRgUnS22]

I enjoyed the hell out of ranked, going up against the best PC players. (I tried and failed to face Jagx and VoDToast so many times back then, lol.)

[@CaneMcKeyton]

I still listen to its soundtrack to this day

[@Joshua-dh3uj]

I’m surprised I’ve never heard of this game! It looks quite interesting

[@SensualEdamame]

talk about Nostalgia, played the demo for this for years on my Xbox 360 before actually finding a copy, now i wanna revisit on PC lmao

[@TheNukeGeneral]

I just found this game by accident at an old game store, the Xbox version. I went home and found it on abandonware and have been really enjoying it, yet I found zero content about it. I'm glad you're talking about it.

[@ignaciotaborda6538]

An universe at war video on 2024, that's wild

[@GloriousGrunt]

Another one for the backlog 😎🤙 The game looks great, thanks for the showcase!

[@TheGamingDefinition]

Oh it isn't on sale anymore... Any recommendations on where to buy it from, or is it one of them "free/abandonware" type games now?

[@MaSTeRgUnS22]

What you said about free/abandonware is true. However, mods and content are being actively developed on the UAW community discord ow where they made their own launcher and a way to play without having to depend on games for windows live.

[@TheGamingDefinition]

@ thank you very much for all the info, I’ll have to take a look! :D

[@coffee0093]

As a kid I remember seeing alot of ads for the 360 port of this game

[@cburger4life144]

I really enjoyed this game. I replayed it earlier this year and was surprised how well it held up. Reminded me how much I miss a tight, linear campaign

[@Ultrox007]

one of my favorites in concept, but the multiplayer is dead and the campaign is sub-par. Still absolutely LOVE the factions and research options.

[@xShifty38x]

Hey Zade liked the video and Never knew petrogylph had another rts!

[@Zade_95]

They've got a few!

[@romanium365]

I remember playing the demo on 360 years ago with my best friends. It was expensive, so I didn't buy it, but the unique style always stuck with me. Robots versus Aliens versus.. elf things. It was glorious.

[@davyhotch]

I like the pick 6 research out of 12 if you take all the level 2 heroes then you miss out on all the level 3 and 4 techs. The Rad rounds one was fun to make zombies for the Hierarchy

[@freXampl]

Sound and unit (especially hierarchy) design was phenomenal. The rest? yeah it's a bit bland. Yet still I love this game.

[@Marinealver]

Petroglyph Games still patches Empire At War.

[@Zade_95]

Goats

[@Ooorky]

I liked this game so much it's part of my not so big boxed pc game collection.

[@trowachess]

Zade throwing all the Shade on Sega !

[@Fatueable]

So what would you say about "Ground Control 2" this year? - another unique in many aspects game, on top of that a sequel that actually done good!

[@davidkivijr.7712]

I want to play this game again so badly!!

[@VengeanceMkII]

I love this game, in all honesty. I'm quite sad at the fate it beheld alas.

[@uremeureme7750]

Maybe one day we can see sequel , I did enjoy a lot play this game .

[@davidhuxley4818]

While I agree with your assessment of the storytelling overall, the opening levels of the game were a piece of storytelling brilliance, IMO.

[@stormweaver2535]

My problem with it is the multi battle map later in the game would randomly crash. Making it an uphill battle to win against nothing but game glitches.

[@joshwilson7295]

Was literally thinking about this today randomly. What a coincidence

[@OverlordZephyros]

you speaking so much about space battles makes me want to finally play battlestar galactica

[@Zade_95]

Deadlock? Great game!

[@OverlordZephyros]

@@Zade_95 awesome , thank you

[@chunkblaster]

*I know you did not just make the factually incorrect clame that empire at wat is better than universe at war* This game absolutely deserved a sequel. They tried a shittier version with Gray Goo. But this game was TOP.

[@saturn12002]

I played universe at war on my PS2 when I was 11. Loved it as a kid, will probably love it now, more so even that I can actually understand it unlike when I was 11. If only I could find it somewhere and actually play it again. I don't trust torrents. I know there is a discord for universe at war as well but I don't know if there is DL for it.

[@Swatyo]

Really great RTS, the asymmetry of the 3 races is very good, unfortunately the just wasn't supported and is now lost in limbo. Hoping to get a re release on steam and maybe a patch or two to fix the jank.

[@jhonshephard921]

I haven't played it but the story sounds great. Its like looking at colonization from the point of view of the colonized. If you think about it the Command & Conquer games while being campy tackle very complex themes.

[@UndyingNephalim]

Ahhhhh another glorious apocalypse!!!

[@PeteOfDarkness]

I really like about 2/3 of this game. Masari Campaign is mostly skirmish map milking and no substitute for narrative driven story of other two (or three, if you count humans) races :(

[@notani3533]

Back then I'm hyped for an UaW expansion, too bad they never make the sequel or any form of spinoff.

[@MrErskine01]

I loved this game but can't find anywhere to play it. Steam, EA, nor Origin have it. Where can I play this?

[@randomcustodes8934]

I am unable to access the discord server, it seems like the invite is no longer good.

[@martindejonge695]

Yes. You should play UaW, it is a fantastic game. I personally enjoyed it more than C&C3 KW and EaW. I think RA3 would top it if it wasn't for the global conquest. And graphics wise I really do not care. I mean HW3 was suppose to be this massive top of the range game but turns out to be a pile of ****

[@SolidHound871]

Please do Ground Control video next

[@Dirt1061]

There are a lot of fast paced RTS. What would be considered to be slow RTS games?

[@Zade_95]

I'd say supreme commander, rise of nations, sins of a solar empire, etc. You're right though, the majority are what I could easily describe as 'fast paced' lol

[@EvGamerBETA]

I know why it's not space based. You can't walk with the giant quadropod over cities in space, or put that process in the trailer

[@ShadowWing48]

SEGA ultimately is the problem here. Im glad that recently Amplitude, the devs of Humankind, were able to get free of them. Petroglyph needs to get their rights for Universe at War and see if they can work with someone else in an actually cooperative manner. Universe at War has a lot of potential as a franchise, even outisde of being an RTS. Its insane how slept on it is. It has albeit simple but very strong foundations. It skipped the crawling phase, went right to walking and got comfortable jogging I'd argue. Its got the legs to run. Just needs to let free.

[@MrRodrigues520]

Grey Goo is basically a sequel to this

[@Alex06CoSonic]

The soundtrack, game design ideas and art direction/concept art for this game are amazing, it's a shame it's a buggy and unbalanced. Sega really pushed it out the door before it was ready and it had tons of potential.

[@flamingspartan]

I only played the demo but it's still better than most rts out today. Ahem ** stormgate **

[@ars2gam]

Empire at War, Universe at War...Multiverse at War when?!

[@spectr__]

This was still so much better than Grey Goo...

[@FentonFor]

Idk if it’s a budget thing or whatever. But petroglyph never really captured the same magic that was present in c&c. Which really frustrates me :/

[@l0rf]

Empire at War did get a patch just this year... Universe art War is abandonware. That's kind of the metric I go by.

[@billtrent6520]

Why do get the feeling the future game would had space battles.

[@LockandLoad79]

The thing about Universe at War is its path finding system is atrocious, and it becomes more felt with the gigantic Hierarchy Walkers. The rest of the games features are great. But, its path finding system always reminds me in the end why I'd rather play other RTS(CnC, GreyGoo, War/StarCraft, SupCom, etc). I just wish they fix its path finding before release, or at least create a patch for it. Instead, Petroglyph chose "This is fine" approach instead.

[@SlumberingWolf]

Disinfo spotted.

[@Eunostos]

Haven't even touched it so no nostalgia but never seen you roast and dismiss strengths and harp on what they didn't do like this, gross pivot. At least you pointed at its community, i guess.

[@goldenfiberwheat238]

So the game is about 3 alien factions invading earth at the same time and humans aren’t playable? Why does this not have space battles then? Why even set it on earth if humanity is pretty much gone? Wild

[@ExD204]

I wish i can buy this game

[@dracula5752]

maybe is not masterpiece but i loved playing as kid. But got annoying hearing about star wars that never seen or cared...

[@owenwilliams9746]

Better title for this video: just play empire at war

[@Lampoluke]

This video is just meatriding EaW

[@chunkblaster]

TL;DR waaaaaaa its not Empire it war waaaaaaa i guess you can play it waaaaa

[@montypython5521]

Nah, the ground combat is cooler than the space.

[@IsaacIsaacIsaacson]

I had some friends addicted to this game who constantly begged me to play it multiplayer with them. I ended up playing it a lot as a result and frankly, never enjoyed it much. Its counterintuitive in many ways and the factions are completely unbalanced.

[@omerjameel3524]

Great video and points but am a fan of the game so dislike

[@Zade_95]

understandable

[@nuclearicebreaker]

It looks like a console game

[@TurKlack]

Well I found a way to play it myself, and I have to say that I am disappointed. It could have been so easy. Take EaW and improve on that. However Petro decided to make a Command and Conquer Wannabe and doomed the Game from the start. Because C&C has always been a dead genre. Ha. the only C&C that would be considered successful is C&C itself and only because of Kane. The thing is UaW has good ideas and concepts. But they have been terribly executed.

[@emdeo]

I find the statement "C&C has always been a dead genre" kind of funny. Do you think they're not RTS'es, or that RTS isn't a whole genre with multiple spin off genres? you'd call a sleeping man dead, at that rate.

[@TurKlack]

@@emdeo Whatever it is, it's still dead. C&C was only ever relevant back in the old times when there wasn't a better alternative. Just look at all the "Spiritual Successors" Dead. Gone. Forgotten. Everyone that thinks C&C is good is just as dead in their brain.