Corporate Wars Walkthrough

Corporate Wars - the name of this strategy game quick evokes the image of two multi-billion corporations battling for supremacy. Locked in a cold war-like battle, these 2 corporations silently try to outwit and outmaneuver each other. BUT, apparently, only the first part was correct. The battle between these 2 corporations is anything BUT silent. Yes, folks. Corporate Wars take business competition to a whole new level... to an inter-planetary scale war!

The story of Corporate Wars was set in the year 2186. I'm not too sure if I would live to see humanity in that year. Anyway, it was in this year when humanity decided to expand outside earth in search for 'greener pastures'... or should I say greener planets. The expansion led to the discovery of different planets suitable for living. However, there is habitable one planet whose discovery led to an unexpected turn of events - PX-21.

It's not just PX-21's ability to sustain human life that made it special. It was its EXTREMELY unique and native inhabitants that set PX-21 'head and shoulders' ahead of others. You see, when a PX-21 native dies, the energy it unleashes is more than enough to supply energy to a small planet for one whole year!

Energy equals money, all of us knows that. People who control the energy supply will always have a back-breaking influx of cash. With greed setting in, the humans made their move. It only took a year after the planet's discovery for humans to almost obliterate PX-21's population, which came to be known as NRG (Read: energy!). Only a handful survived the onslaught... and they are now living in the most isolated and obscure desert in their planet.

Conquering the greater part of the planet and having the proprietary rights to the NRG's, Universal Energy (or UE) Corporation sets out to capture all of the remaining NRG's. The purpose isn't just to create a massive energy source... rather, UE wants to use the remaining inhabitants of PX-21 to restore the planet's population and bring back its former glory. UE sounds very mercenary-like, BUT you have to tip your hats off to them... their purpose is quite noble.

HOWEVER, this was stopped cold by the pro-government and militarized corporation - JPN Energo. Invading UE controlled territories and ransacking power and energy supplies, this marked the first war between 2 powerful corporations that destroyed NOT only human lives BUT also dozens of planets in the far reaches of the universe. This marked the beginning of the Corporate Wars!

Well, as you can tell, this is one of those strategy games whose background story is just as engaging as its game play. It's not every day that we see flash-based online games that will entice you to sit down and play for hours because of its interesting plot. As for the game play, it adopts a tower defense-like stance. HOWEVER, the futuristic setting that it has is more than enough to set it a notch or two above your average tower defense strategy games.

Oh! And one more thing, this has to be one of the most difficult and most challenging tower defense strategy games out there. If you think tower defense is just about planting and establishing towers; if you are not ready to solve problems 'on the fly' and make hard decisions on the regular like a field marshal does, please steer clear from this game. Yes, it's that hard!

Aside from using your mouse to plant different towers and defenses to ward off JPN-organized forces, there are a couple of hotkeys and reminders you should keep in mind: (1) Press the ESC button to cancel the placement of a tower. (2) You want to beef up your towers with improved stats. To do just that, put 'Foundation' on your towers.

When it comes to the aesthetic side of the game, I just have to give it 10/10. It's amazingly sophisticated-looking BUT it's not as processor-intense as other 3D tower defense strategy games out there. As for the audio, it does fit in with the theme although it can get quite redundant after a while. Unfortunately, I can't find the mute button so that leaves me no choice BUT to remove the headphones. It's just a minor quibble that shouldn't affect your gaming experience that much.

Summing things up, this has to be one of the BEST tower defense strategy games out there. No amount of words can wrap up my fascination for this game. You just have to try it out!