It is a long-known fact in gaming that real-time-strategy games just don’t work on consoles. Blame the power of the mouse and keyboard, if you must, but almost every attempt to move army commanding away from its natural habitat on a PC monitor falls by the wayside. And R.U.S.E. would be exactly the same, if it wasn’t for Sony’s shiny, new Move controller. Players with a traditional controller may well become frustrated by the stickiness of the controls or lack of speed, yet with the motion controller everything becomes as simple as pointing
at the screen.

You're part in the war isn't always the most important one.

But first of all, to the game’s nuts and bolts. As expected, the staples of strategy games are all present and correct: construct bases, collect money, build soldiers, attack. Repeat to win. You will begin the campaign – as in so many other RTSs – with limited unit types while you’re drip-fed new abilities and troop types. For the majority of time you’ll be playing a wartime variation of rock-paper-scissors, being careful to keep an eye out for certain enemy types and countering with the correct opposing forces. This isn’t to say there isn’t an element of depth to R.U.S.E., however. Without backing infantry, for example, anti-tank artillery are vulnerable to almost every attack, meaning you’re better off moving in packs.

Deception, of course, is the key point of R.U.S.E., which is achieved by applying the aptly named abilities, known as ‘ruses’. Each one has a specific effect, which can be used at any time and applied to any of the map’s zones. The choice is left to you: which ruse to use and when and where to use it. It is a gimmick, but one that works well enough to really give you an advantage. Radio Silence, for example, will make all of your units in a zone disappear off the enemy’s radar, allowing them to move undetected, but combine this with Blitz and your army will travel 50 per cent faster – giving you an immediate yet invisible assault.

All the parts are in place for a solid strategy title, with R.U.S.E. taking the slower, more thoughtful side of the scale and really giving you the feeling of control over a smaller set of forces in a larger battle. Players with Move, however, will automatically own the better version of the game, with the motion control becoming intuitive almost instantly. Setting up ambushes, building units and structures and issuing orders across the map are simplified, only highlighting the problems with a traditional controller. It is one for RTS aficionados, though, rewarding pre-planning and tactical play, meaning it’s likely that
the inherent flaws with controller-play are happily overcome.

The slow, methodical nature of proceedings means you'll have no problems on consoles.