Westwood meets Hollywood

Although it was groundbreaking gameplay that made titles like "Red Alert" massive hits for Westwood, part of the appeal of the "Command & Conquer" series has always been the stunning cinematics, often including big name hollywood actors. Now Westwood's latest real-time strategy game looks set to follow suit, with "Emperor : Battle for Dune" (based on the classic "Dune" novels by Frank Herbert) starring the likes of Michael Dorn (Worf from "Star Trek"), Vincent Schiavelli (Dr Kaufman from "Tomorrow Never Dies") and Michael McShane (Friar Tuck in "Robin Hood : Prince of Thieves").

These actors are no strangers to the computer games industry either. Dorn worked on "Deep Space Nine : The Fallen" and "Star Trek Armada" amongst other Trek tie-ins, as well as starring in "Mission Critical" and "Gabriel Knight : Sins of the Fathers", while McShane and Schiavelli both appeared in Westwood's adventure game "Blade Runner" back in 1997. Certainly Michael McShane seems taken with the team at Westwood. "There's a lot of high-end language, big emotions and big canvasses of the world. They show you the stills that you're being dropped into and they're magnificent. Beautiful, beautiful work these guys do at Westwood."

If you want to see how beautiful, we have got our hands on four stills taken from the cutscenes included in the game. Add in an innovative non-linear single player campaign with over 100 missions spread across 33 maps and garnish with an engine that is the product of Westwood's first venture into the world of true 3D graphics, and "Emperor : Battle of Dune" is shaping up to be something a little special...