This second installment of Empire Earth is not for inexperienced RTS players and is definitely an acquired taste - for elephant. It's huge, and with the steep learning curve, density of customizations, and variety of gameplay, Empire Earth II will take hours and hours to learn and achieve proficiency in. So many hours, in fact, that it left little time for our standard voluminous review.

The best endorsement that we can give is that as soon as this gets typed up, we are headed back to the game to learn more. The bottom line: if you never want to have to buy another RTS again, pick up Empire Earth II.