Declaring your game an esport is like giving yourself a nickname: unless the designation comes from elsewhere, it’s never likely to catch on. Perhaps it was fixating on StarCraft’s pro scene, instead of catering to the bigger audience of armchair generals who just wanted to tank-rush their mates, blast through story missions and watch Tim Curry chew scenery, that spelled the RTS genre’s downfall over the past two decades. Slipgate Ironworks understands this. Tempest Rising may turn out to have the fine balance and depth to sustain a pro-aspiring community, but the campy cutscenes and rollicking campaigns are placed at the front of the shop window.

Is it a retro revival piece? Not entirely. That’s despite the fact that it’s riddled with references to Command & Conquer, from the industrial soundtrack and pixellated loading screens to the design and naming of its factions, the GDF (pompous western types) and Tempest Dynasty (Soviet-influenced experimental-weapon enthusiasts). Then there’s the fact that the story begins in 1997, the year of Red Alert’s release and the RTS genre’s zenith. But this isn’t an attempt to fool you into thinking you’re playing something that could have been made then – it’s running in Unreal Engine, for starters. It’s also trying to build systemic depth that wasn’t there in the Westwood games. It’s more like how a Command & Conquer game would play in 2025 if the series had kept its cultural relevance and new titles had continued to be released. Which is ironic, because while Tempest Rising is conjuring up that particular alt-history timeline, its story is based on a different one in which the Cuban Missile Crisis escalated to war, as global superpowers fought for control of an ultra-efficient energy source, the titular Tempest. Both the GDF and Tempest Dynasty believe they ought to control it, and that’s where you and your tanks come in. Slipgate Ironworks didn’t need to put this much effort into building the world, going deep into what the Tempest is. Nor did it need to bookend its campaign missions in interactive briefings with dialogue options and cinematic cutscenes. But that shows where its priorities are. And the enthusiasm rubs off on you.