Battle Bugs

Battle Bugs is simply a wonderful game. You are a general in charge of an army made up of... bugs!
You've got all sorts of various insects at your disposal each of which has particular strengths and weaknesses. For all of the diehard fans of Red Alert, Battle Bugs presents an interesting spin on RTS by doing away with tanks and infantry. Instead, you have an army made up of ants, cockroaches, bees, mosquitoes and my two personal favourites, the praying mantises and the rhinoceros beetles.

At the start of each round, you are given a debriefing by a general who explains the primary targets of the mission. You already have your units ready for you and the goal is simple - eliminate the opposing bugs or (in some cases) capture enough food items.
The graphics are very well done and meant to be cartoony. That adds to the value of the game because along with the sounds and overall effect of the game, I found myself instantly liking this game. Even the animation of the units as they walk along, fight or sway while they are stunned is amusing to watch. It's a great way of warding off boredom that could come with repetitive battles.
Although the game can become hard at times and in fact, some of the later maps seem downright impossible, the game is just so much fun that frustration quickly subsides and you want to try again.
Unfortunately, there are no saves during the mission which can be disheartening especially when your bugs have valiantly fought for an hour and you're down to one ant against a squad of their toughest bugs.
There is a status bar along the bottom of the screen which will show a mini-map where you can see the position of every insect on either team. It also gives you a count of remaining troops and if a bug is selected, the status of the fighter.
In terms of playing the game, the interface is quite simple. The mouse can be used for everything. You simply select a bug (or drag a box around several) and tell them where to go or who to fight. For more options, hold a click over an insect and you could tell them to follow a route, patrol or throw a bomb.
The game adds interesting depth to the battles by allowing the player to do more than just send their troops to rush into fights. Certain insects can throw bombs to harm the enemies or they could instead throw stinky cheese which slows down passing insects. Wasps and bees can do air raids by dropping bombs on the enemy.
Each battle takes place in a household setting - so household items lying around are quite common. In addition, certain portions of the ground could be poisonous to the bugs. Other regions just slow down your troops so occasionally the direct path isn't the best path. Eventually, you'll begin to use everything in attempts to come up with winning strategies against overwhelming odds.
The gameplay is very smooth and I found the game to be very endearing and an instant hit with me. What I found to be surprising was how good the game is given the requirements for it. Granted the game is now 12 years old, but it can still compete with the games of today.