Daedalus1138: Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines is an excellent game. It starts off with small missions and simple objectives. The missions still require thought and planning, but they are not overly challenging. However, once you begin to get farther into the game, the difficulty slowly rises, until finally, well-thought out tactics and a smidgen of luck are your best friends.

"Luck?" you say. "But I thought this game was all about tactics and perfect planning?"

It is, for the most part. But sometimes, you may have to resort to trial and error when you are working out a plan, trying to figure out the best way to go about it. And sometimes, you get lucky, taking out not only the enemy soldiers you were trying to get, but also successfully luring others into a trap that you never had any intention on making. That is when luck comes into play.

The game itself is long, both because there are a lot of missions and because each one requires a good amount of time dedicating to watching your opponents before you strike. It is also deeply satisfying, as pulling off a perfectly (or even a not-so-perfectly) planned move can be very rewarding, giving you a sense of satisfaction.

"What of Commandos: Beyond the Call of Duty?" you ask. And a good question it is.

Personally, I hate it. It is not that it is bad. However, there is, right from the get-go, a ridiculous increase in difficulty over that of the game for which it is an expansion. Behind Enemy Lines grew increasingly more difficult, but never in a way that made you want to scream and throw yourself through a window. In fact, the slow increase in difficulty helped you build yourself up to the strong, tactical-minded person you needed to be when the game became extremely difficult. Unfortunately, with Beyond the Call of Duty, there is no build up; instead, you are thrown right into a frying pan of difficulty, and the only way out is to jump out of the frying pan... And right into a fire of frustrating difficulty.

Take the first mission, for example. You start off in a boat, and the only way to get to dry land is to pass through the watchful gaze of a German guard. Easy, right? Just time it perfectly, and you'll be good to go. Oh, wait. He just saw me. And he killed one of my guys. And now I can't finish the level. Ah, no matter. I'll just start the level over, use my sniper, and off the stinkin' guard. So that works, and you go on. But then another situation arises in which it would seem that your sniper is the only option you have. So you use him. Several more of these situations later, you are finally able to get through the mission using your other guys. You may have run out of bullets for your sniper rifle, but no sweat. Right?

You may think that, until you complete all your objectives and pile into your raft once more to head to the extraction point. Because you will then find that the only path to your destination is blocked by water mines (aren't those supposed to be underwater?), and the only way to get rid of them without killing yourself is to shoot them. But because of their position, they are too far away from land to be shot with a pistol, and remember, you used up all of your sniper rifle rounds. The only solution? Either find a cheat that will skip you to the next level (which is never fun; it is, after all, cheating) or restart the whole level.

There is, of course, a way around it. It just requires more patience and persistence than even the first game asked of you at any time. But the point is that Beyond the Call of Duty is unnecessarily difficult, and it takes away from the experience.

So, overall? It is a pack with a great game and, to me at least, a less-than-fun expansion. But really, how can one complain? Six bucks? Behind Enemy Lines is worth that, at least.