Outside of the alternate history theme and the oodles of creative units, War Front's gameplay looks to follow the rules of RTS games fairly closely, though it also adds some nice touches. Little details like a day/night cycle and variable weather will have subtle effects on the battles, such as reducing line-of-sight visibility and the ability of aircraft to launch. There will also be hero units, which are named infantry and other personnel who can inspire the troops around them to perform at superhuman levels.

Perhaps the most unusual feature is the ability to take over ground-based turrets and fire them from a first-person perspective. Any turret thus controlled gets a 50% damage bonus. In addition to the standard machinegun nests, there are anti-air and anti-tank turrets. Oddly, only turrets can be controlled this way; you can't, for example, assume direct control of a bomber plane. That's too bad. At least the ground-based vehicles support a special third-person mode, in which you can watch over their shoulders and help them aim their weapons -- useful when you want to choose a target with great precision.

The alternate viewpoints, if nothing else, should be good for showing off War Front's better-than-average visuals. The overall level of detail is quite good, with detailed terrains, plenty of destructible foliage and buildings, and some rather amped-up pyrotechnics. Watching large Russian bombers get shot down by the Americans was quite a sight; the visuals left little to the imagination, though it would've been nicer if the bombers had succeeded in kamikazing into the nearby American base. C'mon guys, take one for the motherland.