As soon as it became clear that gamers were willing to pay a tenner a month to play in a persistent online world, there has been rather a glut of massively multiplayer online games (MMOGs). Fair enough, these are expensive projects and they're constantly updated, but there are definitely dollars, euros and pounds in them thar multiplayer hills.

PlanetSide may be an MMOG but at least it brings something a little different to the table; it's a 3-D shooter. No it's not unique in this - there's Neocron already out there for example - but this is still a refreshing enough concept when compared to the compost-heap-load of RPG affairs.

A flippant description of PlanetSide is easy work; think of Tribes, but with huge continents, three massive teams and hundreds of players running around. The storyline is that these three opposing teams are all in a struggle for control of a planet, with ten continents to fight over, each of which has multiple bases. The idea is to take control of as many base installations as you can and even to lock down whole continents if feasible.

PlanetSide may be a shooter but it does boast RPG elements in the form of a certification system. Every kill you score and base capture you're involved in nets experience points and when you 'level up', certifications are gained. These can be spent on acquiring skills which allow you to use heavy weapons or power armour, pilot vehicles along with various medical, hacking and engineering pursuits.

So, for example, you can develop an engineer (who can repair vehicles and set up defensive gun turrets and mines) specialised as a scout and infiltration expert (he has the skill to use cloaking armour and advanced hacking to help break into buildings by cracking the locks). There tends to be a good mix of support type characters and mainline infantry grunts who are specced out in weapons, armour and various deadly firepower-wielding vehicles.

Mentioning the vehicles, they include both ground and airborne types. There are buggies with mounted machine-guns that the passenger can fire, destructive rocket-spewing fighter craft and even huge transports which can drop a whole squad into enemy territory. It can be handy to have a vehicle to travel in, because it's a darn long walk to get anywhere, unless you happen to be in a squad group or outfit (a player-run guild) with a pilot who can chauffeur you.

And it's a great idea to join up with an outfit as soon as you can, as the tactical combat in PlanetSide puts the emphasis on being in a squad of players. Besides, it's much more fun and sociable this way, and higher-ranked characters who lead groups can obtain command levels which accord them special privileges, such as the ability to mark waypoints on their group's map.

PlanetSide is a plain blast in combat. The action is adrenaline-packed and if you die you can (generally) always re-spawn close to the battle and get straight back in. It strikes a good balance between the pure fun of fast-flowing FPS action and the squad tactics which are necessary to overcome a competently defended enemy base.

There are a few weak points in PlanetSide's armour though. Taking bases does earn your side strategic advantages, but they're not huge and as such you can feel a rather small cog in your world, particularly if when you next log back on, all the stuff you fought for has swapped back into enemy hands. Such is the nature of a massively multiplayer team game, but it does help if you're part of a well-run outfit.

Graphically PlanetSide isn't astounding either; it's slightly above average rather than anything special. However, this doesn't stop it from jerking quite badly at times, unless you have a very fast PC (we're talking 2GHz and at least 512Mb of memory with a serious graphics card). Lag also rears its head in big battles, which can be annoying but not game-ruining. Bear in mind that we were playing on 512K ADSL and reports from 56Kbps modem players are that it's very laggy indeed.

In short, PlanetSide is a top, team-based shooter, but you also need a top spec PC and net connection to get the most from it. The well designed, flexible character system and tactical, fast-paced combat make for a most heady mix, though you can feel rather insignificant in the big game world picture at times. Also bear in mind that there is a monthly subs fee to pay.