When Lowry painted his matchstick men, he probably didn't envisage them romping around a virtual 21st Century battlefield massacring each other with guns and bombs. But that's exactly what happened in Darwinia, the critically acclaimed strategy game from indie developer Introversion.

And now we have Multiwinia, which takes these stick soldiers and retro arcade visuals and deposits them in an arena of capture the flag and king of the hill style games. Yes, this time around the focus is online multiplayer warfare, although you can set up a game against computer AI controlled opposition for some practice.

The basic philosophy behind Multiwinia is to make the RTS battles as streamlined as possible. There's no base building or faffing around like that; you capture spawn points which continually produce troops, and order your units around with simple clicking. They don't have special abilities and they engage with the enemy automatically, leaving you free to survey the map, ordering troop movements just like a General using one of those push-stick things they shove squads around with (the technical term is probably something like fodder rod).

Get the latest Dell Coupons and other computer coupons at CheapStingyBargains.com.

The player can promote a Darwinian troop to leader, a giant stick man with a flag who can automatically direct spawning units to a specified location. This minimal micromanagement is refreshing, although there are some basic nuances to the control system. For example, a leader can order troops into a block formation, which gives them a more concentrated forward firepower but makes them vulnerable to flanking manoeuvres.

Multiwinia comes with six flavours of game, the basic two being domination and king of the hill. These simply revolve around capturing target spawn points or objective areas respectively, although an adept player will also keep a close eye on crate drops.

These are boxes that fall from the sky containing power-ups, some of which are very powerful, such as air strikes or giant flamethrower turrets. They add a somewhat random element to the game but are in keeping with its tactical nature, as the players have to prioritise grabbing these (they take time to secure and open) alongside controlling the vital point-scoring objectives.

The other modes of play include the likes of capture the statue - in which Darwinians must shoulder a giant statue and lug it back to base - but they mostly revolve around area control. Probably the most different is the assault game, where a defending team is tasked with protecting a nuclear device from a much greater number of attackers. There's some imaginative map design here, with one assault level being a mock D-day landing in which the defenders must use cliffs and gun turrets to overcome the odds stacked against them.

Multiwinia's sleek design particularly suits multiplayer action, as do the short, ten minute games. It's bite-sized, highly addictive, real-time strategy, and about the only criticism we can level at it is an old chestnut when it comes to these sort of multiplayer affairs. The player population is fairly small and as a result, getting a game can involve spending some time waiting in the lobby.

With its concise matches and smooth interface, Multiwinia is a tasty addition to the real-time strategy genre. The player base isn't large, but it's well worth a tenner of anyone's money.