Putting on the Blitzkrieg

YOU can't fault Blitzkrieg 2 for taking a narrow view of history. Despite the title you don't just play as the Germans in this World War Two simulator.

Depending on the options you choose the game puts you in charge of the Germans, the Brit, the Americans or the Russians. It's a real-time strategy game (albeit one without the constant need for resource management to replenish your battered forces) where you start a mission with a set number of men and machines and have to finish it - or fail. Reinforcements are usually available but there's only a finite supply so budding armchair generals have to think first before committing precious forces to the frontline.

Before the fighting starts you get to choose what sort of forces you take into battle. Do you opt for tanks and their peerless performance over land or opt for fighter-bombs and hope to destroy enemy ground forces before they even reach your lightly defended boys? The choice is yours.

It's a bit dispiriting however when the enemy seems to have an inexhaustible supply for men and deadly accurate anti-aircraft batteries.

On a more tactical level you can call up an overhead map of the battlefield and deploy your forces to strike at the enemy's weak spots (if he has any!); cutting off lines of supply and interrupting reinforcements is supposed to make your opponent weaker as the fight goes on.

At least the game doesn't over stay its welcome. There are 70 missions but many of them are very short and a seasoned RTS veteran will waltz through some in less than an hour.

Gamers who last played an RTS in the Command and Conquer era will be knocked out by the detailed graphics and the excellent sound effects really add to the wartime atmosphere.

War-gamers who enjoy flight sims will probably find this a bit too lightweight for their tastes. The rest of us, who just want a short sharp fire fight without the relentless slog of a massive campaign, will enjoy this instead.

NHL 2006. Formats: PS2, Xbox, Gamecube, PC. Publisher: EA Price: £39.99. Family friendly? 12+

ICE-HOCKEY games aren't big sellers in this country. Electronic Arts must wish it could somehow translate the critical success of its slow-selling NHL franchise to the big-selling (but critically mauled) FIFA football games.

This year the ice-hockey season in America was cancelled after a dispute over an attempt to cap player salaries.

Having paid out a huge fee to utilise player likenesses and real teams Electronic Arts went ahead with its traditional annual NHL game regardless. So, for true fans, the game became the only way they could ever play the 2005 season.

Now we have the 2006 edition and it's even more comprehensive this time around. I'm no fan of the sport so the array of teams and names was pretty bewildering. At least the game encourages casual gamers to dive in and give it a go.

NHL veterans will find the "Dynasty" mode suitably in-depth.

It offers a degree of management responsibility (from deciding who is on the team to keeping the management happy and juggling club finances) that wouldn't disgrace a standalone title.

But the real fun is to be had when your players take to the rink. EA's control system has been refined and reworked over the past decade to the point where fine movement is second nature. The shooting system has been tweaked for this '06 edition and it is better than ever.

All the little touches are present and correct. The crowd makes the right noise, the sound effects are spot-on and rival teams will even indulge in a bit of fisticuffs when games get really close.

The PS2 version even has a neat reminder of how things used to be - there's the complete version of NHL 94 to be found as a hidden extra.

More than a decade later ice hockey as a sport may not be any more popular but NHL 2006 deserves to be known as the lord of the rinks.

VIRUSWATCH

Authorities in the Netherlands have arrested three men suspected of running a zombie network of more than 100,000 computers.

Zombies have nothing to do with the living dead. They are computers that are remotely controlled by malicious hackers. The men, aged 19, 22 and 27, are accused of computer hacking, installing adware and spyware and using innocent people's compromised computers without their permission. Police confiscated computers, cash and a sports car during a search of the suspects' homes.

Prosecutors claim that the men ran a zombie network of 100,000 infected computers, one of the largest ever detected, which included computers around the world. Such zombie networks, also known as botnets, are often used to launch distributed denial of service attacks (DDOS) or to launch spam campaigns.

The suspects are alleged to have used the W32/Codbot worm (also known as Toxbot) to take remote control of the PCs of innocent computer users. A number of new versions of the Codbot worm have appeared since the start of 2005, as its authors changed its appearance in an attempt to avoid detection by anti-virus software.

Some versions captured keypresses, in an attempt to commit identity fraud by stealing bank account information and credit card numbers.

Dutch authorities are investigating claims that the gang attempted to blackmail a North American organization. It is not unusual for criminal gangs to use zombie networks to extort money from online companies, forcing them to pay to prevent a DDOS attack against their websites.

"Zombie botnets are becoming an increasing security problem as they pump out spam campaigns, steal information, or launch attacks against corporate networks," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for anti-virus experts Sophos. "The Dutch authorities should be applauded for investigating this case, but with many other internet criminals in operation these arrests are unlikely to make a dramatic impact on the safety of the internet."

Published: 21/10/2005