Several attempts have been made to capture the scale and atmosphere of Tolkien's epic on PC, but few have come close. In The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle Earth, EA Games has combined relatively straightforward RTS gameplay with an outstanding look, impressive atmospherics and a remarkably accessible interface.

Although its billing as a 'next generation' city-building game might be a little over the top, Immortal Cities: Children of the Nile is a well designed and pleasantly addictive title that comes with a nice sense of history.

The movie's flop obviously hasn't helped, but developer GSC seems to have cut a few unexpected corners in the latter stages of developing Alexander, with the result that what promised to be a stirring title turns out to be fairly average after all.

TimeGate Studios' original Kohan: Immortal Sovereigns caused a bit of a stir back in 2001 by defying a few of the realtime strategy genre's long established conventions.

We're big fans of Creative Assembly's Total War series. Like the original games, you have the option of playing through various campaigns, or jumping straight into the tactical game with historical scenarios or custom battles.