Hordes unleashed as PlanetSide 2 launches with new video.

Are you prepared for war?

Many players have been champing at the bit to choose their side and lay waste to the opposition in PlanetSide 2. Their time has come.

A countdown clock has been running that will expire at 10 AM Pacific today -- which is right about now at time of publishing -- signalling the start of combat between the Vanu Sovereignty, New Conglomerate and Terran Republic armies across the three massive continents of Auraxis.

Whether it is the lush landscapes of Amerish, the frozen Tundra of Esamir or the craggy terrain of Indar, players will have a massive area across which to contest the many tactical points that will sway the battle one way or the other.

I am an unabashed fan of the free to play game from SOE and I've spent more hours than might be construed as sane pulling off extreme range headshots with my Infiltrator or barreling through the opposition with my Heavy Assault -- as well as crashing a Mosquito in a panicked attempt to avoid ground to air fire, I'm not a great pilot.

It really is a tremendously exciting game, particularly when you join up with some experienced players who can show you the ropes. So my advice would be to jump in and get a feel for the classes that you like -- you're not constrained to any one though, don't worry -- and start looking for a good Outfit, you'll soon see them in chat, or leading columns of armor to attack valuable Amp Stations or Bio Labs.

Also take a look at the in-game voice controls as they are very important. Proximity voice chat -- default hotkey is Num Pad 4 -- will allow you to speak to people in your area, whether you are in a squad or not. It's the prime way of finding out what the soldiers around you are doing and start forming up squads, picking locations for attack and eventually perhaps join an Outfit.

As you score kills you will earn Certifications; these unlock special equipment and upgrades for everything from your sidearm to tactical loadouts for the large Galaxy troop transport ships.

For a more immediate idea of what to expect, take a look at the blazing launch trailer below.

For Nvidia users, the latest Geforce drivers have just been released with specific focus to enhance your PlanetSide 2 experience.

Also, if you took part in the beta, be sure to delete those files completely and start the game with a fresh client, this has been stressed as very important by the dev team.

When servers are up and running, I will be streaming the action over on ZAM Official, our shiny twitch page where you can see a real pro at work -- by that I mean whoever just shot me.

Also, check out ZAM.com tomorrow where we will have an exclusive guide on how to get going in PS2 by Yeti, finalist in the PlanetSide 2 championship at SOE Live and -- alongside LiquidPixels -- one half of the renowned PS2 streaming team HimVsHer.

Scott "Jarimor" Hawkes, Editor in Chief