Zed Is (Not) Dead - Z: Steel Soldiers Comes To Steam

We could just spend all day, every day writing about the ancient games being re-released via Steam, but this is one people actually care about. Z: Steel Soldiers, the Bitmap Brothers RTS and sequel to Z, lands on the service later today. There's a new trailer below, but first I want someone to explain to me: why did you like this game?

In case you don't remember what the original version looked like, there's a gallery of comparison screenshots. It looks like there's certainly higher resolution textures, though a thread on the game's Steam forum from the developer also lists proper shadow mapping, a new tutorial and a more efficient codebase.

I played the original Z and it was a bombastic if forgettable robot romp, like a midway point between the click-and-swarm of Cannon Fodder and the gosh-its-nearly-strategy of Command & Conquer. I remember it mainly for the CG intro, which works today as a reminder of an age when all British game development was apparently fuelled by 2000AD, Viz comics and Bill & Ted.

I never played the sequel though, which Wikipedia tells me abandoned some of the original's simplicity in favour of a by-then traditional plot-driven story. It even gave the two robot armies names other than simply "red" and "blue". What did I miss by not playing it, do you have any fond memories of it, and is it worth re-playing today for any reason?

Basically: why?