Command & Conquer

I guess it is a bit irrelevant to rate a computer game 13 years after it's release. C&C's legacy speaks for itself. However, the only reason people would play it nowadays is because of nostalgia or out of curiosity. Mine was the latter.

I have never played a C&C game before and must admit that for such an old game it was thoroughly enjoyable.

Playing the game one quickly realises why it was such a hit 13 years ago, and even though graphics, gameplay and AI of RTS games improved considerably since 1995, it seems pretty cutting edge for the mid-nineties and actually aged relatively well.

I believe it's one of the first RTS game that introduced opposing sides where units were not simply copies of each other, but where sides were unevenly matched and had different strenghts and weaknesses. The game also had a strong storyline (unlike another hit of that time, Quake) and video cut-scenes(that were a bit rare back in those days).

For the single player campaign, the gameplay has a interesting balance in that it is fairly simple to survive the AI attacks on your base because the idiot AI insists to keep attacking your base with a small number of units at a time (a minor nuisance to a well defended base). But capturing your AI opponents well-defended base is sometimes extremely difficult without exploiting a quirk in the AI.

The stupid AI is C&C's biggest drawback, for example the AI pays little attention to protect his valuable (and expensive) harvester, and will simply replace it every time you destroy it. So by keeping on destroying the AI opponents harvester, your AI opponent will eventually run out of money, and you can take your time to conquer your now penniless opponent.

One last thing the Kane character (Joseph D. Kucan)- I just don't get it... Why does everyone say he is so scary/charismatic???? For me the guy is just kind of goofy, and I tried my best to be amazed by his presence.

Overall, an old RTS game that aged really well, is still enjoyable and worth a play if you haven't tried it before.

The debate rages on - what was the first ever RTS? Herzog Zwei? Stonkers? Dune 2? No-one's really sure - so much depends on the definition of "RTS" (and, for that matter, "first") that even Railroad Tycoon has seen entry into the fray. What is certain is that it was Dune 2 that put Westwood Studios on the map and planted the seeds of what the RTS would eventually become. Blizzard's original Warcraft ran some more with the idea, but it's Command And Conquer: Tiberian Dawn that truly set the world alight.

Dune 2 struggled with a quirky unit cap, caused simply by a shortage of processing power. C&C has no such limitations, and battles featuring scores of men and tanks over a multitude of landscapes looked stunning in addition to playing well. The linking FMVs are absorbingly written and acted - witness General Sheppard's growing frustration and rage throughout the pursuit of Kane, which is believable and compelling. These improvements marked the true beginning of the CD age of PC gaming - with this game showing what was possible, the floppy disc was dead and buried.

The story is as well-known and standardised as it is irrelevant - two organisations compete for resources and military supremacy. It's the little differences and quirks between the Global Defence Initiative (a spin off from the UN) and the Brotherhood of NOD (as old and biblical as character names like Kane and Seth are intended to imply) that grant the game the longevity, acclaim, sequels and spinoffs that it has maintained in the twelve years since.

A juggernaut that shows no signs of slowing down, and it kicked off in 1995. Now available again as part of the First Decade pack, this is a milestone of gaming that still plays well today.

Before I commence with this review, I must regrettably inform anyone reading that due to game-crashing bugs that I have been unable to work around(yup, in both campaigns), I have not finished this game recently... so my review will be based in part what I've played of it over the last few days, which makes up about half of the game put together, and what I remember of playing it back when it was new. This came out around the time of StarCraft(don't believe the year on that game's IMDb listing; 1998 was the year that marked the release of Brood War, the expansion pack, not the original game, which came out four years earlier), so comparisons are logical to draw. One of the first things that you will find this has that StarCraft doesn't is areal damage. This has flames, grenades and explosions... whereas in the futuristic RTS title, you either attack a certain object... or don't attack at all. True, some damage can affect more than one target... such as the blast of the Siege Tank... but this has a much smoother and more versatile engine for such. In both games, most of the stuff in-between levels is briefings, with occasional cut-scenes that tell back-story, further the plot... or just plain look cool. Blizzard's game had the looser, more colorful style(possibly due to the science fiction genre of it), where even the humans were animated, and Westwood's... that would be this one... was more realistic and natural. Sure, we can tell today that it was green-screened, and the CGI no longer has as much of an effect... but it was an ambitious project, and the drive still clearly comes through. Playing this after one has played the later Command & Conquer titles(yup, it's not only the title of this, the first game... but also the franchise as a whole, including the ones that take place in different "universes" than this one), you miss some of the later features and such... but once you get used to it, you find that this had more than enough to keep you entertained, and most of the features that people love about these games were present right from the start. Selecting multiple troops and assigning the squads numbers, the radar window(which has a zoom feature that I'm afraid did not last long in this franchise), great scenarios... not to mention the cool units, awesome style, and the music. To take them in the order I've just mentioned... you've got the grenadier, and the flame-thrower, to name one from each side, both of which can hit several units with a single attack, but which are also dangerous to keep in clusters, because if one goes, his arsenal goes with him... his fellow soldiers burning up with him(War is the H-word, as the Futurama episode title goes), several cool tanks which pack a punch but of course also move slower than the less armored and armed vehicles, and last but most *definitely* not least, the Commando, who can take out enemy troops in a single shot, and blow buildings up with explosives. The style is not overdone, but rather very easy to take in, and you feel as though you're in a cool alternate world, or possibly just in the not too distant future. And the music... adrenaline-pumping techno to get you in the war-waging mood, with around a dozen diverse pieces. The missions are all very good, and the difficulty of them increases as it should. Many objectives will seem relatively similar, but the many different level designs help to keep things interesting. After each level, the game lists percentages for how many of your own men you kept alive as well as how many of the enemy's you neutralized, as well as the same for buildings and a count of how many credits you had left at the completion of the level, and a time for how long it took you. There's a top 10 list of scores that lets you put in your name, which, together with all the levels that there are several different versions of(only one of which you may play each play-through) keeps the re-playability quite high. The game also offers multi-player, over modem, internet or network. In this, as in other RTS titles, later C&C ones as well as StarCraft, you can play as both the good guys and the bad guys... the first being GDI, the Global Defense Initiative, who were established as peace-keepers and who seek to rid the world of terrorists, and The Brotherhood of NOD, a religious cult that wish to control the planet(you *know* they've got serious megalomania when their barracks(named The Hand of NOD) is a large hand with the world in its palm) and rule it according to their beliefs. Now, when you play as NOD, you will find that the leader makes a rather powerful entrance when you first see him; his name is Kane, and he's got charisma and screen presence enough for several dozen warlords, each one more brilliant than the last. Joseph D. Kucan portrays him, and he is... incidentally... also the man behind these games. Whenever Kane makes an appearance in any of these games, Kucan is the one doing the acting. And whenever he is on screen, he *has* your attention. The actors are all fairly good, but he stands out as the best. Now, I'm afraid there are also a few things about this game that are negative... the AI, for example, could have used some work. The AI programming is about the same as StarCraft, all in all... each has good and bad points. The plot and story-telling is quite good, especially for a game from the mid-nineties. While ID Software were busy making bleak monsters for players to blast away, Westwood were doing well-done cinematics with CGI. I recommend this to any fan of the franchise as well as people who just plain enjoy RTS gaming. Cool, fun and well done. 8/10

Things I like about the game:

• The computer mouse being used as the N64 controller when playing a level.

• The chart that pops up pressing the Z button.

This has hands-down got to be one of the best cutscene-based game ever. One of the pioneers even! At least in the RTS space. I have fond memories of watching Joe Kucan as Kane terrorize the GDI. It's a great story and one that hopefully one day will get its own films!

Of course the quality of the video was limited by the times- only so much data could be stored on CDs back then. But do play this game or watch the cutscenes on YouTube, you won't be disappointed. The music is like techno-military-funk, it's very unique and well-done by Frank Klepacki. Hopefully EA Games will also revive the franchise for us. 8/10.