Oh C&C, How many ways do I love thee? Let me count them, one, two, three...
No... It's Generals, and the first mission? The invasion of Baghdad.
2003 was the year C&C as we knew it died, doomed to be replaced by the words "Zero Hour" in the same way that "Brood War" brought new life to Starcraft (in an entirely positive way). If ever there was a way to demonstrate how a venerable series can be turned in to a cash cow, surely EA, there is no better way than to release a game themed on Middle Eastern terrorists at the height of US tensions with Iraq.
To be fair, Generals was an excellent game in its own right, made only better by the Zero Hour expansion, but let's get this sorted out right now - it was not Command and Conquer, despite all titles to the contrary. Unless the game contains a bald, charismatic genius against GI-Joe heroes, or campy 50's communists against the combined might of an alternate reality NATO, I don't want to know about it.
For a C&C Romantic raised on Mammoth Tanks and Tesla Coils, 2003 was a sad year indeed. Nearly ten years after the first Command and Conquer, my beloved series was now representing everything that I played games to avoid. Yet still, like an addict searching for more, I played, modded and enjoyed Generals for the merits it presented, pretending all the while that this was not the way C&C was going.
Then in 2004, my hopes of a sequel to Tiberian Sun were further dashed when EA employee Mark Skaggs announced that "Red Alert 3" was in development.
Mark Skaggs then left EA, and I heard nothing more of this until 2006...
Sure enough, like a Phoenix rising from the ashes, C&C 3: Tiberium Wars was announced to the jubilant cries of the Command and Conquer faithful. Redemption was at hand, Kane was returning, and things were again bright for the future. We will probably never know what happened to Mark Skaggs, nor will I care. Like rekindling my love for an old flame, the epic struggle between GDI and the Brotherhood is back, and it's never been so good.
C&C 3 is, in short, a return to form that has been desperately wanted by the Tiberium universe since Tiberian Sun, marking a return of the campy Full Motion Video sequences we all hate to love, and all the tassels and trimmings that we know and adore from the first games. It far from reinvents the series, and for Command and Conquer, let's face it; we probably don't want it to.
The RTS genre has grown significantly since the days of Dune 2 and the original C&C. Games like Blizzard's venerable Starcraft, and Relic's Homeworld, Dawn of War and Company of Heroes have evolved and developed the genre in new ways that improve and re-define benchmarks for the genre as a whole, and while many would love to see C&C go this same path, the simple fact remains that if it did so, it would cease being Command and Conquer.
Our reasons for coming back to the series are many and varied, be it the story, the old-school tactics and gameplay, or simple adoration of Joe Kucan in his definitive, infamous role of Kane. No, C&C remains the same as always - a simple, tried and true resourcing system that encourages expansion, the building of a base and the relentless pursuit of crushing your opponent beneath the treads of a hundred tanks.
It's to be noted and recognised then that while it doesn't redefine, it improves. The side-bar returns, offering a swag of new options and developments which aid the management of your base and unit construction. The addition of construction cranes to one's base allows multiple buildings to be queued up, and this is repeated with war factories, airfields and barracks, which will also open new construction queues for each one you put on the field.
Of these however, the crane is the most significant, as the addition of even one or two of these removes the all-important pressure of keeping the previously mission-critical Construction Yard intact. While an inconvenience if destroyed, losing the construction yard no longer means the imminent doom of your forces, and may only prove a temporary setback to your plans.
The key word in C&C 3's gameplay more than ever is expansion. Tiberium fields will run dry fast when multiple harvesters are tasked to them, and you will be constantly searching for more sources of funds across the battlefield. Needless to say, Tiberium Wars is not a game which rewards turtlers. Your first online experiences will be shocking and brutal as your base is quickly overwhelmed and crushed under a weight of tanks, artillery and infantry, and you begin to realise just how far your opponent has expanded, and how many resources he has at his command.
The three sides of Tiberium Wars feel solid and well thought-out. Unlike some previous games of the series, there is a unit or structure for virtually task you can think of, no matter what side you choose to play. Joining the traditional ranks of GDI's Rifle Infantry, Engineers, Grenadiers and Rocket troops are Sniper teams, battle-suited Zone Troopers, and for the first time since the original C&C, the Commando.
This kind of variety is common to all three sides, but each plays differently and it's virtually assured that there is a unit combination for every kind of player and their different types of tactics. More often than not, online games will frequently boil down to who can build the most Mammoth tanks the fastest, but it's nice to know you are not restricted to this 'tactic' alone. While GDI's units are powerful and shrug off large amounts of firepower, they are slow and cumbersome, and will have difficulty across an extended front where mobility might be a deciding factor. As could be expected, Nod is the antithesis of this doctrine, with the bulk of their forces being made up of fast, lightly armoured units which are highly specialized in their roles. The new Alien Scrin forces are an eclectic mix of lightly armoured units and powerful air forces which reward rapid expansion and control of resources.
At the highest technology tier however (assuming the battle lasts this long), these lines are blurred as each of the sides bring to bear their most powerful (and evenly matched) units, the GDI Mammoth Tank, Nod Avatar and Scrin Annihilator Tripod.
Superweapons at this tier are similarly powerful and satisfying, and when used in combination with many of the other secondary powers, can quickly spell the beginning of the end. For the first time since C&C 95, Nod sees a return of its nuclear weapons, which, when used in conjunction with their other powers like the Fuel Air Bomb and Catalyst Missile give them the most potent arsenal of support powers. GDI counters with its traditional Ion Cannon (which is guaranteed to leave a lasting impression the first time it is used) while the Scrin offer up the single most destructive superweapon in the game, the Rift Generator, which essentially opens a black hole that sucks in everything for a considerable radius. Often, you might find that while completely capable of crushing the opposition before your superweapons are even ready, you'll wait that extra five minutes purely for the satisfaction of detonating a nuke, and following it up with a wave of Avatar war mechs to overwhelm and finish the enemy.
The campaign, spanning all three sides, is lengthy and satisfying, although the end may well leave people wondering what EA has in store as far as sequels are concerned. Locales as diverse and varied as Washington D.C, Sydney, London and the former-Amazon Basin are but a few of the places your army will roll over in the course of the game's single player campaign, and fans of the story will appreciate the bonus objectives which unlock "intelligence data" that offers insight in to the game's back story, and the events that occurred after Tiberian Sun (including an in-universe explanation on why Tiberian Sun's AT-AT-like Mammoth Mark 2 is nowhere to be seen.)
The campaign's story is filled out between missions by live action cut scenes provided by the likes of Michael Ironsides (Starship Troopers, Sam Fisher from Splinter Cell), Josh Holloway (Lost), Battlestar Galactica gals Grace Park and Tricia Helfer, and of course, the actor who plays Kane himself, Joe Kucan. It should be no surprise to series fans that despite the on-going list of TV celebrities in the game, Kane is the one who steals the show with virtually every appearance.
Former Westwood composer Frank Klepacki did not compose C&C 3's musical score, and Transformers-composer Steve Jablonski, provided a soundtrack that follows in the style of 2003's Generals, offering an ambient music score that is, at best, mood-setting, and at worst, uninspired. Far from "bad", series fans will be nonetheless disappointed to miss the electronic-rock sounds of Klepacki's previous works (who's C&C masterpiece is widely considered to be Red Alert's infamous "Hell March")
Voice overs and sound effects are well-produced, and the units respond with different moods and styles depending on their battlefield role that range from amusingly macabre (GDI's Mammoth Tank) to outright frighteningly fanatical. (Nod's Harvester)
While it is hard to recommend Command and Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars to RTS purists that are looking for constant innovation and improvement, fans of the series will welcome a return to form.
Westwood might be dead, but their legacy is alive and well.