EGO ALERT: A shortened version of this rant was broadcast on National TV
by Digitiser the Channel 4 Teletext Computer Games pages. END OF EGO ALERT.
The history of C&C: Red Alert can be traced back to DUNE II, the first
succesful real-time wargame. DUNE II was a nice game except that:
The AI sucked big time, computer attacks came in nice steady lines at the
same point time and time again so all you had to do was build defences at
certain points.
If you increased the speed of the game then the Sonic Blasters increased
in range while the rocket artillery became less accurate.
The AI cheated like hell. It knew exactly where you started and had it's
bases where pre-built, also when you destroyed computer buildings it could
replace them in any part of the map without adjacent buildings. This meant
attacks had to be incredibly slow because you had to keep re-destroying
gun towers you'd already eliminated twice before. Once, the computer
replaced a rocket tower right on one of my tanks that was sitting in the
middle of no-where.
Then came the original C&C. I felt that Command & Conquer was a neat
game that had too many bugs and flaws:
Once again the A.I was pitiful. Attacks where predictable and regularaly
spaced. The path finding was awful with units often running in the wrong
direction. Troops would hang around getting shot to pieces by enemy units
that where right next to them.
Then you had the joy of selling guard towers for profit. True this was
fixed by a patch, but surly they could have spotted it in playtesting.
More damigingly was the snadbags bug. For those of you who don't know, the
sandbag bug was that despite promises in the maual the computer wouldn't
run over sandbag walls you created. The computer would often stand stupified
in gullys by a line of 5 sandbags. The net result was that you could build
a line of sandbags into his base and then build an Obelisk of Light or a
Barracks at the end of the line. You could then either fry or capture his base.
The A.I still cheated like hell in exactly the same manner as DUNE II. Funny
that.
The advertising for the game used bloody mock-up shots of the games as well,
you know, the one where two hovercrafts have dropped off a squad of infantry
who are wading ashore into the fire of a couple of gun towers. Can the infantry
wade. Can they bollocks. Also promised was gurilla warfare along with ambushes
and sneak attacks. Sneak attacks my arse, as you can see everything that goes on
in an area of map even if you don't have a unit there ambushes are impossible.
As for the gurilla warfare, pah! As tank armour is identical all round, as the
enemy can always see you, as there is no bonuses for being in cover the only way
of winning a battle is with superior numbers. By the way, the only chance a man
with a rifle has of taking out a tank is if he get some bullets through the vision
slits. In C&C a mini-gunner can keep running round a single tank who would be
unable to damage him as the tank needs a direct hit becuase no tanks in C&C where
loaded with HE shells.
And in the readme file for the game the designers had the gall to say that
C&C was not DUNE III. Bloody liars.
The only good thing about C&C was the story line which, it has to be said, was
excelent.
Then Red Alert was going to be released, people said many things about it,
Improved AI! To get rid of the annoying faults from C&C.
More units!!
Amazing Backstory!!! which sketches out the history of the C&C universe. It
would show the discovery of Tiberium, the rise of NOD and the GDI.
Indoor Missions!!!!
Multi-player against the Computer!!!!!
It seemed like it was going to be a whole new game. Ooops, my mistake, it wasn't.
The AI still cheated. It still had pre-set bases. In the Skirmish mode it NEVER
makes use of navals units.
The new units where just 4 progresivly bigger tanks. The only intersting unit was
the Mobile GAP generator which is Westwoods fairly unsubtle way of allowing sneak
attacks. The way the units are distributed is also strange. Why do the Russians
get the Mammoths? After all it the GDI who have them in C&C. Why don't we get MIGs
in C&C as you can get them in Red Alert. Radar Jammers, Chronospheres, Iron Curtains,
Gap Generators, where have they all gone by the time of C&C?
And then there is the resource system, which is what really lost it for me. While I can
belive that a new Mineral called Tiberium grows on the ground I cannot belive that Gold
just oozes up out of the soil.
The indoor missions are awful, I have not met anyone who has liked them. Tediously dull
and requiring a large amount of reloading as you learn where the trigger points are.
The backstory, the best part of C&C, is abysmal. Full of historical as well as C&C
universe inconsistantcies. Tedious scripting, pointless cut scenes as well as the least
surprising surpise ending ever made them a complete turn of for me. Oh yeah, GDI and NOD
got a grand total of 1 mention each and Tiberium was never sighted.
It so obvious what happened as well, Westwood ran out of cash while developing
Tiberium Sun and so chucked out Command & Conquer a second time with new graphics.
The development team must have laughed themselves silly when it became the
definitive war game. I think I'll go back to Hexes.
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