So, the Command & Conquer (C&C) series is back. I played the demo, loved it, and can’t wait for it to hit the stores on the 28th of March.
I won’t say much about the storyline and what has been happening, because when I played the first two C&C games I was just about 10 years old or around there. At that age, you don’t really bother about the storyline, you just want to get into action and start fragging. Almost every game I played at that age, I hit the escape key to skip the stories.
Therefore, I’ll just talk about gameplay, the strengths of the Global Defence Initiative (GDI), and the strengths of the Brotherhood of NOD. Everything I say here will be among GDI and NOD only. I have no idea what Scrin is does, I only know that they are an alien race.
Tutorial
The first thing one would usually do is start the game and play the tutorial. Well, you start off in this tutorial with what I believe are 2 squads of overpowered Zone Troopers. I tell you, these guys own everything, from infantry to vehicles to buildings. They don’t really have a weakness, except to weapons which kill infantry easily. So in this tutorial you just do all the lame basic stuff you need to know like scrolling around the map, attacking, building, and some other things unique to the C&C series.
GDI prologue mission
Ok, tutorial complete. Then there’s two missions for you to play in the demo. The GDI prologue is really easy, because after you try attacking them using aircraft they give you the powers of the ion cannon. Target the ion cannon on their base, and their base is toast in 1 shot. That’s it, mission accomplished.
GDI demo mission
The other mission is much better, as the enemy has a lot more defences put up and there was no overpowered ion cannon for you to use. You get to use the mammoth tank in this mission, and its one of the strongest tank, if not, the strongest tank in the game. Well, just spam about 5 or 6 mammoth tanks and send them to their base and they are dead. No challenge.
I actually see some features from Company of Heroes (CoH) and Dawn of War (DoW) implemented in this game. I saw an option to allow tanks to reverse all the way, facing their stronger front armour at the enemy. This is something the Company of Heroes community actually want in CoH. In DoW, when you drag that box to select multiple units at a time, if a builder unit happens to be in the selection, it doesn’t get selected. I find this really useful. This is implemented into C&C3 by having the harvester not get selected.
GDI strengths
If you’re wondering why I can actually talk about NOD forces in the game, its because you are actually able to use both NOD and Scrin in the skirmish. However if you use Scrin, you would lose in 13 seconds. After using both GDI and NOD about 3 times each, I realise that the GDI has a much stronger frontal assault force than NOD. The GDI infantry and tanks has more firepower than NOD infantry and tanks. In fact, the NOD tanks are really pathetic. However, by having more firepower, GDI is a little weak in terms of defence.
NOD strengths
NOD, on the other hand, is a lot better at holding their ground rather than attacking. The Obelisk of Light has to be the best defence building among these two factions. The basic NOD defence always come in threes, and they cost about the same as 1 of GDI’s basic defence. NOD also has the power to stealth its whole base, proving vital against air strikes and artillery. If NOD wants to attack, I don’t recommend a frontal assault unless you have a force equal to the number of orcs in LOTR. I recommend long range, hit and run attacks. NOD has an aircraft bomber which remains stealthed, and I have to say its one of my favourite units. What I like about NOD infantry is also the fact that they can upgrade themselves so that they are invulnerable to Tiberium radiation.
Superpowers
On to the superpowers of GDI and NOD. The GDI has the ion cannon, and NOD has the nuclear missile. They are both equally powerful I think, and they can destroy a whole base (except for the construction yard) in 1 shot. What I want to comment is how crazy the nuclear missile is. Maximum frames per second (FPS) in game is 30, and guess what it fell to when I nuked the enemies base? It hovered around 1-2. An in-game timer showed that the animation of the explosion only lasted 4 seconds, but in real life it took 15 seconds or even more.
Skirmish
Anyway, what I like about the skirmish option of the game is the fact that you can choose the AI personality. Balanced, rusher, steamroller, turtler, or guerilla. Here are what they mean.
Balanced: Well, balanced. Duh. Rusher: Enemy builds up forces quickly and attacks easily only 1 or 2 minutes in the game. Steamroller: Enemy focuses on heavy upgrades, slowly building up strong units. Eventually ends up spamming heavy tanks. Turtler: A player who sits back, builds up a crazy defence which should be impenetrable. Guerilla: Hit and run tactics, and some ambush and stuff.
Issues
While playing the game, I saw some interesting stuff. I saw allied infantry walk through my tanks, and I saw allied tanks going through each other. I’m sure it’ll be fixed by the time the game is released or through a patch.
Good news for players with not-so-good PCs. This game doesn’t require a powerful PC to run on, so even if you can’t play Supreme Commander, you have C&C 3 to play.
One thing I don’t really like is the powers each faction has. The missile strikes and nuclear missiles, ion cannons are way too much overpowered. They easily flatten a base in a shot. For the weaker powers, they destroy a building in a shot. I’m sure the community will give lots of feedback and maybe it’ll be nerfed.
I know is my longest post ever, but who cares? The real reviews you find on the net are easily 3 pages long. In fact, this review is 1049 words long. If only game reviews were allowed in English composition writing.
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars Trailer (1:12)
Graphics: 8
Sound: 8
Gameplay: 9
Lasting appeal: 8
Overall: 8.8
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