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Command and Conquer 3 Announced
pasamio writes "After years of April Fools Jokes and other pranks, EA has officially announced Command and Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars. Set for PC release in 2007, they're keeping the details very close to hand but it is being developed using the next generation SAGE engine (used in C&C:Generals and Battle for Middle Earth)."
As a member of the C&C community, I can actually say that this could have potential to be good. In many ways, they're returning to the roots of the game with GDI and Nod, live-action cutscenes (although it's unknown if Joe Kucan will return as Kane) and an immersive single player campaign. EA have actually taken some time and care to get a bit of science behind tiberium, which I feel is a good sign.
I still feel betrayed by EA for letting the community down at so many points - Generals, their interference in Tiberian Sun (look at prerelease info about the game to see what I mean), the dumbing down of Red Alert 2 (the original RA was serious, RA2 was all cartoony and not serious at all) and then the fiasco surrounding The First Decade pack they released. If they can release a solid C&C game that lives up to the expectations of myself and other C&C fans, I could probably forgive them.
Also, not mentioned there but there is to be a third side available once GDI and Nod campaigns are complete, but it's unknown as to who you'll be playing as. If you're in the US, there's a PC Gamer coming out that will have a lot of info about the game, and a Dutch magazine, PC Gameplay, also has a preview of the game.
If we can hit that bull's-eye, the rest of the dominoes will fall like a house of cards... Checkmate.
I loved Generals. It was an awesome game. For a while.
But I have vowed never to give EA another dime for that franchise if it's the last thing I ever do. Why? Because their commitment to their customers is crap compared to their RTS rival Blizzard. Here's what happened for you non C&G:G players:
First they released the game. It was cool. People noticed it was blantantly unbalanced. It was still imbalanced. They released 3 or 4 patches and then Zero Hour came out. Zero hour further screwed up the balance of the game. In the end, they patched it a few more times and then left it in a crippled, obviously screwed up state. I remember being so frustrated with the game being one sided that I was posting in their support forums. EVERYBODY was angry about the game. It came down to a point where people were telling prospective customers to not purchase the game because EA doesn't care about you once you cough up cash. It was only after insane amounts of anti-EA posts when EA staff finally started interacting - on a very limited basis - with the community. I remember their first post being an apology of sorts. But it was clear the higher ups were telling them to can support and move on to working on the LoTR game that was coming up.
The consensus was that the game coulda been great, but EA's lack of commitment to release balance patches (is it that much work???) killed hard core players' will to keep playing. I remember vowing to never play again until they patched the current version. I haven't picked up that CD since.
Why would I complain about the game's balance? Because the expansion set made the game have TWELVE sides and yet at the end of the day there was one or two CLEAR superior sides to play (inf and usaf). It became boring and frustrating to play when two out of three random opponents you played was one of the two cheese sides.
I don't care how shiny and flashy their next game is. I'm not giving them a damn dime. If they are going to release a multiplayer RTS and then not bother to make sure it's balanced, I'm not interested.
Blizzard is good for micromanaging. Age of Empire was good for huge wars and economic games. TA was for downright fighting and it seemed to me that C&C was going for the TA feel but never achieved it.