Customer Reviews

Command & Conquer 3:Tiberium Wars Kane Edition DVD

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I am new to the Command and Conquer series, so I bought C&C3 with no particular expectations. I thought that the demo--which I recommend you play before buying--was merely decent, but decided to give the game a shot. If you are into real-time strategy (RTS) games, this one is worth a try. It is fairly easy to pick up and play, has lengthy campaigns, and it looks great. However, this is, at best, second-tier gaming in my book. When compared to the likes of Dawn of War or Battle for Middle Earth 2, C&C3 doesn't fair well. However, it does have its moments and can provide some good entertainment.

Gameplay: This game has a late 1990s feel to it. It's an RTS game where back-and-forth resource collecting, tank rushing, and unit spamming still rule the day. But to its credit, these throwback features are put together fairly well. The game does allow for some strategic decision-making, despite itself. For example, you can tech fast to big tanks and the super-weapon and hope that the enemy does not show up in the meantime. Or, you can depend on air power to take out strategic targets and take a chance on the enemy not having good air defenses. Or, you can raid the enemy base with an expensive commando early on. Or, you can take a chance and construct turrets all over the place and play a defensive game, at least for a while. Sometimes, tank spam will win the day, but not always. A mixed force is usually best if you don't know what your enemy is up to.

The campaigns are somewhat interesting overall. Each of the three races (GDI, NOD, and Skrin) have their own story lines, which will allow you to become familiar with each side. There are a good 35 missions in all which should keep you preoccupied for a while. The missions are uneven in quality and difficulty. Some are fairly easy and straightforward and can be completed in 10 minutes. A few will require repeated, frustrating efforts and are based on questionable design decisions. The stories are tied together by cutscenes that are generally decent, especially for NOD.

The AI holds its own pretty well in skirmishes. It switches up its strategies, flanks your base, and fights aggressively. You can set the AI to behave in various ways based on your gameplay style and skill level. Unfortunately, the game ships with only about 20 skirmish maps, with the typical over-abundance of 2-player maps. However, a map editor has been released by the developer, and a few decent player-made maps have appeared. I assume that the inevitable expansion pack will include more maps, missions, and units.

C&C3 flaws are largely tolerable and relate primarily to it being a re-make of an older game. Its familiarity as a traditional RTS is both its greatest strength and weakness. The resource model is straight out of classic RTS games like the Age of Empires series, Warcraft games, and other C&C games. Some will find this enjoyable. However, it leads to the ugly base sprawl and pathfinding problems that are the bane of such games, as well as games that degenerate into who can destroy the other player's harvesters and refineries the fastest. Very few of the newer gameplay mechanics that are found in recent RTS games are found here, such as hero units, RPG-style leveling (well, units do gain experience, but you hardly notice), or alternative win conditions (you must annihilate the enemy in every game to win). Since you can climb the tech tree so fast and spam units so ridiculously, you never feel any attachment to any of them. And gameplay is fast and furious. I hope that an expansion introduces some sort of hero units or roleplaying elements to the game, along with some caps on the number of super units that can be made (at least things like Mammoth tanks should be more expensive). Anyhow, as I said before, some people are going to like this traditional style of gameplay. At least the game has modern amenities like hotkeys, save/load options, and easily adjustable difficulty levels.

Visuals: The game looks great, especially on high settings. Explosions, heat exhaust effects, unit animations, and map features are very well done. Each side looks distinctive. The interface is a lot like that of Battle for Middle Earth 2; necessary information is easy to get to without being in the way. The cutscenes, while a bit to melodramatic at times, do tell the story well, and the actors are all usually convincing, besides the fact that they are talking to the camera most of the time.

Sound: Units make appropriate sounds and have decent voice acting. They don't have the personality of a game such as Dawn of War or even Warcraft 3, but they're good enough. The game's music is also decent, but not memorable.

Technical issues: The game comes with a good manual that explains the basics. The tutorial mission is only for GDI; there should have been a tutorial mission for all three races. The game has run nearly flawlessly on my computer, with only one crash in about 50 hours of gameplay. I suppose it should run well on most mid-range and better computers.

Replayabiity/Value: Since RTS games probably offer the best replay value for the dollar of any gaming genre, anyone who likes RTS games should get good value from C&C3. There is an online community, and the AI poses a good challenge. I would not be interested in replaying the campaigns any time soon, but could see running through them again at some point. If you are a fan of the C&C series, I imagine this is a no-brainer buy. For those (like me) with no previous experience with C&C, play the demo first. I overall recommend this game.

Pros:
--Great graphics, scalable to various computer set-ups.
--Good AI, entertaining campaigns, decent skirmish mode
--Easy to pick up and learn
--Some strategic depth, despite itself
--Fast and furious gameplay

Cons:
--Fast and furious gameplay
--Spamalicious; badly needs either caps on super units, more balance, and/or increased costs
--Old-fashion gameplay, with unsightly base sprawl and tired resource collection model
--Only 20 skirmish maps, with too many 2-player maps
--A few very frustrating campaign missions

The Command and Conquer series is one of the most developed, longest-lived in strategy game history. What we get with Tiberium Wars is a continuation of that tradition, streamlined and with a few new features. The problem is, the "new features" (mainly in the form of multiplayer) tend to be painfully flawed, leaving us with a playable but not entirely complete game.

First, the single player campaign. Single player starts with the option of two different campaigns - GDI (the "good guys") and NOD (the insane rebels that some players will find slightly cooler). Supported by video footage that includes many known faces (Michael Ironsides, Billy Dee Williams, Grace Park, and Joe Kucan among others), you'll battle your way across the Earth in numerous missions. These missions are often short, but they tend to be both interesting (often with unique situations) and numerous enough where you won't feel you were short-changed by the developers. If you've played C&C before, everything will feel similar. In fact, not a lot has changed besides a slight update to the graphics.

Multiplayer, however, is where a lot of new features are added - and everything falls apart. A number of new features appear in an attempt to make this RTS game a viable "sport" with fans. These features include broadcasting games as a sort of internet TV channel ("battlecast"), various challenge systems, and clans. The problem is, at the time of this writing, multiplayer is painfully broken. Patch updates can cripple players and force them to re-install the entire game if they want to compete online; the interface makes it hard to select games; the network itself appears unstable at peak times. Actual play, if you can get to it, is OK (there are three different races/groups you can be) - but it can be extremely frustrating getting to that point. Hopefully, in the future, the online play will also be streamlined - and I can give the game a much higher rating.

So, what makes the Kane Edition different from the standard? Roughly $10.00 in price. ;) The complete differences are available in the various descriptions (a few multiplayer maps, unit skins, blooper vid, making of vid, tips, etc..). In the end, though, you won't be missing much if you just get the standard edition. Fans of the series and/or the actors might consider it, but most people will use the extras once (at most) and never bother with them again.

In summation: For those that enjoy single player RTS (real time strategy), this game would rank four or five stars - the story arc is interesting, well-supported by video footage, and diverse enough to keep player interest. For those that want multiplayer action, you may be sorely disappointed until that aspectis fixed/overhauled - buy with caution.

Quick Summary:
PROS:
*BEAUTIFUL Graphics - The visuals and special effects are spectacular, EA really outdid themselves this time. Easily the best looking RTS out there.
*Incredibly Smooth - Load times are nearly non-existent, and I never experienced even the slightest drop in FPS which is incredible since I had well over 50 mammoths on the screen all firing at different targets.
*Balanced Forces - All three factions are relatively balanced (NOD is somewhat weaker in late-game but a upcoming patch will fix that), and each plays very different. Not as much variation as RA2, but still very good.
*Same Old Game - Just like the original C&C this game is simply fun to play. The speed has been substantially increased, making it much more intense.
*Multiplayer - Brutal and not for the newcomer, but loads of fun.

CONS:
*Repetitive Campaign - The single player campaign gets repetitive towards the end of the game as the same simple strategy is all you use over and over. Could have used something more to keep it interesting.
*Same Old Game - There is very little new here, many of the units are the same, although they do look a lot nicer.
*Weaker Story - Acting and actors are great, but I just felt the story wasn't developed enough (might be due to my speed of running through it)
*Short - This will vary for each person, and I have been playing these games forever so I really know what I'm doing, but the campaign is really short. I finished the GDI campaign completely in under 6 hours. Kind of a let down there.

Bottom Line:
C&C3 is a great game, and more fun then most things out there. Great characters, fast paced action, and wonderful graphics easily make this game well worth the money. In the end, however, it is just the same old game as before. For most people that will be more then enough. For the rest of you, go buy Supreme Commander.

I have always liked C&C games because of their different style of RTS. Command&Conquer is now a huge title in the RTS industry; an original product of Westwood Studios has kept the attention of thousands, making the revolution in 1996 with the original Command&Conquer, Westwood's RTS (that includes Tiberian Sun and Red Alert) now was admired by leading corporations, and EA's attention never quit til they could convince Westwood to be a part of their company. Now EA uses their name, and promotes these games taking the credit, but we all know the true people (which are now part of EA) that really MAKE the game.

Command&Conquer is different and makes the difference! Companies had tried to copy this unique RTS, but they certainly fail or do it different. Not too much people know about Command&Conquer, so to you new people searching for a GOOD STRATEGY GAME, I fully recommend this game, and after testing and reviewing it, I give this game 5 stars.

Definitly a must for RTS fans. Hey it just released, and there are players around the world playing 24/7 so there gonna find the exploits, just hopefully EA will not get lazy early on like past RTS games and keep the patches comming.

Graphic: Zoom in/out rotation left/right all look good in Mechanic/structure detail. Air forces blow out hot air effect and dust are impressive. Anti air guns look funny like water when firing though. With moderate CPU/GPU, like E6600/ati 1950pro, and 1680x1050 with max setting, it maintains almost no noticable frame rates below my eyes can sense in any cases so far. So I wonder why some other games require so much more cpu/gpu powers with or w/o better graphics. Smaller characters, like infantry, look less detailed though when zoomed in but they are doing something, like push up, when idle. The walkers of GDI, I like most when idle. They act like a strained animal, wiggling its feet, standing up, and sitting down but stay where I told them to. It is an an art and humor. 9/10

Sound: The musics are quiet inspiring according to battle situation. Explosion, reporting, echo, environmental are realistical and immersive. Different things respond in their own way and changed sometime. Snipers of GDI says funny when injured. 9/10

Gameplay: The tech trees are not very deep but take some time and resource to reach all of them and no ones become useless at the end. Different unit has differnt weakness and strength. Especailly, difficulty >= hard, the AI alters stratigy to defeat you based upon your soft spots. However, the AI is becoming less intellgent after 15mins gameplay if you can hold on and built up your base. And I think difficulty=brutal is impossible to win aginst AI. 8.5/10

The game AI plays very fast once it finds your soft spot, then sends overwhemling counter-forces to attack to let you feel deparate. If that happened, I restarted the game usually before the ending.

Superpower, it is not that powerful as it seems. It can't turn the battle tide the other way as long as you have spread and properly populated bases. It can't destroy every things in its range. Actually commando is far more efficient in that but easily get killed. Different units need backup and cover to do its best.

C&C3 is all about building a large force fast and crushing the other side, also known as "Zerging". There is almost no time when you will have to build up a base that can withstand a large scale attack.

I like turtling and slowly climbing up the tech tree and making an army of powerful units but in C&C3 you almost always must just build the basic structures and units then run like mad to overwhelm the other side.

This is fast paced and most games will last 10-20 minutes with some being even shorter.

If you want more depth, larger maps, longer games, and the chance to use the turtle tactic try Supreme Commander (if you system can handle it).

This is all not to say the game is not good, it is, it's just fast paced.

The full motion video looks fairly good but this is no 250 million dollar Hollywood blockbuster. Most of the actors acting is a bit off but that is what makes Command and Conquer well Command and Conquer. The character of Kane is played very well and the GDI general is the best played from what I've seen. Billy D Willams smiles all the time for some strange reason.

System requirements are not bad. My system is not much now days with an AMD XP 2700+ CPU (2.1GHz), 2Gb of PC3200 memory, GeForce 7600 GT (256Mb) video card, and a Soundblaster X-Fi XtreameMusic sound card, but I can set most everything to max except shadows on off and no anti-alaising at 1024 x 768 and I have no problems with frame rate.

If you like the Command and Conquer games or you want a Real Time Strategy game that does not take and hour or more for each map then this is a game you will want to look into.

The Kane Edition has some nice stuff such as a blooper reel and some basic tactics given by one of the developers.

I'm 24 and I guess I come from the older generation of RTS gamers. To me, no game has ever even compared to StarCraft when it comes to RTS games. Red Alert was probably a distant second. That being said, this is probably one of the funner recent RTS releases. I've played through a few missions and it was overall pretty fun. This review is intended for single player, only.

Personally, I love the FMVs from Red Alert and really looked forward to the live action in this one. First of all the acting is pretty good. Michael Ironside's voice is awesome as usual. I haven't seen much of Grace Park, although she looks better here than in the newer eps of BSG. Although every time I see her, it's like she's holding back and about to burst out in laughter or something. Fans of Star Wars will recognize Billy Dee Williams / Lando. I havne't seen him in years. The acting is surprisingly pretty serious and not campy like Red Alert. The props and sets are very authentic looking.

Gamewise. Almost all the units seem to move in slow motion, even the APCs and tanks. The GDI seem almost identical to Company of Heroes in terms of units. Missle, machine gun infantry, tanks, sniper. Gameplay is similar to COH as well but more futuristic. The single campaign is also disgustingly easy even on hard. Just mass units and win. Units get pumped out really fast and the tech tree is climbed equally as fast. Yet the units move so slowly. I can see how this can be a problem for MP'ers.

The graphics are actually pretty beautiful. I was surprised at how well the units look versus the cpu power it takes up. The game runs great on a Geforce 6800, P4 3.4. Supreme Commander looked completely awful on my system.


Cliffs:

Good:
Graphics are great and older system friendly.
Acting is pretty decent overall. Grace park is in it! with other stars.
Gameplay is reminiscent of Red Alert - modern yet classic.
Varied and fun single player campaign.
Great game presentation.

Bad:
The annoying 'incoming messages' that *frequently* interrupt your gameplay in the campaign.
Units seem to move in slow motion.
A bit on the easy side.
Tech tree can be climbed within minutes.
GDI is a bit too much like COH.
Missing a scantily clad Tanya. :(

EA has earned a reputation for producing bland but competent games. What I got, much to my surprise, was a professional, slickly presented and enjoyable Single-player campaign, combined with a bland multiplayer component.

First, the Single-Player campaign. Not as cheesy or fun as Red Alert 2 or the original C&C. This is especially evident in GDI, where the supporting characters take themselves way to seriously. Fortunately, both Michael Ironside and Billy Dee Williams have tremendous fun with their roles. In terms of storyline, NOD is definitely more fun to play through. The standout performances here are Joe Kucan (as Kane) and Josh Holloway (as Ajay). Joe Kucan is as charismatic as ever, and Holloway totally gets the C&C ethos and atmosphere.

The biggest problem with this game is its lack of diversity in each sides unit selection. Defensive turrets are less than useless, and there are no counters for the most powerful units (ie. Mammoth Tanks, Avatars, Walkers). Which means every LAN game becomes a rush up the tech tree, ending in a massive high-tech tank rush. There are many prominent RTS games (Dawn of War, Supreme Commander, Company of Heroes) where the Tank Rush has been effectively neutered as an endgame tactic. So C&C3 ends up being an embarassing throwback to a bygone age, rather than an evolution of a much loved gaming series.

The product reviews for Ea Games: Tiberium Wars and TW Kane Edition say the games are compatible with Windows 98 and 2000- they are not.