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vCheats.com - Command & Conquer 3:Tiberium Wars DVD
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List Price: $29.99
Our Price: $21.99
Your Save: $ 8.00 ( 27% )
Average Customer Rating:  
Availability: In stock soon. Order now to get in line. First come, first served.
Manufacturer: Electronic Arts
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Amazon Maximum Age: 20
Amazon Minimum Age: 144
Batteries Included: 0
Binding: DVD-ROM
Brand: Electronic Arts
EAN: 0014633156294
ESRB Age Rating: Teen
Feature: Ultra-responsive, smooth-as-silk gameplay that places your entire arsenal at your fingertips
Is Autographed: 0
Is Memorabilia: 0
Label: Electronic Arts
Manufacturer: Electronic Arts
Model: 15629
Platform: Windows XP
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Release Date: 2007-03-26
Studio: Electronic Arts
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Features
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Ultra-responsive, smooth-as-silk gameplay that places your entire arsenal at your fingertips
30 single-player missions, in a vast open-world theatre where each decision you make matters
Observe, broadcast, and compete in thrilling online battles - with all-new interactive spectator modes, VoIP communication & player commentary
High-definition, live action video sequences seamlessly ties the game's epic story together
Adaptive AI matches your style of play & gives you the highest level of challenge
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Real Time Slaughter (Tiberium sun was better)
Comment: First I don't like the balance in this game. Everything dies so fast that there's not really much chance for micromanaging. Eventually the low tech troops are just meat shields. Graphics are ok, effects like lasers are fine. But there is basically nothing new. It seems like a game that could have been released five years ago and for me that doesn't cut it today. I grew up on the first 5 or so C&C games and those were great. IMO, C&C as a great series ended with Tiberium Sun.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Ridiculously one-sided, with the GDI so damn dreary and boring
Comment: I'm a long time Command & Conquer Red Alert fan, so I'd only heard the inklings of the original C&C series, featuring the highly charismatic and almost godlike Kane, worshipped as such by so many gamers, and the names thrown about of GDI, Nod, Tiberium, etcetera, and I wanted to get in on it.
The situation setup in the beginning is spellbinding and drags me in with full optimism and wonder. The world is divided into three zones based on Tiberium infestation: Blue Zones controlled entirely by the GDI where life is good, Yellow Zones where Tiberium infestation has almost destroyed the local ecosystems and where Nod gets most of its recruits, and Red Zones which are completely uninhabitable.
Maybe because it was the first one listed, or I just wanted to save the more fun faction (Nod) for last, I started with the GDI. And right away I was disillusioned.
Michael Ironside, or "That Cranky Old Jerkass with the Metal Arm from Starship Troopers", seems like such a lazy actor here that he could easily be replaced by some other cantankerous old man actor like Stacey Keach or Kurtwood Smith and it wouldn't even make a difference. The entire GDI setup, acting, and color scheme just screams "Sci-Fi Original Movie" D-quality production. Be it Captain Generica as played by Ironside, or even the smooth and cool President Lando Calrissian (since he's played by Billy Dee Williams. I forgot his name) who seems to be the only saving grace here.
The worst of the actors is the Intelligence officer, some woman whose name I never even learned. She looks like a woman, yes, but she is so stiff and jagged, with such a grating tone of voice, blank and dead eyes, and heavy cheekbones, that she seems like she used to be a man. And nothing she ever says is ever important. Anything she says in the beginning, she ends up repeating in-mission, while the mission text tells me this during the loading screen, and with EVA transmissions, and with the Objectives bar in-game. She's completely useless, only there to add some tranny sex appeal, somehow. And the few times where she does show emotion, it's so forced and awkward that you can barely stand to look at her any more.
The environments are far more realistic and graphically advanced than Red Alert 3, but it gets to a point where nearly ALL the environments have the exact same shade of gray, brown, and tan, and it starts to become a tired hassle to play through them. Even worse is that the GDI forces are some of the most generic and lamest military forces in any RTS game I've played. They have almost nothing special beyond bombs and machine guns and tanks, with some "futuristic" style weapons like the Zone Troopers and.... zone troopers. Their arsenal looks like that of a "Sci-Fi Original Movie" D-quality mixed with Starship Troopers.
Every mission feels like the exact same dreck of "build a base, kill Nod, be good guys, feel happy and play patriotic music". There's no influencing manner beyond just a lazy sense of duty which is only further escalated by the "dramatic" acting of Captain Generica.
At the end of the campaign, you are faced with a "dilemma" of choosing to use a Liquid Tiberium bomb, which would be the 2047 equivalent of the 1945 Atomic Bomb. Amazingly, Captain Generica drops his Generican title and puts on the most solid, credible, and heartfelt acting without breaking character in explaining to you every reason why you shouldn't ignite the Tiberium Bomb, whereas President Calrissian's entire justification why you should boils down to "NOOOOD BAAAAADD DROP BOMB KILL INNOCENTS BUT END WAR ROFL!"
Then comes the Brotherhood of Nod and Kane. And here is where I realize the C&C games got their shining moments of greatness and where this whole worship of the game character Kane came from.
The game developers are completely and totally in favor of the Brotherhood of Nod. They love them. They put all their effort into them. Nod is their bread and butter. Without Kane and Nod, C&C3 would be the most boring and generic dreck this side of "Sci-Fi Presents: Captain Generica's Starfleet of D-Movie Quality".
Kane is beyond words phenomenal. His tone of voice, his message, his rhetoric, his body language, everything about him oozes such charisma and righteous belief in his own cause, that the disillusionment I suffered with the GDI instantly converted me to his side. And unlike the GDI, who just seemed to be "we're the good guys because we are", Nod actually made a very convincing argument as to why their side is right: the GDI takes control of the precious Blue Zones for themselves, where they rule completely, and in an isolationist fashion which ignores the plight of the downtrodden in the Yellow Zones. While they call themselves the "Global Defense Initiative", they only bother to protect 20% of the globe that they control. Nod makes this very clear, and even though from the outsider's view (and my view until I started the Nod campaign) they are a deranged, evil cult dedicated to a world where Kane is god and no one but Kane matters to the world, once you are inside Nod, you fully realize just how beautifully right and just Nod is.
This doesn't just extend to the FMV's or Kane, but the main lieutenant is a great deal more charismatic, calm, and at ease in his role than the GDI counterpart. He's the average Southern man who cracks dry and wry jokes, and even if the information he gives isn't so stellar that you can't learn it from the repetition in-game, he gives it with such style and flair that you want to listen to him because of his delivery, rather than necessity (of which there is none).
On the battlefield as well, Nod is superior in their variety of weapons from the much more enthusiastic riflemen the Militants, to the heartbreaking sacrifice of the Fanatics, to the variety of vehicles and weapons that come down even to jeeps and motorcycles instead of the same dreary tanks and APC's.
Then there's the Scrin. I won't say anything about them because I haven't reached their campaign yet, though I did manage to test them out in the GDI campaign.
This causes me to come to my complaints on gameplay.
- The three sides are in almost no way different. Unlike the Red Alert series where different buildings were faction-specific and different strategies had to be employed to account for different units and tactics and things, virtually all three sides in this game are identical save for different unit appearances. The best comparison would likely be Age of Empires, where all sides are fundamentally identical save for some minor unique differences. All sides have the exact same basic buildings with the exact same spots in the building queues and the exact same functions and purposes. This is no "Starcraft" when it comes to variety. Even the Scrin have the same generic riflemen/rocket trooper infantry to start out with; though with much more alien functions, they are fundamentally the same thing as riflemen and rocket troopers.
- SEVERE PATHFINDING ISSUES. I'm using version 1.0 so maybe this is addressed in patches, but thus far the in-game units have had severe pathfinding issues. I've had far too many instances where ordering a group of tanks and infantry has caused some of them to go where I say, and half of them will end up trying to find a way around something in their way, only to not find a way around, but end up going off in other directions. Other instances have seen vehicles completely ignore the "Guard" stance, and go chasing after enemy units until they run into an enemy defensive structure and get killed. On more than one occasion, I've had to click an area for a unit to go, only for them to completely ignore my order and go some other way. On many of these occasions, they've decided to dash straight into the enemy, so that I've angrily rightclicked where I want them to go maybe 30 times as they finally listen and obey. Other instances include trying to attack units within their line of sight around obstacles. While other units are clearly capable of hitting enemies from the edge of certain obstacles, some units not only can't, but see fit to wander out INTO THE LINE OF FIRE and get within arm's reach of the enemy before bothering to shoot. This leads to some serious issues with gameplay and strategy.
- The AI is ridiculously overbearing and gratingly annoying even when it isn't difficult. Hard mode has proven too hard for me sometimes, so I've gone down to Easy mode, only to see the AI continue their exact same tactics as in Hard mode, just with a slight decrease in frequency. And their tactics almost ALWAYS amount to "Junkyard Dog" tactics, in which they muster up as many light or light/heavy mix units as they can into a small pack of 6-12, and attack me with no intent of causing any damage except to fully stall my war effort again and again without any final invasion to put the crush on me. In this way, I've never lost (on Hard mode) because the enemy never bothered to finish me off, but just keep harassing me over and over until I have virtually nothing and just give up in anger and frustration and restart or quit the mission.
Despite, or perhaps because of, the heavy emphasis on the greatness of Kane and Nod, the game is only half-good and half-fun, while the bland environments and mostly bland units have me feeling more and more desiring to play Red Alert 3 again.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Comment: Fun game.
Good campaign, good multiplayer.
Much better on a higher end machine.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Friends want to beat me...
Comment: Got this since a friend want to beat me at CC3... Installed it on an older computer just to find out the video card was supported... Moved it to a new system and problems with the Audio... Fixed with a driver update..
Other then that, the game is great... Haven't had enough time to get beat yet...
Customer Rating:
Summary: Skirmish was challenging until AI forgot to play.
Comment: This game is sort of like a beautiful aging celebrity who just gets more elegant with age but doesn't get any wiser. I bought it because I thought I would like the "blast from the past" (and it this case quite literally a blast) and found that it really hasn't changed a whole lot.
What happened is that I went into skirmish mode and set my opponent to "hard rusher". Once I figured out how to defend my base, I found I could successfully defeat successive waves of attacks and I looked forward to building my forces and fighting my way across the field to the enemy base, when suddenly the attacks just stopped.
So, I built a little "Pitbull" and drove it over to the enemy base only to find abundant Tiberium, and bunch of buildings, and nothing going on. Then I built some tanks and drove them over to the enemy base and during the course of razing it I found about four enemy harvesters clumped together full of Tiberium not doing anything.
What happened? Well, it looks like the AI got confused and stopped playing. That's sort of a let down, especially in this day of 2 gigahertz and above chips and machines with several gigs of memory. You'd think someone could write an AI opponent that wouldn't get stuck and stop playing during a skirmish. This has happened with games like this in the past, and you'd think that it would have been dealt with.
The bottom line is that it looks like even more cosmetics making an even prettier face on an old game.
I found after writing this review that whenever you've got four or more harvesters and one refinery, they get gridlocked trying to unload their Tiberium.
And, just as you're in the heat of battle and you think things are going well, the Tiberium runs out and your harvesters just head on out across the battlefield to the other side of the "board" and get all destroyed. Has anyone thought of giving us a means to automate the harvesters in an intelligent manner?
There are other quirky things, like if you tell your bombers to bomb a target, and they destroy it, they'll go back to the base by the most direct route possible (regardless of the fact that you made have made a great effort to steer them around enemy defences) and all get shot down. If they don't, they'll return to where the target no longer exists and just fly in circles. Sheesh, talk about "dumb unit syndrome".
So, it should be possible to give the player much more of an ability to customize the behavior of the various units under his/her command. This is where the game really lacks to me, and where the lack of advancement given the years this game has existed is hard to excuse.
On the other hand, once you start a campaign the cut scenes are very cool. So, at the end of the day when I'm too brain dead to want to do anything but blow stuff up in a post-apocalypic world, this is the place to go. It's hard enough to be entertaining, but easy enough to play with half my brain tied behind my back (once I learned what all the units do, of course).
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