‘Everyone has done head to head unit combat to death so the idea here is to give players other options. No way you could afford broadband in 1999, you liar. Even without that level of depth, Tiberian Sun still carried subtle ways to really screw with your opponents over 36k dial-up. ‘Designers didn’t build maps with terrain modifying unit speeds in mind’, recalled lead designer Adam ‘Ishmael’ Isgreen in 2007. Movement being hindered or helped by certain terrains was considered at later stages of development, but the risk of ‘messing up the balance’ stayed the programmers’ hands. ‘The player who controls certain areas will have the power to destroy bridges, cut supply lines and dominate the Tiberium Ore fields to a greater extent than ever before.’ ‘Land itself will inherently become a vital resource’, correctly proclaimed PC Gamer magazine’s James Flynn in April of 1998. Explosive firefights leave craters in the ground, bridges can be demolished to deny easy access, and rivers freeze over on the chilling Arctic maps. In Tiberian Sun, the terrain became more interactive than ever before. Could they deliver a brand-new RTS experience, or would they be forever doomed to wallow in the house that Red Alert built? After all, this was a test of their abilities. The stakes were high, and Westwood were going big or going home. For Tiberian Sun, explained Castle, it was destructible terrain. Co-founder Louis Castle explained in February that all of the studio’s games were born out of a set of ‘high ideals’. This was not a realistic goal since it’s just not possible to make something that will meet everyone’s expectations.’īut Westwood had always been ambitious. We had a team of experienced developers who wanted to beat their own expectations while simultaneously building a game that would be everything the fans of the series expected and more. Producer Rade Stojsavljevic recalled the atmosphere in 2000: ‘‘The degree of hype and expectations that Tiberian Sun had to fulfil was staggering. It was anticipation that the team felt very heavily on their shoulders. God, was that year great for games.īut there were still many cheap imitators, and Command & Conquer was still a franchise whose forthcoming entry was highly anticipated. Other games like 1997’s Dark Reign: The Future of War, Age of Empires and Total Annihilation were shaking up the RTS in new ways. StarCraft’s monumental legacy needs no introduction or explanation. Blizzard Entertainment, after riding Westwood’s coattails with its Dune II clone Warcraft, revolutionised the genre with 1995’s Warcraft 2 and unleashed a juggernaut in 1998. You build, you train, you attack before your enemy does simple, but effective enough to make Red Alert one of the most iconic games of the dial-up age.īut the RTS was not living in a vacuum. With 1996’s Command & Conquer: Red Alert came the peak of the ‘old-school’ RTS. They had invented the genre with 1992’s Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty and refined it into its modern form in 1995 with Command & Conquer (known as Tiberian Dawn amongst fans and Westwood themselves). You see, there was a time when Westwood ruled the RTS world. It’s also ambition that makes Tiberian Sun stand out from the rest of the Command & Conquer family. Reasons for this are complex, but they can be simplified to a single word: Ambition. In fact, Tiberian Sun had already been delayed by the time of the acquisition – and would be a second time. They were hard at work on Command and Conquer: Tiberian Sun, a game that wouldn’t see the light of day until just over a year later. Electronic Arts’ purchase of Westwood in 1998 – a bonus for its annexing of Virgin Interactive’s US branch – cast the studio’s independence into doubt, as its new masters put it to co-development duties and seemingly dragged down its other iconic franchise.īut EA had purchased Westwood in the midst of a creative firestorm. Its more successful titles like 1997’s (excellent) Blade Runner failed to turn a significant profit. 1997’s Command & Conquer: Sole Survivor and 1998’s Dune 2000 were both shrugged off by critics. The late 90s were a turbulent time for Westwood Studios.
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