CNCNZ.com

19/11/2020

C&C auction by The Tech Monkey is now live - grab awesome stuff while helping out charities!

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21981-cc-auction-by-thetechmonkey-now-live/

27/10/2020

A streak of anniversary posts, eh? On 27 October 1997, CNCNZ.com first came online (then under the name TiberianSun.Net.NZ).

While a good year for Command & Conquer, with how the Remastered Collection reinvigorated public interest in the franchise, it was another quiet one on this front. Another round of personal obligations, interests in other (often higher-level) communities and even grabbing a position in a game studio didn't reflect well on the willpower to reignite this site's activity. Also, with the C&C community being increasingly decentralized yet again, thanks to numerous topical and off-topical Discord servers which catch news and things of interest before we can, I think a proper discussion on what the site's future direction really should be is in order. This is in no way a criticism towards those servers, as they have in fact been instrumental in getting a lot of projects going, mods progressing, and even the remasters themselves patched (at least to a decent degree). We just need to find our place again.

(Also, I am aware of a glitch on the non-forum part of the site preventing drop-downs from appearing on mouse hover, and medium-to-large gallery pages ending up blank. IIRC there was a similar issue before but I can not remember what the solution was. I will investigate it by the end of the week.)

25/10/2020

Exactly 20 years ago (25 October 2000), Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 hit the shelves in North America. It was the first time a Command & Conquer title was developed mostly by a team other than the original Westwood Studios folks at Las Vegas, and the new developers (Westwood Pacific, from Irvine) would end up making one of the highest-regarded titles in the franchise. A true icon of the genre, Red Alert 2 alone brought so many legendary units, quotes and moments to the, by then, already rich gaming world, and is still well-enjoyed to this day.

For me personally, Red Alert 2 (with the Yuri's Revenge expansion pack) shares the top spot as favourite C&C game with Tiberium Wars (again, with the Kane's Wrath expansion). It is probably the RTS I've played the most, and one I'd always put as ground zero for anyone who wants to make their own game in the franchise - do not take anything from it (without a valid replacement), just base the gameplay around it. It is always easy to pick up and entertain oneself with, the units and techs are creative, and the campaign never gets old. I only wish that there was a fourth AI difficulty that would actually put up a fight on its own in 1v1...

What are your favourite RA2 memories? Let us know!

(P.S. source for the release date, take that IGDB: https://web.archive.org/web/20010615170550/http://westwood.ea.com/html/backstage/press/2000/10-24-2000.html )

26/09/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21967-25-years-of-command-conquer/

On September 26th, 1995, after about a month's worth of distribution issues, Westwood Studios shipped the original DOS version of Command & Conquer. It was based upon their 1992 strategy Dune II, but without a book/film license to keep them chained regarding what they could and could not do. Alongside Blizzard's WarCraft and later StarCraft series, Command & Conquer would become the most formative RTS franchise.

The Command & Conquer demo was one of the first games I've ever played, and being just a little less than 5 months older than the game itself, I have a special connection to it. Admittedly, I play many different games these days, but returning to a Command & Conquer title feels like coming back home after a long trip - everything's comfortable and familiar. It's also much easier to return to the mentality of C&C than for most other strategy games, and no matter how many mechanical additions later C&C titles would get, they were all relatively simple on a fundamental level. While it is nice to spend an evening thinking of advanced build orders in Age of Empires or micromanaging small-scale shootouts in Company of Heroes, the certain bluntness of Command & Conquer is satisfactory on a different level. It's kind of like eating a few exotic flavours of ice cream and then returning to plain old basic chocolate - no matter how much you love the wacky combinations on your cone, the classics never fail you.

While my go-to C&C throwback games are usually Yuri's Revenge, Kane's Wrath, the original Red Alert, and even Firestorm sometimes, the recent C&C Remastered Collection release reminded me of some things that got me hooked on the original (e.g. the feeling of commanding a contemporary-ish army with a few hi-tech gadgets, the lore, the simplicity) and even removed a few flaws that would turn me away from it after a while (absence of build queues, running out of Tiberium on the map, being very careful with new mission savegames, no proper skirmish). That little bit of fresh paint and a good tech refit enabled me to get a bit of that feeling of all-round satisfaction when playing Tiberian Dawn that I simply couldn't get in that level if I'd just fired up one of the original versions on this date.

I have further thoughts on C&C as a franchise and RTS as a genre, but these will have to wait for a proper article or two in the coming days. Until then, whether you prefer the original 1995 DOS discs, the fan-updated Gold edition, or the recent remaster, please give Tiberian Dawn a run or two. This birthday is one you should show up to.

25/09/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21966-jim-vessella-looks-back-at-25-years-of-cc-posts-modding-guidelines/

On the eve of the 25th anniversary of the original Command & Conquer Jim Vessella posted on Reddit what the series means to him, but more importantly, he addressed a common community dilemma of what is acceptable in a Command & Conquer mod and what is not. So for the first time, we have a written general modding FAQ on the official website. Finally, he informed the fans that the Limited Run Games collector's editions should be shipping soon, but that it may take a few weeks to reach individual locations.

24/09/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21965-cc-remastered-collection-hotfix-released/

As we reported yesterday, and as was to be expected considering the problem reports from around the entire community, the C&C Remastered Collection received a hotfix patch to resolve some of the issues that have arisen since last week's major patch. Again, the team did not have much time to resolve all issues so they concentrated on the more critical ones.

23/09/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21964-cc-remastered-collection-sale-giveaways-hotfix-announcement/

A couple of news bits regarding the Command & Conquer: Remastered Collection have popped up:

* The Command & Conquer Community site has prizes for players of the remasters from 24th to 27th September. Those who rank first in the Tiberian Dawn and/or Red Alert leaderboards for that day will receive a 1-year subscription to EA Play (formerly named Origin Access), and those who finish in the top 50 have a chance to receive a random prize as well.
* The Remastered Collection itself is 25% off until 5th October on Steam to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Tiberian Dawn (which is on 26th September), while the other Steam C&C titles are 75% off (note that that is 75% off the increased price from this February).
* For those who have the remasters and are facing numerous issues, Jim Vessella has confirmed that a hotfix is being made to address at least some of them, but it would appear that the team has already past the deadline to do so, so not all of the issues seen since last week's update may be fixed.

16/09/2020

As announced last week, today is the day we receive the final (intended) update for Command & Conquer: Remastered Collection. It's a pretty large one, though, including the following key features:

* loading screen enhancements including minimap display
* added local replay file support
* added 6 player support in Tiberian Dawn
* added beacons
* expanded features for mods and custom maps including intro and win/loss videos
* updated German translation thanks to the feedback from United-Forum.de
* fixed numerous bugs

10/09/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21958-cc-remastered-collection-next-patch-intended-as-final-map-editor-source-released/

In Jim Vessella's latest update, he mentions the latest addition to the Command & Conquer Remastered Collection source code package - the map editor itself, which is something that the community has loved to expand on for multiple titles in the series. But alas, next week we will see the last intended patch for the C&C Remastered Collection, as the team feels the game has reached the vision that was meant for it during development. It will, however, include bugfixes, quality-of-life changes, and the introduction of the beacon system in multiplayer.

12/08/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21954-another-quick-cc-remastered-update-released/

A quick update for C&C Remastered Collection has been released, this time focused on fixing several game-breaking bugs that the community has reported since the last patch:

* Fixed an issue where extra enemy Harvesters would instantly spawn in campaign missions
* Fixed an issue where extra enemy aircraft would instantly spawn in campaign missions
* Fixed an issue where the extra Key Binding conflict dialog box was not disappearing (we suppressed this extra dialog for now)
* Fixed an issue where the radar offline / low power sound is heard after completing a game
* Fixed a game freeze and connection lost error with player certain games on custom maps
* Fixed a connection lost error when playing in LAN / Skirmish
* Fixed an issue where the AI could take over player functions in certain custom maps
* Fixed an issue where the Repair and Sell commands were not working if you loaded a previous patch save game in the new version
* Further performance optimization in larger scale maps with tons of resources
* Expanded the Quickmatch MMR search ranges to help players get into games faster

All users should receive the patch automatically upon launching the game on Steam or Origin.

12/08/2020

Marketing done right

check out the view

06/08/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21951-cc-remastered-collection-new-update-live/

New C&C Remastered Collection patch is live

04/08/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/forum/27-command-conquer-news/

There's been a few news in the Command & Conquer community in recent times, so here's a round-up

23/07/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21947-cc-remastered-collection-extensive-beta-patch/

About an hour and a half ago, Jim Vessella posted an update on the C&C subreddit regarding changes in the beta branch of the C&C Remastered Collection, as per last week's call for community input:

- The Nod Cargo Plane delivery time has been normalized to 4 seconds on Normal speed
- The TD Weapons Factory health has been increased by 30%
- The RA1 naval structures have been removed from the victory condition
- To address the TD Engineer / APC issue, the APC now has the Repair Facility as a pre-requisite to build
- Harvester logic improvements
- AI supported in LAN mode
- Quickmatch map pools rotated, added selected community-made maps

About an hour and a half ago, Jim Vessella posted an update on the C&C subreddit regarding changes in the beta branch of the C&C Remastered Collection, as per last weeks call for community input: The Nod Cargo Plane delivery time has been normalized to 4 seconds on Normal speed The TD Wea...

17/07/2020

Update on the hot topic of balance issues in the C&C Remastered Collection: https://www.reddit.com/r/commandandconquer/comments/hsy1t0/remaster_update_and_july_balance_feedback/

Fellow Command & Conquer fans, Over the past several days we've been actively discussing some of the top balance issues and exploits the...

15/07/2020

https://forums.cncnz.com/topic/21944-cc-remastered-collection-patch-2-enters-public-beta/

The development of the second patch for the Command & Conquer: Remastered Collection is well underway, and players can test out its beta right now. Aside from an early version of LAN play, it has a feature that will bring a smile to many players - a slider which dictates the speed of Tiberium/ore regrowth, among other changes that will be officially announced once the patch is finished.

Instructions to activate the patch are in the article link above.

03/07/2020

Command & Conquer and Red Alert are both remastered in 4K by the former Westwood Studios team members. Includes all 3 expansions, rebuilt multiplayer, a modernized UI, Map Editor, bonus footage gallery, and over 7 hours of remastered music.

28/06/2020

You may have seen a bunch of cute and chunky Tiberian Dawn unit videos floating around the community in the past several months. These come from Benjamin Tay, an animator who worked for Lemon Sky Studios (including the C&C remasters), who has decided to make a video series of short stories with such adorable unit designs. Direct & Dominate: Absolute Units follows a GDI light scout and APC scouting around a nearby Nod(dy) base.

If you're new to the series, visit the official channel to catch up: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSt7dofQxC-pIL9hUT6uX0A/videos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGlX7cXnT3Y

Consider supporting me on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/nightshadow02 Hello all a new episode is released! Special thanks to members of the community for ...