Command & Conquer™ Remastered Collection

[i]Command & Conquer: Remastered Collection[/i] is a 2020 remaster of the original 1995 game ([i]Tiberian Dawn[/i]) and its 1996 prequel, [i]Red Alert[/i], plus all three expansion packs and remakes of the exclusive levels from the N64 and PS1 console ports of [i]Tiberian Dawn[/i]. As the only new release of the [i]Command & Conquer[/i] franchise in a decade, following the dreadful [i]Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight[/i] in 2010 and the cancellation of the 2012 [i]Generals 2[/i] free-to-play reboot, [i]Remastered Collection[/i] delivers one of the best remasters on the market and should be a gold standard for how to do a remaster/re-release collection. [h2]Story[/h2] [i]Tiberian Dawn[/i] follows the United Nations' Global Defense Initiative as it fights off the terrorist organization known as the Brotherhood of Nod and its mysterious leader, Kane, as they take control of Europe and Africa following the spread of the deadly but valuable alien green crystals known as Tiberium. [i]Red Alert[/i] follows an alternate history created after Albert Einstein builds a time machine and erases Hitler from history, causing the Soviet Union to rise to power. The Allies must beat back the Soviets to prevent them from taking over Europe during an alternate World War II set in the 1950s. The stories are very basic compared to other story-heavy games and later titles in the franchise, but they are interesting enough to keep players invested. For example, in the [i]Tiberian Dawn[/i] campaigns, GDI has to deal with PR disasters and budget problems as the Brotherhood manipulates the media to publicly defame GDI. Meanwhile in the Nod campaign, you have to deal with the Brotherhood's second-in-command, Seth, who tries to backstab you to protect his position within Nod from you and Kane. In [i]Red Alert[/i], you have a darker story of the Allies trying to win a losing fight while the Soviets deal with traitors, use citizens as test subjects for weapons of war, and have Soviet leaders killing each other as they try to rise to the top or punish officers for failures, similar to Darth Vader and the Empire in [i]Star Wars[/i]. Unfortunately, the expansion packs do little to progress the story, unlike later expansions. [i]The Covert Operations[/i] is just a series of harder missions set during and after [i]Tiberian Dawn[/i], with no live-action FMVs outside of the opening of the Fun Park dinosaur levels. [i]Red Alert[/i]'s expansions fare better, as they use the PS1 [i]Retaliation[/i] port's exclusive FMV cutscenes for the [i]Counterstrike[/i] and [i]Aftermath[/i] expansions that were not in the original PC releases. These make the two expansions into a more cohesive narrative. [h2]Gameplay[/h2] As the grandfather of the RTS genre, the core gameplay is simplistic and lacks many of the core elements and depth found in later games, but Petroglyph has done a great job modernizing the controls to make the games more player-friendly. These include unit queues that go up to 99 instead of one at a time, unit grouping, etc. While the modern controls and quality-of-life improvements are great and generally feel better to play than the originals, these are still 25+ year-old games and feel like it. For example, there are no additional build queues like in [i]Command & Conquer 3[/i] onwards, and the AI pathfinding can be odd, with units sometimes taking unnecessarily long paths or moving directly into enemy fire despite having safer routes available. By far the worst addition is the difficulty settings, as they feel like an afterthought and are very unbalanced. The original 1995 game had no difficulty settings, with the Nod campaign having a bit of a difficulty spike by level 8. However, the new Casual and Hard difficulty settings either make the game too easy to play with little risk or insanely hard to the point of becoming unfun, like [i]Halo 2[/i]'s notorious Legendary difficulty, where you have to exploit level design and AI scripts, such as blocking paths with sandbags, while also dealing with RNG to win. [b]Some levels can take up to one to two hours to beat on Hard difficulty.[/b] It makes the multiplayer balance patch that destroyed the campaign balance in [i]Command & Conquer 3[/i] seem more like a fair challenge in comparison. While [i]Red Alert[/i] did have difficulty settings in the original release, it is also annoyingly hard in the [i]Remastered Collection[/i], and Petroglyph and EA should have made a balance patch to fix the Casual and Hard settings for single-player content. [h2]Presentation[/h2] The new 4K graphics by Lemon Sky Studios are great and, in general, should be the gold standard for how to do remastered graphics. Unlike the [i]Halo Anniversary[/i] remasters, where the new graphics completely change the design, tone, and art style of the originals while also covering up or misaligning the hitboxes, [i]Remastered Collection[/i] is a near-perfect 1-to-1 translation where the designs are the same, just with added details to make them more visually clear while maintaining the originals' art styles. Just like the [i]Halo Anniversary[/i] remasters or [i]Monkey Island: Special Edition[/i], you can switch between the new and original graphics in real time with just one button click. The FMVs were also remastered with some upscaling and the interlacing removed. While they still look like muddy, very low-budget '90s videos, they get the job done. The actors in the live-action FMVs are decent, but not that good compared to later games, with the exceptions being Joe Kucan's Kane, who comes across as cold and threatening, and Eugene Dynarski's Joseph Stalin, who ranges from an over-the-top cartoon villain to a mentally unstable mad tyrant who could snap and kill anyone at any moment. The soundtrack is the biggest highlight. Each game has a jukebox where you can select and play any music you want, and the selection is massive. Not only does it have original music from each game, but also unreleased tracks, demo versions, recorded music, and brand-new music from the original composer, Frank Klepacki, and his band, The Tiberian Sons. [h2]Final Thoughts[/h2] [i]Command & Conquer: Remastered Collection[/i] is the definitive way to play [i]Tiberian Dawn[/i] and [i]Red Alert[/i]. Not only does it contain all their expansion packs and console port exclusive content in one package, but it is also filled to the brim with new content. From music and behind-the-scenes unlockable content to custom map editors and even a working multiplayer mode when all other [i]Command & Conquer[/i] games had their official servers shut down years ago. If you are new to RTS games or the series, this is a great place to start. For remaster collections, this is one of the best, alongside [i]Halo: The Master Chief Collection[/i].

Ist Nun mal c'n'C?! mehr muss man nicht sagen. erinnert mich immer schön zurück an die Langen Wochenenden mit den Kumpels im Keller!

Awesome remaster, my only gripe is the cutscenes look worse than the original

Epic Classic

I bought this game solo for playing online and the lobbys are buggy and unstable, trying to get a game is almost impossible, when you do loading into a online great fun, getting to the point that may even seek a refund.

Highly recommend this game. Red Alert was my absolute favourite game growing up. Westwood Studios at its finest. The remaster is amazing keeping the original feel but improved graphics. Nostalgia at its best.

No... just no.... rebalance is wrong.... EVERY MATCH IS A FING SLOG!!! Even on skirmish AI alliers are useless... ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ enemy ore regenerate faster than your!!!!! Enemy OP... Even on easy difficulty and my ai allies on hard.... AI just turtles and has endless funds... Unit pathfinding is screwed up.... responsiveness is horrible... WTF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!