If Command and Conquer ever offered a hallowed formula for the RTS, EA LA may soon be accused of sacrilege. The final installment in the Tiberium Sage attacks the immortal tenets of base building and resources management, elevating in their stead the principles of immediacy; dynamism and persistence.
That’s pretty good as far as heresy goes. The headlines changes static bases are replaced with mobile crawlers that can spit out units at a moment’s notice, as well as bolster the frontline of every battle. Three distinct classes, offence, defense and support, each with a customizable selection of units plucked from the 75 strong rosters for each fraction. Players can switch between classes on the fly and even total annihilation only result in a 15 second penalty before respawning.
One of the first things I notice as my offence crawler stalks into conflict is that gunfire is color coded, indicating how effective it will be against the current target. However over an enemy and the cursor changes to a rectangle if your selected unit is its fitting opponents. The battlefield must be comprehensible on a quick scan, says producer Raj Joshi, but this isn’t a dumbing-down: it’s a shift in emphasis from micromanagement and fiddle some execution to border strategy. EA are looking into special tournaments modes. Will that be enough? Either Way, you have to respect EA’s tenacity in trying to move the series forward without leaving old fans behind.
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