Command & Conquer: Generals

Command & Conquer: Generals
Command & Conquer Generals cover art
Developer(s)	EA Pacific (Windows) Aspyr Media (Mac OS)
Publisher(s)	EA Games (Windows) MacSoft (Mac OS)
Series	Command & Conquer
Engine	Strategy Action Game Engine (SAGE)
Version	1.08, December 2005
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows, Apple Macintosh
Release date(s)	NA February 10, 2003 EU February 14, 2003
Genre(s)	Real-time strategy
Mode(s)	Single-player, multiplayer
Rating(s)	ESRB: T PEGI: 16+
Media/distribution	CD-ROM (2) (PC), DVD (Mac OS)
System requirements Minimum: PC: Intel Pentium 3/AMD Athlon 800 MHz 128 MB RAM Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/Vista 32 MB AGP DirectX 8.1 compatible video card NVIDIA Geforce 2 or ATI Radeon 7500 DirectX 8.1 compatible sound card 1.8 GB hard disk space 8x CD-ROM/DVD-ROM drive Mac OS: 1 GHz PowerPC G4 256 MB RAM Mac OS X 10.2.6 32 MB video card DVD-ROM drive Recommended: 1.6 GHz Processor 256+ RAM 64 MB Video Card Directx 9c

Command & Conquer: Generals is a real-time strategy game in the Command & Conquer series. Generals utilizes SAGE (Strategy Action Game Engine). This proprietary engine is an extended version of the Command & Conquer: Renegade 3D engine. Generals was released onto the Microsoft Windows platform in 2003, and a Mac OS version was released in 2004, marking the return of the Command & Conquer series to that platform. An expansion pack, entitled Command & Conquer: Generals – Zero Hour, was additionally released for PC in 2003, and for Mac OS in 2005. A sequel, Command & Conquer: Generals 2, is due to be released in 2013.

Plot

Generals takes place in the near future, with players given a choice of three factions to play. In Generals, the United States and China are the world's two superpowers, and are the targets of the Global Liberation Army (GLA), an omnipresent borderless terrorist organization, fighting as a fanatical irregular force. The United States and China are depicted as allies in the series who occasionally co-operate against the GLA, whose goals is the elimination of the military forces of China and the United States.

The game begins with a devastating GLA nuclear attack on Beijing and a subsequent GLA attack on the Three Gorges Dam. The player assumes the role of a Chinese general who rallies the remaining Chinese forces and counterattacks. The general eventually destroys the GLA cell masterminding all Pacific Rim operations.

The player then assumes the role of another GLA general who regroups GLA forces in the Central Asia and gathers funds and biological weapons. In doing so, he has to face both American and Chinese armies and a GLA splinter cell. His campaign eventually culminates in the overtaking of the Baikonur Cosmodrome and the firing of a rocket bearing a biological MIRV at an unnamed city.

At this point the American campaign begins in which the USA engages the GLA across the Middle East and the Central Asia. A joint American-Chinese operation eventually destroys another GLA command base in Astana, Kazakhstan.

Gameplay

Command and Conquer Generals operates like most other real-time strategy games, in that the player must construct a base, acquire resources, build various combat and support units, and defeat opponents. Various unit types can be constructed, ranging from infantry to vehicles and air units. The player may control the United States of America, the People's Republic of China, or the Global Liberation Army, and each side has its unique characteristics and abilities. All sides share some similarities, such as training infantry at a barracks, building armored vehicles at a factory, possessing "high tech" buildings needed for more advanced units, possessing a means to acquire additional resources and possessing a unique superweapon.

The game's interface is similar to that of real-time strategy games such as Age of Empires or StarCraft. The player selects buildings to bring up build orders and purchase upgrades, and can select individual units to activate their special abilities. Structures are built by selecting dedicated builder units and placing the structure anywhere on the map.

As with other real-time strategy games, the various units have advantages and disadvantages against other units, and the player is encouraged to mix unit types in order to succeed and fight tactically with various unit abilities in order to win.

For example, rifle infantry are capable of quickly killing other infantry types, but are vulnerable to light vehicles and dedicated anti-infantry/anti-air units such as tankettes and APCs, which in turn are vulnerable to main battle tanks, which themselves are vulnerable to missile-equipped infantry and aircraft.

As the game progresses and the player defeats enemy units in battle, the player will gain "experience" points, which are used to purchase "Generals Abilities," unique abilities that range from enhancing units and unlocking new unit types to powerful air strikes, one-shot enhancements to units, or targetable "spawn points" to drop or create groups of units anywhere on the map.

As individual units attack and defeat enemy units or capture buildings, they gain "veterancy" and become more powerful, much like the General commanding them. Higher-ranking units attack faster, have more health, and heal or repair themselves.

Single player

In a single player campaign, a player can play any of the three sides in any order, with each side's campaign consisting of seven missions. The storyline follows the order of China first, then the GLA, then the USA.

Multiplayer

Games can be played both over the Internet or a local area network (LAN). It adopts a similar format to skirmish mode whereby the goal is to eliminate the other team. Games over the Internet can be completely random, in the form of a Quick Match. Players can also play in Custom Matches where the number of players, the map and rules are decided upon by the host.

Soundtrack

Generals presents players with a separate musical score for each faction. The United States' theme music consists of epic, militaristic scores composed by Bill Brown and Mikael Sandgren. China's musical themes feature apocalyptic, orchestral scores combined with East Asian instrumentation. The GLA faction's theme soundtrack can be described as a combination of Middle Eastern and few South Asian sounds coupled with heavy metal music, similar to the music in the Somalian sequences in Black Hawk Down.

Factions

Each of the three factions has a play style that corresponds with its real-world counterpart. Every faction has advantages and disadvantages. Each one also has upgrades to improve its army. All of the factions, when played in the correct order, create a storyline of events.

USA

The United States is the most technologically-advanced faction, and fights with a combination of skilled personnel, versatile ground units, a diverse fleet of aircraft and superweapons. USA ground vehicles can construct unmanned drones to support and repair them in combat, and some American troops and vehicles make extensive use of laser technology to guide weapons and defend against attack. American infantry have a number of special abilities; for instance, Pathfinder, the stealthy long-ranged sniper can detect stealth units; a powerful commando named Colonel Burton can place demolition charges, stealthly kill infantry units or engage in firefight. The USA also fields the largest air fleet in the game, including attack and transport helicopters, fighter aircraft, high speed tactical bombers and stealth fighters. American Generals' abilities revolve around air power, including air strikes by ground attack aircraft, heavy bombers and fuel air bombs. USA forces work best in a combined arms approach, with air power supporting tanks and artillery, which in turn support infantry, which in turn protect armor and aircraft, enabling them to defeat a much larger but less diverse enemy force.

The USA has a major disadvantage, however, in that it has the slowest resource gathering in the game in comparison to troop costs, it has a less stable supply of power than China, and its high-tech units are expensive. This can be remedied by building a large number of Supply Drop Zones. This forces a USA player to construct a smaller, more specialized army than a Chinese or GLA player, and work to minimize losses. Chinese and GLA opponents can swarm a comparatively small American army and overwhelm it.

The United States' superweapon is the Particle Uplink Cannon, which fires a powerful particle beam into space that is reflected off a satellite to the desired target on the planet. As long as the beam is being fired, the player can constantly change the beam's point of impact to create a beam path (by clicking or double-clicking) thus being able to destroy specific adjacent targets with deadly precision. The particle beam consumes anything it touches, and leaves flames in its wake. This superweapon recharges itself almost twice faster than the Chinese Nuclear missile silo or the GLA SCUD Storm. The particle cannon is reminiscent of ion cannon seen in Command & Conquer: Tiberian series.

China

The People's Liberation Army relies largely on raw power and massive numbers, culminating in a variety of powerful and heavily armored tanks, and has limited air power based on MiG Multirole Fighters. China's heavy-handed playstyle emphasizes direct assaults and sheer power to defeat American technology and GLA stealth. Chinese troops and tanks gain special bonuses when in groups, and make extensive use of propaganda (passive healing) to support their troops. China has a wide range of vehicle types, and the largest tank arsenal in the game, including several specialized tanks like the anti-infantry "Dragon" flamethrower tank, "Overlord" super-heavy tank, the "Inferno" napalm cannon and the Nuke Cannon. Chinese forces also make heavy use of gatling guns, nuclear, and napalm weaponry to destroy the enemy. China also utilizes advanced electronic warfare technology, including elite hackers, a spy called Black Lotus, and electromagnetic pulse weapons. The Chinese Nuke cannon and Inferno cannon are the only artillery units whose ammunition cannot be intercepted by any defenses.

China has a major disadvantage in that its ground forces are generally slower than those of the other two factions. Due to having virtually no fast attack units, except for their MiGs, China is forced to make large, ponderous assaults with heavy units, a tactic that can be countered by the GLA's speed or the USA's air power. However, the Chinese forces are well-suited to winning drawn-out battles of attrition.

China's unique superweapon is the Nuclear Missile, in which a missile is launched and creates a "mushroom cloud" upon detonation at the desired target. Aside from inflicting massive damage to enemy structures, the explosion leaves the affected area temporarily irradiated; the radiation is enough to slowly kill infantry and destroy vehicles standing on the contaminated ground.

Global Liberation Army (GLA)

The Global Liberation Army, better known as GLA, is the primary antagonist of the video game. A terrorist organization of Middle Eastern and former Soviet origins, GLA initially wages war against China over the control of the central Asian economic areas.

GLA heavily relies on mobility, invisibility, guerrilla warfare and deceit. To gain mobility, GLA extensively uses inexpensive structures euphemistically referred to as Tunnel Networks to instantly teleport units across the battlefield. In addition, a special power euphemistically called Rebel Ambush can instantly materialize gunmen anywhere on the battlefield, including the enemy base. In terms of stealth, GLA can produce infantry that are invisible to naked eyes or deploy bomb trucks that can transform and masquerade as an enemy vehicle. The stealth is used in conjunction with guerrilla warfare: GLA can set up booby traps, deploy suicide bomb trucks and hijack enemy vehicles with their stealth units.

GLA vastly employs deceit. "On behalf of the oppressed nations of the world", they employ angry mobs, murder civilians, plunder villages and trigger riots. Although they employ advanced technology such as teleportation and invisibility, their buildings and units look deceivingly primitive. For instance, GLA vehicles may not look sleek but can salvage material from destroyed enemy vehicles and receive a significant boost in firepower. Likewise, the GLA structures which look primitive are self-sufficient buildings that not only can operate without any external electrical power but are outfitted with underground shelters that can rebuild a destroyed structure. Also, the GLA workers, who are as effective as a the mechanized construction vehicles of the USA or China, maintain a tormented demeanor and constantly whine about being tired, having splintered hands and not having shoes.

GLA also enjoys the most powerful economy as it can quickly expand to other resource locations and salvage enemy wreckage.

The GLA's disadvantage is the lack of air power and powerful base defense structures.

The GLA's superweapon is the SCUD Storm, which fires multiple biochemical Scud rockets on a target. This attack destroys most structures in the target area and contaminates the land with Anthrax toxin. Enemy infantry stepping on the Anthrax-laden ground die faster compared to the radiation generated by China's nuclear missile.

World builder

Generals also includes a map editor named World Builder for the PC edition only. The World Builder includes features such as:

• A terraforming tool
• An intelligent road system, able to detect when the player wants an intersection
• A tool to scatter flora around the map
• Waypoints and area triggers that the AI can use. Waypoints also determine starting points for the players on a skirmish map.
• A scripting system that was meant for the missions in the single-player campaign

This scripting system is very simple but sufficient for basic, static campaign mission scripting. However, it is criticized^{[citation needed]} for its lack of capabilities regarding alternative map programming and dynamic scripting. An example of a RTS game editor with a more advanced scripting editor is Warcraft III's World Editor.

Reception

After its release, Generals received mostly positive reviews. Based on 34 reviews, Metacritic gives it a score of 84/100 which includes a score of 9.3/10 from IGN. Generals has also received the E3 2002 Game Critics Awards Best Strategy Game award. One review noted that Generals was the first ever "C&C" RTS game that did not include full-motion video cutscenes to tell the story and that it departed from the unique interface and base-building mechanics that had characterized all of the previous C&C RTS titles.

Ban in China

The Generals series is banned in mainland China. Throughout the Chinese campaign, the player is occasionally made to utilize heavy-handed tactics such as leveling the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre after it becomes a GLA base and destroying the Three Gorges Dam to release a flood on GLA forces. Chinese forces also liberally use nuclear weaponry in-game, albeit restricted to the lower tactical nuclear weapon yield range. Furthermore, in the introduction of the game, Tiananmen Square and its surrounding areas in Beijing is decimated by terrorist nuclear weapons.

German localization

In the beginning of 2003, a regular localized German version was released in Germany.

Due to the war in Iraq getting closer, the Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Medien (Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons) put the game on index two months after the initial release, stating that the game would give underage people the ability to play the war in Iraq before the real war had even begun. Additionally the player is able to kill civilians. Based on these two points the BPjM put the game on the index, because they thought it glorified war.

The sale to minors and marketing of the game were prohibited throughout the Federal Republic of Germany. Later, in the same year, EA released a new version called "Command & Conquer: Generäle", which did not incorporate real world factions or any relation to terrorism. For example, the suicide bomber unit was transformed into a rolling bomb and all other infantry were changed into "cyborgs" in order of appearance and unit responses similar to earlier releases of the Command & Conquer franchise.

Sequel

In September 2003, an expansion pack called Generals - Zero Hour was released, which continues the story of Generals. In December 2011, a sequel, Command & Conquer: Generals 2, was announced, due to be released in 2013.

See also

• Command & Conquer: Generals – Zero Hour
• Command & Conquer: Generals 2
• Command & Conquer: The First Decade

External links

• Command & Conquer: Generals Official Site
• Command & Conquer: Generals guide at StrategyWiki
• Illustrated Command & Conquer: Generals story with saved game downloads (PC)