Command & Conquer: Tiberian series - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Command & Conquer: Tiberian series is a sub-series of real-time strategy

Real-time strategy

Real-time strategy is a sub-genre of strategy video game which does not progress incrementally in turns. Brett Sperry is credited with coining the term to market Dune II....

video games belonging to the extensive Command & Conquer franchise
Command & Conquer
Command & Conquer, abbreviated to C&C and also known as Tiberian Dawn, is a 1995 real-time strategy computer game developed by Westwood Studios for MS-DOS and published by Virgin Interactive. It was the first of twelve games to date to be released under the Command & Conquer label, including a...

by Westwood Studios

Westwood Studios

Westwood Studios was a computer and video game developer, based in Las Vegas, Nevada. It was founded by Brett Sperry and Louis Castle in as Westwood Associates, and renamed to Westwood Studios when it merged with Virgin Interactive in...

and Electronic Arts

Electronic Arts

Electronic Arts, Inc. is a major American developer, marketer, publisher and distributor of video games. Founded and incorporated on May 28, 1982 by Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer games industry and was notable for promoting the designers and programmers...

. The games of the Tiberian series are the 'original' Command and Conquer 'universe', with the first game in the Command & Conquer: Red Alert
Command & Conquer: Red Alert
Command & Conquer: Red Alert is a real-time strategy computer game of the Command & Conquer franchise, produced by Westwood Studios and released by Virgin Interactive in...

, alternate history series being a prequel to the first 'Tiberium' game, however EA has since decided that the Red Alert games would be a separate series to the 'Tiberium' series. In Command and Conquer: Tiberium Dawn, an anomalous extraterrestrial

Extraterrestrial life

Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...

substance known as Tiberium

Tiberium

Tiberium or Ichor is a fictional substance that is central to the plot of much of the Command & Conquer series of real-time strategy video games...

is brought to Earth through a meteoric collision during the early 1990s. The substance's intriguing yet hazardous properties begin to fuel an escalating war between two globalized factions; the United Nations

United Nations

The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...

' Global Defense Initiative, who wish to prevent the proliferation of Tiberium for safety reasons, and the mysterious and ancient Brotherhood of Nod society, who embrace the substance as the herald of a new age and the next stage in humanity

Human condition

The human condition encompasses the experiences of being human in a social, cultural, and personal context. It can be described as the irreducible part of humanity that is inherent and not connected to gender, race, class, etc. — a search for purpose, sense of curiosity, the inevitability of...

's evolution

Evolution

Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...

Games in the series

Command & Conquer (1995) (Note: This game is referred to as "Tiberian Dawn")
- Command & Conquer: The Covert Operations (expansion pack
  Expansion pack
  An expansion pack, expansion set, or supplement is an addition to an existing role-playing game, tabletop game or video game. These add-ons usually add new game areas, weapons, objects, and/or an extended storyline to a complete and already released game...
  
  ) (1996)
- Command & Conquer: Sole Survivor (1997)
Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun
Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun
Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun is a real-time strategy video game developed by Westwood Studios and released in . The main storyline follows the second major war between the Global Defense Initiative of the United Nations, and the global terrorist organization known as the Brotherhood of Nod who...

(1999)
Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun 2 (2000) (was announced and canceled)
- Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun: Firestorm (expansion pack) (2000)
Command & Conquer: Renegade
Command & Conquer: Renegade
Command & Conquer: Renegade is a first and third person shooter video game developed by Westwood Studios and is part of the Command & Conquer series. It is the only C&C game that uses the first person view...

(2002)
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars is a military science fiction real-time strategy video game developed and published by Electronic Arts for the Windows, Mac OS X and Xbox 360 platforms, and released internationally in March 2007...

(2007)
- Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath
  Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath
  Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath is an expansion pack for the 2007 real-time strategy video game Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars. Developed by Electronic Arts Los Angeles and BreakAway Games studios, it was released on March 24, 2008 in the United States and on March 28, 2008 in Europe by...
  
  (expansion pack) (2008)
Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight
Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight
Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight is a real-time tactics video game and the latest installment of the popular Command & Conquer franchise, released March 16, 2010. It constitutes the final chapter in the Kane saga...

(2010)

Command & Conquer

The genesis of the Tiberian series as well as the C&C franchise

Command & Conquer series

Command & Conquer is a video game franchise, mostly of the real-time strategy style as well as a first-person shooter game based on the former...

in its was also released, which added new missions, maps and music to the original game. Command & Conquer is widely known under its subtitle of Tiberian Dawn throughout the C&C fan community, and was also referred to as such by Westwood Studios

Westwood Studios

in several readme files and FAQs for their following C&C games.

Versions of Command & Conquer were released for the Sega Saturn

Sega Saturn

The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...

, PlayStation

PlayStation

The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console first released by Sony Computer Entertainment in Japan on December 3, .The PlayStation was the first of the PlayStation series of consoles and handheld game devices. The PlayStation 2 was the console's successor in 2000...

and Nintendo 64

Nintendo 64

The , often referred to as N64, was Nintendo′s third home video game console for the international market. Named for its 64-bit CPU, it was released in June 1996 in Japan, September 1996 in North America, March 1997 in Europe and Australia, September 1997 in France and December 1997 in Brazil...

platforms, all of which contained the Covert Operations missions as well as a package of a few additional missions entitled Special Ops. The Nintendo 64 version of Command & Conquer also featured 3D

3D computer graphics

3D computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data that is stored in the computer for the purposes of performing calculations and rendering 2D images...

graphics instead of sprite

Sprite (computer graphics)

In computer graphics, a sprite is a two-dimensional image or animation that is integrated into a larger scene...

s in the series for the first time. The game additionally was one of the first to be released on two CDs

Compact Disc

The Compact Disc is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage , write-once audio and data storage , rewritable media , Video Compact Discs , Super Video Compact Discs ,...

, instead of one, allowing multiplayer games between two computers to be played with a single copy of the game.

The Covert Operations

The Covert Operations is an add-on for Command & Conquer featuring 15 new missions and several new music tracks and multiplayer maps. Unlike the original game, the missions of Covert Operations can be played at any time and in any order, but are not accompanied by mission briefing cutscenes. The add-on added two new units to the game, and the 15 new missions are more difficult than the campaigns of the original. The add-on pack also features the DOS

DOS

DOS, short for "Disk Operating System", is an acronym for several closely related operating systems that dominated the IBM PC compatible market between 1981 and 1995, or until about 2000 if one includes the partially DOS-based Microsoft Windows versions 95, 98, and Millennium Edition.Related...

version's soundtrack, which includes music that was absent from the Windows 95

Windows 95

Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented graphical user interface-based operating system. It was released on August 24, 1995 by Microsoft, and was a significant progression from the company's previous Windows products...

(or Gold Edition) version. Covert Operations was originally needed to unlock secret missions, which were later enabled by a patch to the main game

Sole Survivor

Command & Conquer: Sole Survivor was a multiplayer spinoff of the original Command & Conquer game. It featured a deathmatch

Deathmatch (gaming)

Deathmatch or Player vs All is a widely-used gameplay mode integrated into many shooter and real-time strategy computer games...

-style game in which each player controls a unit of the original Command & Conquer game and travels around the game arena collecting crates to increase this unit's firepower, armor, speed, attack range and reloading speed. Sole Survivor was often compared to a first-person shooter

First-person shooter

First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...

, however played with a top-down perspective of the arena. It featured no single-player mode and the multiplayer had no hints of a storyline, and was omitted from inclusion in the Command & Conquer: The First Decade

Command & Conquer: The First Decade

Command & Conquer: The First Decade is a compilation of the Command & Conquer series' games published from 1995 to 2003, all bundled into one DVD and updated to run optimally on Windows XP. It was released on February 7, 2006 and sold for the price of one retail game...

compilation pack.

Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun

Released in 1999 by Westwood Studios, Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun was the highly anticipated sequel to the original Command & Conquer. Tiberian Sun was built on a 2D engine with fixed isometric

Isometric projection

Isometric projection is a method for visually representing three-dimensional objects in two dimensions in technical and engineering drawings...

perspective terrain tiles that allowed varying terrain height, dynamic lighting which allowed for real-time day/night cycles, as well as several special effects such as ion and meteor storms. Tiberian Sun also featured maps consisting of cityscapes, providing players with the option to conceal their forces and do battle with them in urban environments. Numerous structures and armored units were rendered with voxel

Voxel

A voxel is a volume element, representing a value on a regular grid in three dimensional space. This is analogous to a pixel, which represents 2D image data in a bitmap...

technology, although all infantry units were still rendered as sprites

Sprite (computer graphics)

In computer graphics, a sprite is a two-dimensional image or animation that is integrated into a larger scene...

. Map terrain in Tiberian Sun was deformable and interactive; bombarding the soil with explosive weapons resulted in the formation of craters of varying depths, bridges in urban areas could be destroyed and re-built, and certain Tiberium

Tiberium

Tiberium or Ichor is a fictional substance that is central to the plot of much of the Command & Conquer series of real-time strategy video games...

fields could, intentionally or accidentally, be detonated, all of which had strategic impacts on the gameplay.

Tiberian Sun was often speculated to be a BattleMech-type game prior to its release, due to a promotional preview of the game within the ending cutscenes of the original Command & Conquer, which extensively showcased an experimental battle-walker prototype (which appeared in Tiberian Sun as the GDI Wolverine) being field tested by the Global Defense Initiative. Upon its release, TS would prove to continue the real-time strategy

Real-time strategy

Real-time strategy is a sub-genre of strategy video game which does not progress incrementally in turns. Brett Sperry is credited with coining the term to market Dune II....

formula, however three futuristic mech walker units were introduced to GDI's side (the Wolverine, the Titan, and the Mammoth Mk. II), replacing the more conventional Humvee and tanks the faction had used within the original Command & Conquer.

The full motion video

Full motion video

Full motion video based games are video games that rely upon pre-recorded TV-quality movie or animation rather than sprites, vectors, or 3D models to display action in the game. In the early 1990s a diverse set of games utilized this format...

s were scripted differently from their counterparts in the series. While Command & Conquer and Command & Conquer: Red Alert
Command & Conquer: Red Alert
Command & Conquer: Red Alert is a real-time strategy computer game of the Command & Conquer franchise, produced by Westwood Studios and released by Virgin Interactive in...

FMV sequences were filmed from first-person perspective, Tiberian Sun used traditional cinematic shots which featured acclaimed Hollywood actors such as James Earl Jones

James Earl Jones

James Earl Jones is an American actor. He is well-known for his distinctive bass voice and for his portrayal of characters of substance, gravitas and leadership...

and Michael Biehn

Michael Biehn

Michael Connell Biehn is an American actor. He is best known for his roles in James Cameron's science fiction action films The Terminator as Kyle Reese, Aliens as Cpl. Dwayne Hicks, and The Abyss as Lt. Coffey. He has also acted in such films as Tombstone, The Rock, and Planet Terror...

.

The soundtrack of Tiberian Sun again was composed by Frank Klepacki

Frank Klepacki

Frank Klepacki is an American musician, video game music composer and sound director best known for his work on the Command & Conquer series. Having learned to play drums as a child, he joined Westwood Studios as a composer when he was only 17 years old...

, but departed from the industrial/hip-hop styles of its prequel in favor of slow, moody and ambient music, reflecting the game's apocalyptic background setting of a world being ecologically ravaged by Tiberium, and a humanity facing an increasingly uncertain future. A CD of the game's soundtrack was also released.

Tiberian Suns storyline followed the continuing struggle for world domination between the Global Defense Initiative and the Brotherhood of Nod, as well as the human race's struggle with the relentlessly advancing alien Tiberium substance. Nod's leader and GDI's public enemy #1, Kane

Kane (Command & Conquer)

Kane is a fictional character in the alternate history universe of Westwood Studios' and Electronic Arts' Command & Conquer real-time strategy video games in which he is a seemingly immortal mastermind behind the ancient and secretive Brotherhood of Nod society...

, resurfaces from an apparently faked death nearly 40 years after the initial conflict, which sets off the Second Tiberium War between the Global Defense Initiative and the Brotherhood of Nod. The game's theme also subtly revolves around the question of why Tiberium came to Earth in the first place, with the discovery of what appears to be an alien spacecraft and a mysterious object known as the Tacitus.

Despite the anticipation surrounding the title, Tiberian Sun was released to mixed reviews. Delays had caused the game to take a total of four and a half years to develop, and as a result the game suffered from outdated features. Many found the game performance to be sluggish on all but the latest computers of the time as well, and numerous of Tiberian Suns touted innovative features, such as intelligent and adaptive skirmish AI

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents" where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its...

, unit veterancy and real-time lighting were severely scaled back as the result of time constraints. Westwood Studios

Westwood Studios

later would eliminate many of the performance and stability problems of Tiberian Sun, and would reuse its 2D engine for the production of Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 is a 2.5D real-time strategy computer game by Westwood Studios, which was released for Microsoft Windows on October 23, 2000 as the follow-up to Command & Conquer: Red Alert. Set in the early 1970s, Red Alert 2 supposedly picks up at the conclusion of the Allied...

.

Firestorm

Firestorm was the expansion pack

Expansion pack

An expansion pack, expansion set, or supplement is an addition to an existing role-playing game, tabletop game or video game. These add-ons usually add new game areas, weapons, objects, and/or an extended storyline to a complete and already released game...

to Tiberian Sun, introducing several new missions for each faction which followed on the conclusion of the main game's GDI campaign. Firestorm featured several new units and structures for both factions, and told a story where GDI and Nod were shown as being compelled to reluctantly join forces in order to overcome Nod's renegade artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence

, CABAL. Prior to the release of Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars is a military science fiction real-time strategy video game developed and published by Electronic Arts for the Windows, Mac OS X and Xbox 360 platforms, and released internationally in March 2007...

in 2007, Firestorms storyline was unique in the Command & Conquer series as it was the first to feature ending sequences for the GDI and Nod factions which took place simultaneously, and both of which were considered as official canon storyline. By contrast, only the actions and events which occurred during the GDI campaigns were considered canon story throughout all other Command & Conquer games, with the events portrayed in the Brotherhood of Nod campaigns having traditionally been treated as alternate "what if" realities.

Command & Conquer: Renegade

Command & Conquer: Renegade is a first-person shooter
First-person shooter
First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...

, in which the player takes the role of a Nick "Havoc" Parker, a GDI commando in the war against Nod. The game is set in the final few weeks of the storyline portrayed in Command & Conquer.

The game engine, called the "Renegade engine" or "Westwood 3D", was developed in-house by Westwood. It could support real world physics and allow seamless movement from indoor to outdoor environments. The game also took on one of the most unusual approaches to the FPS genre. The player could interact with structure units from the original C&C game, which is still unique and original. Through the game, Havoc can enter and destroy enemy structures with C4 explosives, drive mammoth tanks, MRLSs and other classic Command & Conquer vehicles.

The multiplayer mode extended these concepts further, giving this FPS many mechanics of the RTS. For instance, a player would be given a budget to individually purchase and drive vehicles. Two players could also man a single vehicle as a driver and gunner team. Massive environments allowed for large armoured battles as well as subterfuge. A player could also target and launch the famous Ion Cannon or Nuclear Warhead superweapons. Destroying specific enemy buildings would, depending on the buildings' purpose, cripple electrical power, Tiberium gathering, base defences, or unit production capabilities. The ultimate objective was to eradicate the opponent's base.

The game was not without its shortcomings. Critics have pointed out the lackluster graphics, poor AIs and "laggy" online performance for the reason why it failed to achieve popularity. However, such problems with lag have since been fixed and there are on average 50 servers, and up to 450 people still playing online at any one time. The Renegade network is now run by Strike Team and Black-hand Studios, in association with EA.

Command & Conquer: Renegade 2 (Canceled)

Command & Conquer: Renegade 2 was to be another first-person shooter game using an updated version of the "Westwood 3D" engine. Renegade 2 had two build versions. The first version of Renegade 2, was drafted as a connection to Command & Conquer from Red Alert 2. However, this was scrapped in favour of a Red Alert 2 based FPS that took place in the post Yuri's Revenge world. The storyline was about a rogue Soviet commander attacking America to avenge the honour of Premier Romanov (The commander was a Romanov). Most units designed were based on Red Alert 2 styles, however the Allied Light Tank, and Soviet Hind Gunship made a return.

Command & Conquer: Continuum (Canceled)

Command & Conquer: Continuum was to be Westwood's second MMORPG, developed on the "Westwood 3D" engine, set in the Tiberian Universe. It was canceled, due to the termination of Westwood Studios in 2003. As said by Adam 'Ishmael' Isgreen and Rade Stojsavljevic, it was supposed to be a non-stand-and-swing MMORPG, featuring:

Instanced "crisis zones" in it, hubbed flight routes, scripted boss battles, and a lot of other ideas that have shown up in all the MMORPG since.
GDI, Nod, Mutants and CABAL. Scrin to be added later. Los Angeles half underwater, Area 51, Dino island, Newark airport, a mutant city and lots more.
Fluid and movement-oriented combat, unlike most MMORPGs. Range was important for weapons use, and there were layers of counters for the weapon types.
Creatures that had many console-game-boss sensibilities, in that you could expose weaknesses on them and then hit those for extra damage.
A moving and evolving Tiberian world, where the players could play a great role in the entire story.

Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars

Command & Conquer: Tiberium Wars is the title of the third game in the Tiberian storyline. After several years of circulating rumors that Westwood Studios

Westwood Studios

was working on a new Tiberian game - rumors which were fueled by leaked concept art posted on the Internet

Internet

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...

by artists who once worked at Westwood, interviews with Louis Castle

Louis Castle

-Career:Castle co-founded Westwood Studios with Brett Sperry in 1985. Castle remained with Westwood when it was bought by Electronic Arts in 1998 and he was a vice president and General Manager of EA's Blueprint Studio...

as well as posters of C&C3 concept art in The First Decade

Command & Conquer: The First Decade

game-collection - Electronic Arts

Electronic Arts

finally announced on 18 April 2006 that a third game in the C&C series was in the development stages by them.

Before this announcement, fans referred to the speculated third game in the series as "Tiberian Twilight", as it had been discovered that http://www.tiberiantwilight.com had been registered by Westwood and still leads to EA's webpage for the Command & Conquer series. The official website is: http://www.ea.com/commandandconquer/

The first gameplay footage of Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars premiered on the SpikeTV show Game Head
Game Head
GameTrailers TV with Geoff Keighley is a television show about video games hosted by video game journalist Geoff Keighley. Originally titled Game Head, on January 25, 2008, the show relaunched under its current name with a slightly different format and further incorporation of GameTrailers hosts,...

on Saturday, August 19, 2006 at Midnight.

Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars was launched on March 28, 2007, and was met with critical acclaim.

Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath

Four months after the release of Tiberium Wars, an expansion pack
Expansion pack
An expansion pack, expansion set, or supplement is an addition to an existing role-playing game, tabletop game or video game. These add-ons usually add new game areas, weapons, objects, and/or an extended storyline to a complete and already released game...

was announced under the title Kane's Wrath, which was released on March 26, 2008 for the PC

Personal computer

A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...

and June 24, 2008 for Xbox 360

Xbox 360

The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...

. In the campaign, the player takes on the role of LEGION, an advanced Nod military artificial intelligence created from the remains of CABAL, Nod's previous AI who went rogue during the events of Tiberian Sun: Firestorm.

The game features "Risk-on-steroids"-type gameplay where the players move their armies around the world. The actual battles are fought with traditional Command & Conquer gameplay. The campaign spans two decades in telling the behind-the-scenes story of Nod from the end of the Firestorm Crisis to five years after the Third Tiberium War.

Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight

Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight is the title of the fourth and final game in the Tiberian saga involving Kane, but not the universe as a whole. After several months of circulating rumors that Electronic Arts Los Angeles was working on a new Tiberian game - rumors which were fueled by a survey sent out by Electronic Arts in regards to Command & Conquer 4. It features a Co-Operative Campaign the first in the Tiberium Series, the second in the Command & Conquer Series, as well as new units, a class based system, and an experience system which would allow the buying of new units and powers based on exp. Command & Conquer 4 was formally announced on July 9, 2009, and is slated for a March 2010 release exclusively on Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...

. The subtitle "Tiberian Twilight" was officially announced at CommandCom a Command & Conquer event at Gamescom
Gamescom
gamescom is a trade fair for video games held annually at the Koelnmesse in Cologne, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is organised by the Bundesverband Interaktive Unterhaltungssoftware...

on August 21, 2009 after a "Name the Game" Contest which involved fans submitting their suggestions for the subtitle for Command & Conquer 4.

The first trailer of Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight premiered on the GameTrailers on Friday, July 24, 2009.

The gameplay of Tiberian Twilight differs the most from previous C&C games in the series with the removal of traditional elements such as harvesting resources as well as the sidebar which has been replaced with a "bottom bar" like in Command & Conquer: Generals

Command & Conquer: Generals

Command & Conquer: Generals is a real-time strategy game in the Command & Conquer series. Generals utilizes SAGE...

. Also changed is the base building element which would play a minor role in Tiberian Twilight as it is replaced by a new unit called the Crawler which acts as a mobile base for all classes but the Defense Class, the only class able to build actual structures. A population cap is also included which was never used in any C&C games with the exception of the Xbox 360 Version of Tiberium Wars and Kane's Wrath. Though, there was a hidden population cap in the N64 version of Command & Conquer.

Gameplay

Gameplay is based on Westwood's previous Dune II

Dune II

Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty is a Dune computer game released in 1992 by Westwood Studios...

, in which the player does not take the role of any on-screen individual, but instead takes the role of a commander who oversees military operations on the battlefield remotely through a fictional AI

AI, A.I., Ai, or ai may refer to:- Computers :* Artificial intelligence, a branch of computer science* Ad impression, in online advertising* .ai, the ISO Internet 2-letter country code for Anguilla...

entity known as the "Electronic Video Agent" (EVA), which enables the player to construct a base and deploy and command troops.

The base is built through a futuristic and little-explained mechanism whereby buildings are constructed off-screen and then remotely deployed at the desired location. The one exception is the Construction Yard - the center of base operations - which is responsible for the construction of other buildings. The Construction Yard cannot be built directly but instead must be deployed from a unit known as the Mobile Construction Vehicle.

The base is responsible for the production of all military units - troops, vehicles and aircraft. These efforts are funded by the alien Tiberium

Tiberium

Tiberium or Ichor is a fictional substance that is central to the plot of much of the Command & Conquer series of real-time strategy video games...

substance which acts as a self-replenishing resource that can be refined into funds for the respective sides to finance their war efforts with. The player must therefore create refineries and use harvesters to collect the resource from Tiberium fields on the gameplay map.

In each game the player can choose between two campaigns, each corresponding to either the Global Defense Initiative or the Brotherhood of Nod factions. The campaign consists of a string of missions, with the objectives for each one detailed in a cutscene immediately before the mission begins. In Command & Conquer, the player is addressed directly by the game characters (including the EVA). Conversely, in Tiberian Sun the player is depicted as an on-screen character and the mission briefings are mostly described passively, though in many cases the EVA addresses the player directly in separate cutscenes. Normally the Campaigns are each in their own timeline and do not co-exist. In Firestorm, the two are actually intertwined, a first for the C&C series. Also, now Command and Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars has such a storyline.

In addition to detailing mission objectives, the cutscenes follow the overall storyline, though in most cases the two are one and the same.

The First Tiberium War: Tiberian Dawn

The series' storyline follows an escalating war between the worldwide Brotherhood of Nod society, led by a self-appointed and charismatic leader known only as Kane

Kane (Command & Conquer)

, and the Global Defense Initiative, a United Nations

United Nations

-founded and funded military taskforce. In Command & Conquer, the events of which take place during this so-called First Tiberium War, the two main factions involved in the conflict were described as follows by the EVA:
The EVA goes on to explain the nature of the Tiberium

Tiberium

Tiberium or Ichor is a fictional substance that is central to the plot of much of the Command & Conquer series of real-time strategy video games...

substance around which much of the game's storyline indirectly revolves:
In a later briefing, the EVA provides more background information and new discoveries concerning Tiberium:
Additionally, in a televised interview, the eccentric Tiberium expert Doctor Ignatio Mobius explains Tiberium with technobabble

Technobabble

Technobabble , also called technospeak, is a form of prose using jargon, buzzwords, esoteric language, specialized technical terms, or technical slang that is incomprehensible to the listener...

:
Whereas most technobabble is merely speculative, inaccurate, or fictitious, this blurb is simply nonsensical, and the properties and workings of Tiberium were wholly redefined in Tiberium Wars.

In a later cutscene in Command & Conquer, after learning of Tiberium's deadly toll on ecology and humanity:
Tiberium is never fully explained in the series, and is constantly surrounded in a mystery which only deepens as the storyline progresses throughout the successive Command & Conquer games.

In the campaign of the Global Defense Initiative, the First Tiberium War comes to an end when Kane's temple in Sarajevo
Sarajevo
Sarajevo |Bosnia]], surrounded by the Dinaric Alps and situated along the Miljacka River in the heart of Southeastern Europe and the Balkans....

is destroyed by a final GDI assault. The Nod campaign results in a Nod victory in Africa over the GDI, however the series assumes a GDI victory when the storyline is revisited in Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun

Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun

Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun is a real-time strategy video game developed by Westwood Studios and released in . The main storyline follows the second major war between the Global Defense Initiative of the United Nations, and the global terrorist organization known as the Brotherhood of Nod who...

, which depicts the Second Tiberium War. The expansion pack Covert Operations has various missions that show a concurrent campaign occurring. At the end of the conflict, GDI has won the war in Europe by capturing and destroying the Temple of Nod with the aid of the Ion Cannon

Ion cannon

In science fiction, an ion cannon is a beam weapon that fires beams of ions . Due to its power, it is usually classified as a superweapon. An ion cannon is a type of particle cannon; only the particles used are ionized...

. To prevent the loss of Nod-controlled Africa, the player must take a Nod strike team and destroy an advanced communications centre located somewhere on the continent in order to ensure that GDI does not regain dominance. Other missions like "Infiltration" suggest an ongoing attempt by GDI to deploy back into Nod-controlled Africa as the briefing states Eastern Sudan as the location of the mission.

The Second Tiberium War: Tiberian Sun

The Second Tiberium War begins in the 2030s when Kane (who was presumed dead after Nod's defeat in Command & Conquer) reappears in a live broadcast to General James Solomon (James Earl Jones

James Earl Jones

James Earl Jones is an American actor. He is well-known for his distinctive bass voice and for his portrayal of characters of substance, gravitas and leadership...

) onboard the Philadelphia space station.

Meanwhile, Tiberium has been ravaging the world for 35 years and has grown in many varieties, mutating flora and fauna and forcing humans to move to the polar regions, where the spread of tiberium is slowed down by cold, arid conditions. Many regions around the planet have entered the desertification process, and natural resources other than tiberium are becoming non-existent. As a result of the spread of tiberium, the world's population is decreasing at an alarming rate. Many countries, as well as the United Nations

United Nations

, cease to exist. Other countries still relatively untouched by the Brotherhood of Nod and Tiberium begin to merge with the GDI. While on paper there are still individual countries, in practice the GDI becomes a military and political super-state.

Beyond the problem of simply fighting the spread of tiberium, GDI also has to deal with the reappearance of Kane who, along with a core group of loyalists, reunites the fractured Brotherhood of Nod, which has been splintered since the end of the First Tiberium War. The reunification of the Brotherhood precipitates a revolution across the globe, offering a new hope to those worst afflicted by Tiberium, not in the form of a promise to be rid of the substance (which would prove lethal to many mutants among the new generation), but in the form of the prospect of adapting to and assimilating the emerging Tiberium ecosystem. A second fight for world domination ensues. This war is an important turn in history for many reasons: the discovery of an alien spacecraft (which was, in fact, secretly built by Nod under the command of Kane himself), the role of the Forgotten mutants, the creation of more deadly and powerful weapons like Tiberium bio-warheads, and most of all, the discovery of a mysteriously originated object called the "Tacitus". The conflict eventually becomes truly worldwide, and the player is taken to battlefields in various regions of the globe, like Norway, the United Kingdom, Egypt, Mexico, the United States, etc. The Second Tiberium war finally ends with a battle in Cairo wherein Kane attempts to launch a MIRV-ICBM into the upper atmosphere to spread tiberium throughout the atmosphere

Atmosphere

An atmosphere is a layer of gases that may surround a material body of sufficient mass, and that is held in place by the gravity of the body. An atmosphere may be retained for a longer duration, if the gravity is high and the atmosphere's temperature is low...

. However, GDI finally defeats Nod in Cairo and Kane is supposedly killed by Commander McNeil himself.

The Firestorm incident

Firestorm begins shortly after the end of the last game, when GDSS Kodiak (the GDI command spacecraft) crashes during an ion storm just after leaving Cairo

Cairo

Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...

with the Tacitus on board. Kodiak's crew (excluding Commander McNeil) is killed. The loss of the Kodiak and increase in ion storm activity cut off all contact with Philadelphia space station, the Kodiak being the communication relay between the station and GDI forces. One of the few ground-based GDI generals activates the Firestorm Protocol, taking command of GDI until communication with the Philadelphia is re-established. Following Nod's defeat, GDI fights the remaining Nod forces, who are once again without a leader and hopeless. Eventually, Nod's artificially intelligent computer system CABAL is reactivated, becomes a renegade faction of its own, and starts to build a massive cyborg

Cyborg

A cyborg is a being with both biological and artificial parts. The term was coined in 1960 when Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline used it in an article about the advantages of self-regulating human-machine systems in outer space. D. S...

army and attack civilian populations. GDI and Nod later conclude a cease-fire and unite their forces in order to destroy CABAL. However, it is unclear if CABAL was really destroyed. The Firestorm story was the first in the Command and Conquer universe with both campaigns following a single story, as opposed to two different endings featured in other games.

The Third Tiberium War: Tiberium Wars

The story of Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars

Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars

Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars is a military science fiction real-time strategy video game developed and published by Electronic Arts for the Windows, Mac OS X and Xbox 360 platforms, and released internationally in March 2007...

begins in the year of 2047, roughly sixteen to seventeen years after the events of Firestorm. While the conflict between the GDI and the Brotherhood of Nod appears to have subsided substantially ever since, Tiberium

Tiberium

Tiberium or Ichor is a fictional substance that is central to the plot of much of the Command & Conquer series of real-time strategy video games...

infestation has begun to reach critical levels and continues to destroy the Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

's ecosystems at an alarming rate, prompting GDI to divide the world into three different geographical zones based on the levels of local infestation. 30% of the world's surface has been designated as "red zones", which have suffered the worst contamination and can no longer support human - or otherwise carbon-based - life. 50% of the regions in the world have been designated as "yellow zones", which are dangerously contaminated yet contain most of the world's population. Decades of war and civil unrest have left these regions in a state of social collapse and have continued to provide the Brotherhood of Nod with opportunity for concealment as well as large-scale recruitment over the years. The remaining 20% of the Earth's surface is unscarred by Tiberium outbreak and is relatively untouched by war. These "blue zones" are considered the last refuge and hope of the human civilized world and have been placed under the direct protection of the Global Defense Initiative.

In March 2047 the Brotherhood of Nod suddenly attacks the vulnerable link in the GDI's space-based military assets, the Goddard Space Institute, taking the A-SAT missile defence systems offline and permitting Nod to fire a nuclear missile at GDI's orbiting command station Philadelphia at the precise moment GDI's senior leadership are aboard in council. Since the end of the Second Tiberium War

Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun

, Nod silently built up its influence and its military potential into the status of a true superpower, and is now supported by a significant percentage of the world's population through medical aid, enforcement of stability and hate-mongering against GDI and the "blue zone" populations from within the "yellow zone" territories. Unprepared to handle the offensives led by Nod shock troops across the entire globe (due to 60% of the GDI's bases having been de-commissioned over the revisions of their budget in the past few years), the remainder of the Global Defense Initiative's top military and political officials on Earth take charge and begin rallying all of their standing forces, determined to achieve a new victory over Nod. Later on in the campaign GDI launches an attack upon Nod's rebuilt temple prime in Sarajevo. Upon capture of the temple they discover that Kane has locked himself away below the temple and that he has also been working on a Liquid Tiberium Bomb. GDI then confiscate all of the components of the Liquid-T bomb and decide to try and 'sweat Kane out'. In an incoming transmission Director Redmond Boyle orders the firing of the ion cannon upon the temple, despite advice from his military advisors that this would be a bad idea. The ion cannon strikes the temple and causes a truly massive explosion as the blast strikes a deposit of Liquid-T hidden below the temple. This causes a cataclysmic chain reaction, causing havoc within red and yellow zones across the world. As the conflict ensues, forces of alien origin known only as the Scrin, suddenly enter the battle and alter the nature of the Third Tiberium War entirely. At this point in the Nod campaign, Kane unveils his plans, and the fact that he knew that a Liquid-T detonation would alert the 'Visitors' (as he calls the Scrin) to earth, however in his experiments he could not find a detonator which would give the blast yield needed for such an explosion, the only thing which his scientists calculated could provide enough yield was GDI's ion cannon. This of course meant starting the third Tiberium war with GDI. The Scrin start to build enormous towers on the surface of Earth. GDI manages to destroy most of them and drive the Scrin back, but Nod defends the last tower in Italy and take control of it. Once the tower is completed, it becomes invulnerable to all earthly weapons. After the completion of the last tower, the Scrin leave Earth.

Unlike previous installments of Command and Conquer games, the storyline of the factions appear to be intertwined in the same fashion as the story of Firestorm was. In one faction's campaign, references are made to events and missions that occurred in the campaigns of the other factions, therefore it appears that the events in all of the campaigns are canonical. For example, after the completion of the Nod Temple Prime Mission the FMV shows the destruction of Temple Prime by GDI's Ion Cannon, which is actually a playable mission in the GDI campaign. However, unlike Firestorm, the actual endings are different.

The Fourth Tiberium War: Tiberian Twilight

The story of Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight

Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight

Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight is a real-time tactics video game and the latest installment of the popular Command & Conquer franchise, released March 16, 2010. It constitutes the final chapter in the Kane saga...

begins in 2062, 15 years after the events of Tiberium Wars and 10 years after the events of Kane's Wrath. In this time period, Tiberium has advanced to the next evolutionary stage and is rapidly spreading across Earth, expected to become uninhabitable by 2068. At this time of crisis leader of the Brotherhood of Nod Kane heads straight for the headquarters of the Global Defense Initiative, in hopes of forming a "Tiberium control network", which would allow the spread of Tiberium to be controlled, as well as turn it into an inexpensive power source. The campaign starts 15 years after the formation of the network due to a temporary alliance between the two factions, however extremists of both factions cause unrest, which sparks the Fourth Tiberium War ending the alliance. Tiberian Twilight is set to conclude the Tiberium saga.

The Tiberian series' connection to Red Alert

Westwood Studios

designed Command & Conquer: Red Alert
Command & Conquer: Red Alert
Command & Conquer: Red Alert is a real-time strategy computer game of the Command & Conquer franchise, produced by Westwood Studios and released by Virgin Interactive in...

to be the prequel

Prequel

A prequel is a work that supplements a previously completed one, and has an earlier time setting.The widely recognized term was a 20th-century neologism, and a portmanteau from pre- and sequel...

to Command & Conquer, and by proxy of the Tiberian series as a whole.

During the course of the Soviet's campaign, Kane

Kane (Command & Conquer)

is seen to make infrequent appearances as a mysterious counselor to Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

, and the story implies that he has in fact been the instigator of the world war

World war

A world war is a war affecting the majority of the world's most powerful and populous nations. World wars span multiple countries on multiple continents, with battles fought in multiple theaters....

between the USSR and the Allied nations in order to further the long-term goals of the Brotherhood of Nod. Indeed—Nadia, the head of the NKVD

NKVD

The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....

, Stalin's mistress

Mistress (lover)

A mistress is a long-term female lover and companion who is not married to her partner; the term is used especially when her partner is married. The relationship generally is stable and at least semi-permanent; however, the couple does not live together openly. Also the relationship is usually,...

and evidently a secretive member of the Brotherhood herself as early as the 1950s, instructs the player to "keep the peace" until Nod would "tire of the USSR in the early 1990s" upon the campaign's successful conclusion. Kane however shoots her without warning, and proclaims to the player that he "[is] the future". Moreover, during the fifth cutscene of the Allied campaign, a news announcer reporting on the Allies' loss of Greece

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

is suddenly heard stating that the United Nations

United Nations

are in the process of bringing about a unique military task force

Task force

A task force is a unit or formation established to work on a single defined task or activity. Originally introduced by the United States Navy, the term has now caught on for general usage and is a standard part of NATO terminology...

aimed at preventing future globalized conflicts. This task force is heavily implied to have been "Special Operations Group Echo: Black Ops 9" -- the covert and international

International

----International mostly means something that involves more than one country. The term international as a word means involvement of, interaction between or encompassing more than one nation, or generally beyond national boundaries...

peace enforcing unit of the United Nations and the precursor of the Global Defense Initiative, one of the two main and iconic factions of the Tiberian series along with the Brotherhood of Nod.

A much debated theory intended to resolve the apparent timeline error which came to exist between Command & Conquer and Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 is a 2.5D real-time strategy computer game by Westwood Studios, which was released for Microsoft Windows on October 23, 2000 as the follow-up to Command & Conquer: Red Alert. Set in the early 1970s, Red Alert 2 supposedly picks up at the conclusion of the Allied...

is to consider Red Alert as the genesis of two parallel storylines. If the Soviet campaign were to be completed in Red Alert, the USSR would emerge as the dominant Eurasia

Eurasia

Eurasia is a continent or supercontinent comprising the traditional continents of Europe and Asia ; covering about 52,990,000 km2 or about 10.6% of the Earth's surface located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres...

n power and Kane and the Brotherhood of Nod would subsequently take control of this new empire

Empire

The term empire derives from the Latin imperium . Politically, an empire is a geographically extensive group of states and peoples united and ruled either by a monarch or an oligarchy....

. Conversely, if the Allied campaign were to be completed, the Allies would emerge victorious and the timeline would instead lead into the events of Red Alert 2. According to former C&C designer Adam Isgreen, however, Command & Conquer in fact follows on the conclusion of Red Alert's Allies campaign, while Red Alert 2 and Yuri's Revenge
Command & Conquer: Yuri's Revenge
In Command and Conquer: Yuri's Revenge, the true story starts off assuming the Allies won in Red Alert 2. The plot is based around Yuri, the former head of the Soviet Psychic Corps, coming out of hiding to take over the world by using his Psychic Dominators...

take place in a second parallel universe

Parallel universe (fiction)

A parallel universe or alternative reality is a hypothetical self-contained separate reality coexisting with one's own. A specific group of parallel universes is called a "multiverse", although this term can also be used to describe the possible parallel universes that constitute reality...

, created by a new attempt to alter history in Tiberian Incursion, the working title

Working title

A working title, sometimes called a production title, is the temporary name of a product or project used during its development, usually used in filmmaking, television production, novel, video game, or music album.-Purpose:...

of Westwood Studios' canceled version of Command & Conquer 3. Isgreen also implied that Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla was a Serbian-American inventor, mechanical engineer, and electrical engineer...

may have been responsible for inadvertently having attracted the attention of the Scrin through his experiments, and thus for the arrival of Tiberium

Tiberium

Tiberium or Ichor is a fictional substance that is central to the plot of much of the Command & Conquer series of real-time strategy video games...

on Earth.

When the Command & Conquer: The First Decade
Command & Conquer: The First Decade
Command & Conquer: The First Decade is a compilation of the Command & Conquer series' games published from 1995 to 2003, all bundled into one DVD and updated to run optimally on Windows XP. It was released on February 7, 2006 and sold for the price of one retail game...

compilation pack was released in February 2006, Electronic Arts

Electronic Arts

adopted the policy of considering the C&C franchise

Command & Conquer series

Command & Conquer is a video game franchise, mostly of the real-time strategy style as well as a first-person shooter game based on the former...

to consist of three distinct universes, with this decision apparently violating the storyline connections between Red Alert and Command & Conquer established by Westwood Studios. With the release of Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars
Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars is a military science fiction real-time strategy video game developed and published by Electronic Arts for the Windows, Mac OS X and Xbox 360 platforms, and released internationally in March 2007...

in March 2007 however, Electronic Arts published a document wherein an explicit reference to Kane's appearance in Command & Conquer: Red Alert is made—revealing that GDI's "InOps" intelligence

Intelligence (information gathering)

Intelligence assessment is the development of forecasts of behaviour or recommended courses of action to the leadership of an organization, based on a wide range of available information sources both overt and covert. Assessments are developed in response to requirements declared by the leadership...

division is in the possession of photos of Kane which were taken by the CIA during the 1950s era of Red Alert.

External links

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