Tiberium
Encyclopedia
Fiction
Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...
al substance that is central to the plot of much of the Command & Conquer series
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...
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. Within each C&C title set in the Tiberium story arc
Command & Conquer: Tiberian series
The Command & Conquer: Tiberian series is a sub-series of real-time strategy video games belonging to the extensive Command & Conquer franchise by Westwood Studios and Electronic Arts...
(Command & Conquer Tiberian Dawn, 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...
, Tiberian Sun Firestorm Expansion, 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...
and 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...
), the Tiberium crystals represent both the tools and spoils of war and are used by players to purchase new units and buildings, with each of the series' factions either directly or indirectly battling for control over the crystals. Tiberium has extraterrestrial
Outer space
Outer space is the void that exists between celestial bodies, including the Earth. It is not completely empty, but consists of a hard vacuum containing a low density of particles: predominantly a plasma of hydrogen and helium, as well as electromagnetic radiation, magnetic fields, and neutrinos....
origins and comes in a variety of forms, mostly the common green crystal but also in the form of more rare blue crystals, the extremely rare red crystals, and in the form of "veins". It has also demonstrated a liquid form by the time of Tiberium Wars. Parts of the chemical composition of tiberium remain unknown.
Tiberium is presented as a double-edged sword within the context of the story arc of the respective video games. While it is the greatest mineral
Mineral
A mineral is a naturally occurring solid chemical substance formed through biogeochemical processes, having characteristic chemical composition, highly ordered atomic structure, and specific physical properties. By comparison, a rock is an aggregate of minerals and/or mineraloids and does not...
resource ever encountered, conveniently gathering many potent elements
Chemical element
A chemical element is a pure chemical substance consisting of one type of atom distinguished by its atomic number, which is the number of protons in its nucleus. Familiar examples of elements include carbon, oxygen, aluminum, iron, copper, gold, mercury, and lead.As of November 2011, 118 elements...
into an easily harvestable form, it also brings with it considerable hazards: areas rich with the rapidly spreading Tiberium substance are eventually exhausted of their native ecosystems, and become too toxic
Toxicity
Toxicity is the degree to which a substance can damage a living or non-living organisms. Toxicity can refer to the effect on a whole organism, such as an animal, bacterium, or plant, as well as the effect on a substructure of the organism, such as a cell or an organ , such as the liver...
to support normal carbon-based life
Carbon-based life
Carbon forms the backbone of biology for all of life on Earth. Complex molecules are made up of carbon bonded with other elements, especially oxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen, and carbon is able to bond with all of these because of its four valence electrons. Carbon is abundant on earth...
. In the context of the gameplay, Tiberium can also be seen this way with its obvious tactical advantage as a resource, and its destructive effect on infantry, sometimes transmuting them into Visceroids.
Tiberium is a commodity
Commodity
In economics, a commodity is the generic term for any marketable item produced to satisfy wants or needs. Economic commodities comprise goods and services....
, with everything that one builds in the game costing Tiberium-based credits. It can appear anywhere on 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...
, but spreads much more slowly in areas of extreme cold climate. In Tiberian Dawn and Tiberian Sun, it will spread very slowly in-game but primarily comes from special Tiberium-generating Blossom Trees, infested trees that release Tiberium spores into the air; in Tiberium Wars, these trees are replaced by Tiberium Fissures in the Earth's crust, and Tiberium will not spread outside a certain radius of these fissures. Either way, it is harvest
Harvest
Harvest is the process of gathering mature crops from the fields. Reaping is the cutting of grain or pulse for harvest, typically using a scythe, sickle, or reaper...
ed by vehicles called harvesters. As a currency, Tiberium is collected to build structures and to train units.
The substance is named as such because it was first discovered near the river Tiber
Tiber
The Tiber is the third-longest river in Italy, rising in the Apennine Mountains in Emilia-Romagna and flowing through Umbria and Lazio to the Tyrrhenian Sea. It drains a basin estimated at...
in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. 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...
, who claims it was in fact the Brotherhood who first discovered Tiberium, states that he himself named it after Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus.
Conception
Tiberium was first introduced in the original 1995 Command & Conquer game to replace the "spice" from Dune IIDune II
Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty is a Dune computer game released in 1992 by Westwood Studios...
as the mined resource for building and expanding, and was inspired by the 1957 B-movie
B-movie
A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....
"The Monolith Monsters
The Monolith Monsters
The Monolith Monsters is a science fiction film directed by John Sherwood and starring Grant Williams and Lola Albright. It is based on a story by Jack Arnold and Robert M...
". According to 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...
co-founder 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...
"It solved one of the fundamental problems we had with making an RTS, which was that we wanted to have a central resource that everybody was fighting over. Dune has spice, which made perfect sense — and it was also used when we came to the idea of Tiberium. It became the anchor of the C&C universe because people were arguing over a limited resource that represented wealth and power".
In Tiberian Dawn, Tiberium is said to be composed of 42.5% phosphorus
Phosphorus
Phosphorus is the chemical element that has the symbol P and atomic number 15. A multivalent nonmetal of the nitrogen group, phosphorus as a mineral is almost always present in its maximally oxidized state, as inorganic phosphate rocks...
, 32.5% iron
Iron
Iron is a chemical element with the symbol Fe and atomic number 26. It is a metal in the first transition series. It is the most common element forming the planet Earth as a whole, forming much of Earth's outer and inner core. It is the fourth most common element in the Earth's crust...
, 15.25% calcium
Calcium
Calcium is the chemical element with the symbol Ca and atomic number 20. It has an atomic mass of 40.078 amu. Calcium is a soft gray alkaline earth metal, and is the fifth-most-abundant element by mass in the Earth's crust...
, 5.75% copper
Copper
Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29. It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. Pure copper is soft and malleable; an exposed surface has a reddish-orange tarnish...
, 2.5% silica, and 1.5% unknown substances. Its gaseous emissions are composed of 22% methane
Methane
Methane is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . It is the simplest alkane, the principal component of natural gas, and probably the most abundant organic compound on earth. The relative abundance of methane makes it an attractive fuel...
, 19% sulfur
Sulfur
Sulfur or sulphur is the chemical element with atomic number 16. In the periodic table it is represented by the symbol S. It is an abundant, multivalent non-metal. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms form cyclic octatomic molecules with chemical formula S8. Elemental sulfur is a bright yellow...
, 12% naphthalene
Naphthalene
Naphthalene is an organic compound with formula . It is a white crystalline solid with a characteristic odor that is detectable at concentrations as low as 0.08 ppm by mass. As an aromatic hydrocarbon, naphthalene's structure consists of a fused pair of benzene rings...
, 10% argon
Argon
Argon is a chemical element represented by the symbol Ar. Argon has atomic number 18 and is the third element in group 18 of the periodic table . Argon is the third most common gas in the Earth's atmosphere, at 0.93%, making it more common than carbon dioxide...
, 6% isobutane
Isobutane
Isobutane, also known as methylpropane, is an isomer of butane. It is the simplest alkane with a tertiary carbon. Concerns with depletion of the ozone layer by freon gases have led to increased use of isobutane as a gas for refrigeration systems, especially in domestic refrigerators and freezers,...
, 2% xylene
Xylene
Xylene encompasses three isomers of dimethylbenzene. The isomers are distinguished by the designations ortho- , meta- , and para- , which specify to which carbon atoms the two methyl groups are attached...
, and 29% unknown gases.
For the development 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...
, 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...
decided to radically alter its composition, and commissioned scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
to provide a white paper
White paper
A white paper is an authoritative report or guide that helps solve a problem. White papers are used to educate readers and help people make decisions, and are often requested and used in politics, policy, business, and technical fields. In commercial use, the term has also come to refer to...
describing the biophysics
Biophysics
Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that uses the methods of physical science to study biological systems. Studies included under the branches of biophysics span all levels of biological organization, from the molecular scale to whole organisms and ecosystems...
of Tiberium, its atomic structure, its method of transmutation
Nuclear transmutation
Nuclear transmutation is the conversion of one chemical element or isotope into another. In other words, atoms of one element can be changed into atoms of other element by 'transmutation'...
, the form of the radiation
Radiation
In physics, radiation is a process in which energetic particles or energetic waves travel through a medium or space. There are two distinct types of radiation; ionizing and non-ionizing...
that it emits, and the way to harness it for powering machinery and weapons—giving it the same treatment as would be suitable for a scientific journal
Scientific journal
In academic publishing, a scientific journal is a periodical publication intended to further the progress of science, usually by reporting new research. There are thousands of scientific journals in publication, and many more have been published at various points in the past...
article on a real substance.
Mike Verdu, executive producer for Electronic Arts, gives the following scientific analysis of Tiberium from the perspective of the game universe:
Verdu describes Tiberium as being at the center of the fictional C&C
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...
universe as well: "This enigmatic crystal is at the core of our gameplay as well as our fiction. [...] Tiberium is our Force, our Spice, our One Ring
One Ring
The One Ring is a fictional artifact that appears as the central plot element in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth fantasy novels. It is described in an earlier story, The Hobbit , as a magic ring of invisibility. The sequel The Lord of the Rings describes its powers as being more encompassing than...
, and our Matrix. Everything in our game world is defined by its relationship to Tiberium."
Concept
In the game universe, Tiberium crystals proliferate in a number of different ways. In the simplest and most common way, a tiberium "pod" will send out "roots", which create more pods. Tiberium also spreads by infecting trees and mutating them into so-called "Blossom Trees", which seed the substance across large areas of land. Destroying a Harvester, Refinery, Cyborg, Tiberium Spike, or other Tiberium-containing unit or building can cause a small amount of tiberium to be released. In Tiberium Wars, it spreads by growing out of the ground from Tiberium fissures within the Earth's crust. Verdu describes these Tiberium concentrations as "oddly beautiful fields of green crystal that [kill] everything around them". The substance is radioactive and is extremely toxicToxin
A toxin is a poisonous substance produced within living cells or organisms; man-made substances created by artificial processes are thus excluded...
to carbon-based life
Carbon-based life
Carbon forms the backbone of biology for all of life on Earth. Complex molecules are made up of carbon bonded with other elements, especially oxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen, and carbon is able to bond with all of these because of its four valence electrons. Carbon is abundant on earth...
, causing either death or severe genetic mutations in plants, humans and animals alike. It replicates by converting everything around it into more Tiberium either through oddly directed mutation
Mutation
In molecular biology and genetics, mutations are changes in a genomic sequence: the DNA sequence of a cell's genome or the DNA or RNA sequence of a virus. They can be defined as sudden and spontaneous changes in the cell. Mutations are caused by radiation, viruses, transposons and mutagenic...
of plantlife
Plantlife
Plantlife is a wild plant conservation charity. As of 2007, its membership was 10,500 and it owned 23 nature reserves around the UK.-History:It was founded in 1989 with its first President being Professor David Bellamy. By 1999 it had 22 nature reserves....
, or through direct assimilation of other substances on the atom
Atom
The atom is a basic unit of matter that consists of a dense central nucleus surrounded by a cloud of negatively charged electrons. The atomic nucleus contains a mix of positively charged protons and electrically neutral neutrons...
ic level, through this gradually covering the whole surface of the Earth. It gives off radiation, which in the game universe is harnessed both for energy and as a weapon. In Verdu's words it is both "a gift and a curse — a resource and a plague".
Tiberium is extraterrestrial
Outer space
Outer space is the void that exists between celestial bodies, including the Earth. It is not completely empty, but consists of a hard vacuum containing a low density of particles: predominantly a plasma of hydrogen and helium, as well as electromagnetic radiation, magnetic fields, and neutrinos....
in origin and was introduced to the world through a meteorite impact near the Tiber river in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, in the year 1995. Exposure of human beings to Tiberium, which can be through touch or inhalation, either results in death or extreme mutation, the mechanism (or purpose) for the latter not being revealed in the game. Verdu describes Red Zones as being "like the surface of an alien world". Part of the game storyline comprises scientific speculation that an alien species is using Tiberium to terraform
Terraforming
Terraforming of a planet, moon, or other body is the hypothetical process of deliberately modifying its atmosphere, temperature, surface topography or ecology to be similar to those of Earth, in order to make it habitable by terrestrial organisms.The term is sometimes used more generally as a...
Earth to its own requirements. This speculation is borne out in Command and Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars, when the alien force known as the Scrin arrive at Earth to mass-harvest Tiberium (which they name Ichor).
This effect on both humans and materials has consequences for harvesting. Unprotected infantry passing through a Tiberium deposit are at risk, both from direct exposure to Tiberium itself and thus conversion into Tiberium and from secondary radiation burn
Radiation burn
A radiation burn is damage to the skin or other biological tissue caused by exposure to radio frequency energy or ionizing radiation.The most common type of radiation burn is a sunburn caused by UV radiation. High exposure to X-rays during diagnostic medical imaging or radiotherapy can also result...
s and radiation poisoning
Radiation poisoning
Acute radiation syndrome also known as radiation poisoning, radiation sickness or radiation toxicity, is a constellation of health effects which occur within several months of exposure to high amounts of ionizing radiation...
as others are contaminated and converted around them. Soldiers, tanks, and other vehicles in Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars thus have protective shielding against Tiberium. However, this shielding is imperfect, since it simply slows down the process of conversion, it being based upon the fact that some materials take longer for Tiberium to convert than others (there are other shields against Tiberium. "Sonic resonators", devices that emit sound at particular frequencies, stop the spread of Tiberium and are used in Blue Zones to ensure that Tiberium deposits there are contained). Partial contamination of a human, which can occur within 20 seconds, requires immediate treatment in properly equipped medical facilities.
Tiberium, is, in Verdu's words, a "simple" and an "elegant" piece of game design. It is a resource that drives both the overall storyline and the economy of actual gameplay. Its several properties, including the tradeoff between harvesting it and the damage that it does to infantry that come in contact with it, make game strategy more complex for players. Tiberium deposits provide foci for conflict, and the depletion and regrowth of such deposits both controls the pace of game play and prevents a runaway economy.
Trivia
- The Sims 3: World Adventures contains Tiberium that can be obtained in the form of a relic from Egypt, combining certain combinations of relics using a Carter's series display case, or breaking space rocks using the Board Breaker. It will start out as a small Spire Cut Tiberium that can be sold for 89 SimoleonsCurrencyIn economics, currency refers to a generally accepted medium of exchange. These are usually the coins and banknotes of a particular government, which comprise the physical aspects of a nation's money supply...
, but within a single day, it will become a Large Spire Cut Tiberium worth 30k Simoleons. Leaving a Large Spire Cut Tiberium out on the lawn will spawn more Spire Cut Tiberium. Leaving a piece of Tiberium in a Sim's inventory for a while will give the Sim "Tiberium Poisoning", which drops the Sim's mood by 20, causes them to become very sick and vomit frequently. Plants seem to be immune to Tiberium poisoning.
- In Sim City 4, when placing industrial zones, a high-tech industry named Kane Tiberium will eventually appear.
- The name Ichor comes from Greek mythology, which is the substance that flows in the god's veins.
- 1 Cup of Tiberium is listed as an ingredient for the poison recipe in Lady GagaLady GaGaStefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta , better known by her stage name Lady Gaga, is an American singer and songwriter. Born and raised in New York City, she primarily studied at the Convent of the Sacred Heart and briefly attended New York University's Tisch School of the Arts before withdrawing to...
's video TelephoneTelephone (song)"Telephone" is a song written and performed by Lady Gaga. It was released from her third extended play and second major release The Fame Monster . The song, featuring American R&B singer Beyoncé Knowles, was written by Gaga and Rodney Jerkins...
.