Command & Conquer Remastered Preview: Everything We Learned

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Command & Conquer, a staple video game franchise of the '90s and early '00s and an iconic RTS series, hasn't been able to evolve with modern gaming. Failed relaunches and an awful mobile app hurt the brand more than helped it, so the new strategy is to look to the past.

Command & Conquer Remastered was announced by publisher Electronic Arts in November 2018, before development had even started, and was built from the ground up with fans and community members helping not only shape the vision, but also directly assist in the development. Because of this, the game includes both the original game, Tiberian Dawn, and the fan-favorite spinoff Red Alert - along with restored FMV cinematics, remastered music, additional all-new music, improved UI and upgrades, a map editor, and so much more!

****** participated in a Virtual Roundtable for Command & Conquer Remastered last week with Lead Producer Jim Vessella (Lead Producer) who brings with him experience having worked on five Command & Conquer projects. The theme of the presentation was to emphasize the design goals of EA and developers Petroglyph Games and Lemon Sky Studios to deliver an "authentic, iconic experience" and bring it to 2020 by offering a ton of value.

With that in mind, we're going to share what players need to know about the Command & Conquer Remastered Collection, and what we learned that's new and/or interesting:

60 Things We Learned About Command & Conquered Remastered Collection

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1. Includes two games (the original C&C, known as Tiberian Dawn, and Red Alert) and their expansion packs bundled together for $19.99.
2. There are no DLC add-ons or transactions (MTX).
3. Everything is included in Command & Conquered Remastered and it's coming to Steam as well as EA's Origin platform.
4. The release is timed with the 25th anniversary of Command & Conquer.
5. Petroglyph Games, based out of Las Vegas, is helping develop the game and includes some of the original developers from original developers Westwood Studios. They're handling tech and design and they've partnered with Lemon Sky Studios who are doing the art - they worked on StarCraft remaster.
6. Command & Conquered Remastered was rebuilt at 4K.
7. Over 7 hours of music was remastered for the collection.
8. The project was announced before developing it (November 2018 on Reddit). They launched by starting with fan feedback to shape their focus.
9. There's a Community Council formed of the 14 top fans, from modders and Redditors to shoutcasters. They've been involved with most decisions and are in Discord with 24/7 access to the dev team who they speak with "literally every day"
10. The community helped point out code bugs, an example being a range of certain vehicle being out of whack vertically because of an environmental object. They know the game better than anyone else.
11. EA is also working with fans on content. There's a Tiberiun Suns band, for example, who were hired to come in and record in-studio to get 20 tracks in the collection at no extra cost.
12. The game's box design is inspired by a fan-made box design shared a few weeks after the announcement for the remaster so they worked with that designer.
13. Command & Conquered Remastered's multiplayer has been modernized with quickplay options, dedicated servers, leaderboards, new UI, etc.
14. Cheats will NOT be formally in the game.
15. Players have new gameplay options - instead of causing a debate over what control options are available (left click versus right click or allowing unit queuing), the game provides both options (legacy versus modern control options).
16. Note: For quickplay, unit queuing is on by default.
17. Players can choose their music too - choose classic, remastered, or bonus.
18. Players can customize hotkeys in-game instead of doing that in Windows
19. The original voice talent playing Command & Conquer announcer EVA came into studio to re-record all her lines in high definition.
20. For cutscenes they went to original archive but couldn't find raw files - so they had to work with community to craft an algorithm, using AI upscaling.
21. Subtitles have been added to cinematics, in up to eight languages.
22. The game is built off of recovered old source code, effectively 320x200 graphics from DOS mode.
23. Players can zoom in and out (first time in franchise).
24. Players can switch in real-time between original and remaster graphics.
25. The goal of the remaster was the maintain the original games' 2D style.
26. Unit balance is kept very true to original games.
27. Command & Conquered Remastered's supports 1440p and 4K.
28. All VFX, icons, and animations were recreated in 4K from the dev teams at Petroglyph and Lemon Sky.
29. One of the most challenging elements of developing the remaster was handling the terrain which is comprised of thousands of different tiles, where back in the '90s the devs could just overlap stuff because it was blurry and not noticeable. Modernizing that but keeping it usable form a dev standpoint - and realistic between legacy and remaster modes - was tough.
30. Making the water look right was also very challenging for the remaster.
31. The most challenging unit to redesign was The Orca and the teams iterated on it for months due to the 32 angles required and weird perspective.
32. The iconic units were the toughest to get right for the art teams.
33. In the original DOS version of the game Einstein wore a lab coat. In the Win 95 code he was in Professor garb instead so they went with that for the remaster.
34. Post-mission stats are back, and more info has been added for speedrunners.
35. Command & Conquered Remastered adds a bonus gallery unlock where behind-the-scenes content is earned for every mission completed.
36. Some of this bonus content is footage is from old beta cam tapes that had never been digitized before, showing players how the old FMV was originally captured - you'll be able to see Kane actor Joseph D. Kucan - who directed all the cinematics - doing his thing.
37. Original FMV cinematics were hyper-compressed at 320x200 resolution to make those work in 4K was quite an achievement.
38. The developers got Joe Kucan's blessing on the cinematic and bonus content. He's still running a theater company in Las Vegas.
39. Original composer and sound director Frank Klepacki is heavily involved with the project and discovered unreleased music tracks and behind-the-scenes photos of team members to include.
40. EA is talking to community members and groups to plan something for launch to see if they can put on "casual tournaments" in that release window. If there's a strong online presence, they may do more official stuff.
41. If unit queuing option and hot keys change balance of game they may have to change balancing post-launch.

Tiberian Dawn Remastered Details

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1. The explosions on seen on the sides of the menu are back from the original game but in an unexpected way. One of the community members found the vendor who owned the stock footage and forwarded this info to the devs. EA reached out and the vendor had HD footage of this same explosion so they licensed it to use it and it plays frame for frame just like the original game - a good example of how working with fans got these little details in.
2. A Mission Select options is now available so players don't have to worry about losing a save or progress like in original game. There are tabs for GDI and NOD campaigns, Covert Missions, and now they've also added the 'Console Missions' from N64 and PS1 so they can be played for first time on PC.
3. The original C&C didn't have difficulty levels so they brought that tech from Red Alert and added it to Tiberian Dawn.
4. The Jukebox is back and it got a "full facelift" where players can customize playlists from over 200 tracks across 7 hours of music in addition to the original stuff.
5. Players can listen to Red Alert music within Tiberian Dawn or vice versa.
6. One of the first and biggest feedback points from community is that they universally wanted the side bar overhauled, bringing in the UI options from Red Alert and sequels so that more modern stuff was added to Tiberian Dawn's side bar. This gives many more options (and tool tips) for players and represents one of the bigger actual changes to the original game.
7. The original interface is not an option - it was too "archaic" and it'd have to be built from scratch and they felt from community responses players wouldn't use it anyway.

Red Alert Remastered Details

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1. When EA met with Petroglyph, given the anniversary and their origins, it made sense to start with Tiberian Dawn and then they realized there are so many people passionate about Red Alert so they decided to do that as well, and kept adding to each. "It felt like the right place to start and we've been humbled by the community's reaction."
2. Yes, the infamous Ant missions are included.
3. "General Carville's amazing introduction to the Ant missions" - one of the dev's favorite cinematics - is included too.
4. The map editor comes back for both games, built from scratch by Petroglyph.
5. For the map editor, this was something the community kept bringing up in the monthly Reddit updates so half-way through development EA decided to do the map editor even though it wasn't originally part of the plan.skirmish and multiplayer maps, and scripting behavior for single-player campaign maps 0 they can share theese in an easier way - a button in game that lets you download maps ppl have uploaded to servers
6. Fun fact: Red Alert originally started as an expansion back for C&C but it was so different and made so many advances it became it's own game.
7. Frank Klepacki revealed that the words in the iconic Hell March track are just gibberish.
8. The team colors were redone for multiplayer to make them more vibrant, since the old colors weren't very readable in high definition. This is something they worked with the community on to land on eight colors.

Future Command & Conquer Remasters?

1. There are no plans yet for followups or expansions - EA needs to see how this one performs and how audience responds.
2. EA hopes the quality of life improvements help bring in new, younger gamers into the classic RTS genre.
3. The remastered collection is only "PC for now" - there's no word on whether this comes to PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X.
4. Devs loved process of working with community from the get-go on a classic product and they "definitely want to do this again for future titles"
5. The focus is on quality and goal is to make long-time fans happy, not some sales figure. That's how Jim Vessella defines "success."

While we've yet to go hands-on with the Command & Conquer remasters, they've chosen the right people - original devs, players, and fans - to make it, and they've built it from the ground-up with feedback and the right intentions. It looks great, has everything and more that fans would want, and comes at a great price point of $20 for two games, all expansions, a map editor, dedicated servers, multiplayer modes, and plenty of bonus content.

Command & Conquer Remastered Collection releases June 5, 2020 for PC.