Reviews - Anxozt

Amazing mod, has its own campaign for both sides. Missions themselves are quite well made... well most of the time. Sometimes they can be quite frustrating and confusing but thats inline with vanilla game.

Story sets in what if scenario that GDI loses the first war. But instead of bowing down and accepting tyranny they fight back. And this is funny, as this reverses GDI and NOD playstyles slightly. GDI now has access to what NOD used to have in following wars. Like harassment hit and run vehicle. And because NOD became the technological powerhouse, ironically, they became vulnerable to what GDI was. The Ion storms. Half of the NOD's arsenal malfunctions during it. No cyborg unit works, most high tech tanks neither. While GDI is mostly unaffected, only hover vehicles are grounded, everything else works.

While i would love to give this mod 10/10. I just simply cant, for the following reasons.

1) Skirmish is absolute crashfest
2) There is no real database about the new units so its a guess work.
3) In campaign, i was quite baffled that neither side actually said something about Tiberium lifeforms going rampart, or some unexplained things like NOD forces being present alongside Globotech units. I couldnt find any reason behind it. Were they the Sons of Kane ? But why they used Cyborg reapers and Infectors ?!.
4) AI in Skirmish doesnt build walls and gates but this might be limitation of engine albeit it would be useful for its bases to prevent critical buildings theft. Also if you chose timeless dawn, AI will not build the Dawn units for some reason.
5) Some missions are too frustrating or too confusing. Theres a GDI mission where you have to break in a facility to get railgun tank prototype. There are laser turrets on the way and you got few rangers and commando unit. No idea whos idea it was but you are supposed to engage the anti infantry turret with the commando who shotguns it to death while medic pocket heals him.

Wish i could write more in detail of this bizzare design decisions but moddb has pitiful word limitations on reviews.

Also, i wanted to give this mod actually 7/10 but because it has the option to turn off support powers (Something i wish MO devs added to their mod but they are opposed to that idea for some reason, yeah, adding an OPTION will surely permanently damage the mod) so nothing snipes my units across the map in skirmish with no counterplay.

An amazing mod to behold, the sheer amount of effort put in is astonishing.

New factions, new units, voiced units and so on, its a definite must have mod for such an old RTS game.

Now, aside from the praise, lets talk about its missteps

MO took what was fun from RA2 and ruined it and made it to MP competitive game, as such, it made some collateral damage.

First of all
1) Foehn is just so unfun to play against. Their arsenal is choked full of insta killing, AOE deleting units.

All 3 subfactions have some unfun to play against support powers, btw yes MO added those from Generals/TW/RA3. So yeah, your units will be sniped across the map and it happens that only Foehn has tech (Signal inhibitors) to prevent bloaticks materializing inside your infantry squads and insta killing them.

2) Defences are too tough, half of the artillery pieces are hot garbage that fail spectacularly to do their supposed job. From top of my head, only SCUD and Hailstorm actually outranges the enemy defences. Everyone else will get pummeled back by base defences, wtf is this ?

3) Some missions are just masochistic. Why did Singularity become the most difficult mission in CnC history ?!

4) Sometimes it crashed albeit its rare

Could write more but modDB doesnt allow longer reviews.

A good mod, but has some flaws

1) Map design is epic but enemies tends to stuck in the scenery
2) Balance is questionable, either enemies are weak or they soak damage and dishes alot to you
3) Race specific items make sense but i dont understand why for example Lizardmen cannot buy and use Plated armour. Why cant he order a special deal with some Smith so he can wear an armour... that can actually protect him ?

Since the best armour lizard can get is Old blood one, which is just a plate of metal on stomach and some hide shoulder plates

At +-62k price tag (If you dont invest enough points in trading)
You get a shoe string wrapped around your chest.

Are Lizardmen idiots or what.... i never played Warhammer so i dunno

4) Some Models are bad
Weapon and armour modelling is great but some species are hideously bad. To the point where i started to laugh when i saw Kroxigor (I think) which... i think suppose to be a bigger lizard soldier, but he is very slim (Not enough muscle mass to carry its own weight) and his face looks funny, he looks smashed

Lizardmen in general looks smashed too, Skinks are funny looking too

And its weird why are these models ugly, when Minotaur's looks up to par with the game. Armour and weapons looks great !

This is like Starcraft, but with better story (That hooked me and i played the game only for the story)

Yet it lacks Blizzard (IT isnt made by Blizzard btw) diamond polish and has bugs, balance problems and very boring Skirmish maps (That are made as MOBA maps, with Symmetry so hard i really despise it)

This is quite good game, on gameplay alone this could be 8 or 9/10

But i will nitpick the issues with the campaign (The main reason why i gave this game 6) And the balance isnt alright all the times
------------------
CAMPAIGN

The first campaign is the best out of three, almost every title is unique scenario on its own with unique map and ever changing gameplay

This campaign is amazing to play i usually play it 3 times again before i get... *shutters* to Alin Campaign

Aside from Alin being underpowered and Dark Alin are OP, the first missions are OK, but then ******** starts to pile up.
The amount of unique scenarios are very thin, and 40% of all maps are regular, boring skirmishes

There are some redeeming missions though

The last campaign is utter ****, i wanted my suffering to end so i took cyan......

But unfortunately, game wont let me die

Last campaign has only 3 unique maps i think off, rest 90% are all skirmish maps, which are booooring.

The more you will play the campaign, you will notice that devs either were running out of time, or they didnt cared anymore

And then there isnt any Meta map world conquering in this Rise of Nation game, which is also a reason why this is 6/10

If this wasnt a bug galore, i would give this 9/10

This is so bad its actually good

Balance gets raped, Allies have best ******* units which define the definition of Over powered

They got hovercraft artillery which can one shoot almost everything in game, and did i mentioned it can hover over water ?! Armed with gatling guns which melts even tanks before it deploys its Proton collider cannons which are instant death to any unit and two shoot for Tesla Coil with obscene fire rate ?!

Then they got armoured flying fortress armed with Proton Collider cannon

This "Plane" is calling itself Harbinger, and it has more health than Apocalypse tank and it self repairing.

DID I MENTIONED IT IS A ******* AIRCRAFT ?

You build 4 of them (They dont need Airstrip slot so you can have them as much till your wallet will choke)
And send them toward Enemy base
Watch how it takes 2-4 minutes to kill one Harbinger with AA defence and other fighters

THEN, they got Cryo Legionnaires
This is infantry that can walk on Water and it freezes everything till they are frozen, and they can get one shooted from everything in the game

This is the least OP new unit for Allies

Then lastly, they got Terminator Bot thingy, which has insane HP and Disintegrator beam, they can face the game most toughest tanks in 1vs4 combat with ease.....

The balance of this game is so broken that EA didnt included multiplayer.....

This is the game where RTS and strategy falls apart, Generals and Tiberium War seems as master piece in comparison to this

Major problems of this game are

1) Its reliance on Coop
2) AI
3) Support Powers and Skirmish mode
4) Modding
5) Balance

Lets tear this game a new a-hole

1) Reliance on Coop
- On gamespy, of course why NOT ?
You can play with AI, but Human would be few times better and certain missions would be easier
Revora Net tried to fix it, but i still cannot play Coop with my friend and they refuse to fix the issue despite lots of people are reporting it

2) AI, arguably, RA3 AI is most cheapest and annoying CNC AI ever spawned

It has Omnivision, limitless funds and insane micro and macro
This ties with the topic bellow

3) Support powers, superweapons and Skirmish

This is my main issue why i gave this game 6, above average rating

Support powers are 90% Un counter able instant deletion powers

Like a bomb that warps inside your base

You let it go bang, it will destroy your buildings
You destroy it, it will explode anyway and destroy your buildings and units firing at it.

But worst thing is Magnetic Sattelite, this beam sucks all vehicles and mechanic infantry to space if it reaches them, it can be controled, but AI with its Omnivision it will always target your Harvesters, and there is no warning of that happening

Or it sucks your 12 Apocalyps tanks in few seconds and you wont even notice

There is no way to turn this **** off and it makes Skirmish **** if your units are getting deleted instantly

Skirmish is the gamemode i evade the most, JUST because of the Support Powers !

Thankfully they improved from Generals and you can build only single Superweapon of its kind (Attack/Support)

4) Modding
Modding is sooo limited and there is just soo many hardcoded things, this reminds me of DOW 2....

5) While the balance is somewhat OK, atleast in campaign

The game boils down to massing of strongest units because there is no reason to NOT do that

Among the best RTS games ever created

It has some faults, like the general powers (Aka almost uncounterable point and click deletion buttons) which makes games frustrating and its in general VERY cheap.

Like insta spawn group of terrorists inside your base, they can cap your building

But if you play as Demolition general, you can detonate your own troops = Instant death for powerplants

Or you can do this in group of enemy tanks

Its very cheap and frustrating and there is no way to turn it off.

Oh yes..... the balance of this game is all over the place

First of all, you cannot disable superweapons, and the game gives you NO reason to NOT just sit in your base and build 5-12 Nuclear silos instead of building units and fighting like real man.

And general balance... holy mother of god

Alexander (Super Weapons General) and Juhziz (Demolition General) are arguably the worst offenders

Alexander has EMP Patriot, which disables vehicles on hit (Making tanks useless) and its instant kill if it hits aircraft

Then... she got Aurora Alpha
This bomber is invincible UNTIL it throws its payload

So this bomber can fly around your base while it will pick its target, usually powerplants while everyone is shooting at it... WTF

Juhziz has two major OP things

1) His SCUD
2) His Demolition upgrade with Rebel Ambush ability

His SCUD can one shoot enemy superweapons or HQ
ONE SHOOT ?! Normally you need 2 superweapons to destroy enemy HQ/Superweapon
This means his SCUD can kill every building in game every 5 minutes

Juhziz can rig his troop with explosives, everytime Juhziz unit dies, it explodes with strong explosion, with rebel spawn ambush you can instantly delete group of building and this is very cheap and takes no skill at all. Yet there is NO reason to NOT use it.

You might wonder why i am giving this game 10/10

The game is fine if you dont play against those two generals, as just the balance falls apart.

Awesome ! this have bright future, i wish i could help you with something, but i dont know how to code,model,animate or any UT editor basics

If you like games like CNC, this mod, will takes you to eyes of commander or soldiers, defending to last man that goddamm point !