First Mega Update news - The Art of War mod for C&C: Generals Zero Hour

Hello everyone, it’s been a while.

Many people think that we have disappeared or that we aren’t putting as much effort and enthusiasm into the mod. Well, sorry folks, those people are completely wrong, we may have not been updating very frequently but we have been working really hard and we are accomplishing many things regularly and almost all of it is done in secrecy in our forums.

We’ve come to a decision:
We are going to release more of our work and keep you guys informed more regularly. Whether it is Work In Progress or Completely finished work, you will get to hear from us more frequently. So let’s get started with this update shall we?

First off we are going to introduce a few people. They are our musicians and are working to make unique music for our mod and since they are part of the team they should be obviously officially presented. If you all know Smooder, who has been a very big member of our mod since the beginning, he is in Charge of the Musical group and keeps everything in order. If there are any more people with music talent out there, drop by our forums or Contact Smooder if you wish to help with The Art of War Project.

MUSICIANS:

• Deflektor
• Gamerex

Also we have decided to stick with our forums as our primary and only website.
Join us there at: Taow.simulationboard.com

Later on, when our forums are more user-friendly, members will be able to get sneak peeks at upcoming updates and see things that most people on moddb can't.

Now, this Update is extremely large, we didn’t know whether or not we should show you this until every thing was rendered well and was 100% finished and ready to be presented but we thought that the update would be too big and since we’ve already spent too much time without any news we separated the initial update into smaller, separate parts (currently we have planned Three Mega Updates).

What we’ve done here is re-render every single vehicle and unit that will be in TAoW. Now the renders were a big requirement because in our old renders, the contrast was very bad and it was hard to see the texture of the vehicles.
These new renders show our vehicles much better and can be considered to be the new "standard" from now on. Also, every single vehicle which was previously released has undergone changes within the texture and model.

The F-16, Apache, and Blackhawk models originated from the Mideast Crisis mod, we would like to thank it's mod team for the support.
Each model has gone through heavy modifications to fit The Art of War, all credits go to the Mideast Crisis Team for the original models and for letting us use them in The Art of War.

As you can see the model has undergone a very large change, the turret was completely changed, the texture was also improved. By many requests we added dirt to our "clean" models.
What you will also notice here is the newly added commander's machine gun turret:

In game the tank commander will be able to come out of the hatch and operate the machine gun (M2). If enemy infantry focus their attacks on the hatch then the commander may be "wounded", not "killed". If he is wounded then the hatch will be inoperable for a minute, this feature is very useful for getting rid of over crowding infantry but must also be used very carefully.

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The model has not changed much, the texture was the most changed part.
In game, the Bradley will carry the role of an IFV, the only new special feature would be the animated rear door in which soldiers can get in and out from.

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Not much has changed either model-wise and the vehicle will still carry it’s role as a close range anti aircraft vehicle. Unlike the Bradley the M6 will only have room for 2 extra soldiers, leaving the main role of IFV to the M2A3.

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The model and texture have changed clearly, following the same logic as the commanders gunning position, the Humvee will have soldiers operating the M2 Browning .50 caliber machine gun or the Mk19 grenade launcher.

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After upgrade, the CROWS system will be installed on all humvees. This comes in helpful by limiting “killed” or “wounded” gunners when operating machine guns.

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This is the marine Amphibious Assault Vehicle, and is only available to the US Marines/Navy faction.
The vehicle is extremely useful when it comes to carrying soldiers and taking them safely to land on beaches. The AAVP7A1 is equipped with a 50 cal and an Mk19GL. Not many changes to the model but the headlights have been modified into boxes rather than circles of the previous model, just to keep with the accuracy and real life detail.

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This vehicle is the next generation Marine amphibious assault vehicle, just like the AAVP-7A1 it is able of carrying infantry and ride on land and sea. This vehicle haves improved armor and is equipped with a Bushmaster III, a 30mm Automatic Cannon. This vehicle will be available via upgrade and will replace the AAVP-7A1 in game.

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The slat armor can be fitted on all Stryker Variants, it will help to protect against incoming RPG’s and missiles.

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This is the TUSK package for the M1A2 Abrams, the previous commander’s machine gun will now be replaced with a new Remote Weapons Station. The Abrams will be equipped with Explosive Reactive Armor tiles (two different versions are available).

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This is a modified version of the Mideast Crisis F-16, all original model credits go to the Mideast Crisis Team. The F-16 will be the US multirole fighter, it will carry Sidewinders for Air-to-Air engagements and Mk.82 General Purpose Bombs for Air-to-Ground attack, in addition it will have an animated landing gear.

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The original Blackhawk model which was used as the base to create these models also originated from Mideast Crisis.
The UH-60 will be the standard transport chopper for the US Army/Air Force faction. TAoW's modernized UH-60's have the latest avionics and equipment as you can see in the models, this is to ensure that the Blackhawks will look as modern as possible. The UH-60 does not have any weapons, only that soldiers will be able to shoot out.
The MH-60K is the special operations variant, this specific variant will be armed with machine guns on both sides and will be available for the US Spec Ops.

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The HH-60L is the medical evacuation chopper, it will be able to extract wounded soldiers out of the frontlines, it is also equipped with fuel tanks so the it can stay on the battlefield longer than regular black hawks. Unlike the standard UH-60 and MH-60K it is unarmed and soldiers cannot fire out with their weapons. The MH-60L is an upgrade and specialized variant that will be able to stay on the battlefield longer because of it's fuel tanks.

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This model was modified from the Mideast Crisis original model. The AH-64D will be the attack chopper for the US Army/Air Dorce faction. The Longbow will be equipped with rocket pods, hellfire missiles and a cannon.

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The AH-1Z will carry out an armament which is similar to the one in the Apache and will also have a similar role but will belong to the USMC/US Navy faction.
What you will notice is that this version of the AH-1Z is equipped with the newest engines.

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The UH-1Y, just like the UH-60K, will be a special operations transport for the USMC/US Navy faction.

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Here are a few upcoming vehicles for the Russian faction.

More coming soon…