C&C Tiberium Sun

Tiberium Sun is a game developed by Westwood Studios and released in 1999. It’s the sequel to Command and Conquer released in 1995.

In Tiberium Sun you play in the year 2030, 30 years after the end of the game Command and Conquer. The first Tiberium War has been won by GDI. The two factions are once again in war with each other in a world that now knows a new form of Tiberium. It comes in a plant form now and is being spread by trees infected by Tiberium, releasing Tiberium spores in the air. Next to Tiberium, there are also Tiberium veins, huge plants that spread out in every direction, and visceroids, strange creatures of tiberium with organic material. An infrantry unit can become one if its dies when walking over Tiberium or over Tiberium veins.

The story of both factions are not parallel (with some exceptions) both have their own agenda. GDI’s agenda is capturing/killing Kane and destroying the Brotherhood of NOD with him, while NOD follows their prophet, Kane. Kane’s plan is to blow up the Philadelphia, the GDI command station orbiting the Earth, and to launch a Tiberium missile that will cause the world to become completely covered in Tiberium. There’s one thing that both campaigns have in common. At a point both parties are after an alien artifact called the Tacitus. While playing GDI you are also ordered to secure an alien ship and defend it, the NOD campaign orders you to secure the site.

The game has some new features. The maps now have dynamic lighting, which allows day and night cycles and special effects like awesome Ion Storms, created by Tiberium. Next to lighting, variations in height have been put in the game. Cities, trees, hills etc. are now higher and an almost 3D environment is created, compare this to the almost flat towns and trees in C&C. Craters and fires also appear on the maps when shells and grenades explode on the ground and on units.

Now about the AI, it has been greatly improved. The unit’s pathfinding is finally done well. In C&C you would have units stuck behind a tree because (for some reason) they couldn’t find another route. Some units can now engage enemies while moving, but only if they have an independent turret. Where in C&C units would walk/drive happy past an enemy unit without engaging, now those units are eager to kill them all while getting to their location. Units are now less likely to drive/walk to a building to fire at it at point blank range.

A short note about basebuilding. Now it’s possible to build your buildings separate from the construction yard. This allows for bigger bases and more spread out defenses. Though the size of your base is limited by the construction range of the yard.

The game features a large number of new units in the game. GDI has access to mechs, the disruptor (a tank using harmonic beams to destroy enemy and friendly alike), the awesome Mammoth Mark II, Orca fighters and bombers, missile hovercrafts. Its infantry hasn’t changed a lot, light infantry and disk thrower (grenadiers) and engineers. Three new units are the jettrooper , the medic and the Ghoststalker (replaces commando)
Nod still has its familiar buggy and the attack cycle. New units are the stealth tank, artillery, the devil’s tongue(a flamethrower tank capable of moving underground), the Tictank ( can deploy itself), the Harpy attack helicopter and the Banshee fighter plane. Its infantry, like GDI, has some new units. The cyborg, the mutant hijacker, and the cyborg commanda (this is next to the Mammoth Mark II, the most awesome units of the game).

To comment the new units. The infantry haven’t had a make-over of their models, so they look alike. The vehicles however are rendered with voxels, these are pixels that don’t have a specific coordinates and that are used to make a 3D image with 2D images. This may sound confusing but this is the way to describe it. So they look a lot cooler.

To close this review, Tiberium Sun has some big improvements compared to its predecessor C&C. this isn’t surprising because Tiberium Sun was released five years later. The AI has improved and the terrain is now worth looking at with craters, sometimes waterfalls and good looking cities. The units are balanced and are not overpowered. So this game is a game worth playing and enjoyed it a lot.