Total Annihilation: Commander Pack

TA is how you know gaming loves you. If you factor in the fan-made, 3D, free to play knockoff Total Annihilation Spring in its heyday (~2005 - 2008, sadly dead now), this is the best game ever made. I sank more time into this game than raiding in any MMORPG. Unlike the MMORPGs, I loved every minute of TA. This is the game that came out just before Starcraft and got buried by that game's simple polish, good balance and simple gameplay for the masses, but exceeded Starcraft in every way in terms of mechanics, scope, revolutionary concepts, complexity, scale, music, macro/micro mix, modability (over 10,000 fanmade units), victory paths, information play (the value of radar and *active* scouting / Line of Sight), and flat-out overall Kickass. TA has nukes that can hit anywhere. It has physics-based artillery that can reach across a map. Water units, underwater, hovercraft, air, space, tanks, robots, Godzilla-sized robots (Krogoth!), gattling artillery, weather effects, dozens of weapon types that all operated under different physics.... Spiritual successor SupCom: Forged Alliance had some of the macro play, but almost none of the micro. Spiritual successor Planetary Annihilation used cookie cutter rock paper scissors unit interactions whereas TA uses physics. You could fire at units and actually miss! You could fire long-range plasma cannons from across the map (from on top of hills for extra range of course), hit an enemy deflector shield covering their base, and instead of simple hit point bullcrap that SupCom pulled, bounce that shot back and land who knows where all based on the subtle angle of the shot and angle of deflection. Some mods had 32v32 player games with only two commanders and global unit control for teams. If you like the music of Jeremy Soule, and if you like video games you should, then check out the Total Annihilation Soundtrack on Youtube - some of Soule's finest work, even after a brilliant career. Word limit on GoG's too low.

TA is a grand RTS. It might (and to be honest, is) my nostalgia talking, but only other RTS game that could stand somewhere near it is SupCom (Spiritual succesor of TA). (Honest warning: I'm writing what I remember from playing the game when I was ~7 years old) For the Features: -Unique resource system: Unlike most RTS games, Resources are generated over time by special buildings, like windmils, solar generators, and such for Energy, and Extractors for Metal, (and using a Windmill on an asteroid won't be really helpful). and building things uses up your resources gradually. (adds a negative "Income") and of course the more workers are building things, the faster it is built, but the greater the use of your resources (this applies to both buildings and units); On another hand even if you have 0 of everything and -100 income per second, you still can start building things, though It will take forever for them to be competed. -Units: there are a lot of them: several kinds of tanks, walking robots, planes, ships, and submarines. and that is only the base game: there are a lot more made by fans! (On another hand, this game allows you to have control over EVERY EXISTING UNIT (provided you manage to steal a "worker" from other faction (It's really fun to send a transport plane to the enemy base to kidnap their worker transport it to your Commander )), and there also is the Commander, powerful, slow, and crucial for the existence of your army (aka "You get him killed means you just lost" unit) which also explodes nicely when killed. -Buildings: Besides already mentioned resource buildings there are of course Factories (land, vehicle, air, ship)*2 (because there are "Upgraded" versions (I forgot the name) that produce different units) radars, radar jammers, turrets(several kinds), sonars, torpedo launchers (what? and how did you want to defend from the subs if not with torpedoes?), nukes (Oh the terror when you notice that the enemy has built a few nukes somewhere along the way...), and what I presume is a rocket defence (back then I never figured out how to use the damn thing). Besides EACH building has an animated model (You can see at a glance whether your windmills are producing energy, what (or whether something) is currently being built. Oh, and the 2 factions' units and buildings are distinct (though buildings may feel like reskins, since the do the exact same thing as their counterparts (or I failed to see the difference between them). (but on the other hand, what can you expect from a windmill? or a Solar Panel?

Some say it doesn't have soul. It doesn't have the cuteness or character that other RTS games have. I agree, but what it does have is a balance and replayability that has seen it being reinstalled on all my computers since it came out in 1997. Others have outlined it's features and the fact that it still looks good while other games of this age don't hold up to what modern games offer. Still playing it after 20 years so that is why I recommend getting this game.

It's hard to put into words what this game is. It defined an entire genre. The story is basically us-vs.-them; the Arm reject becoming machines; the Core embrace it. The orchestral soundtrack is perfectly over-the-top to accompany intergalactic warfare. The gameplay is excellent and includes naval warfare and even hovercraft and seaplanes in the expansions. There is a wide variety of units from the lowliest pea shooter to various game-ending doomsday weapons. The campaign is engaging and there is multiplayer including custom units once you're done. Or you can check out a successor game such as Spring.

The koreans are wrong :)