Total Annihilation: Commander Pack

I grew up on my dad's computer playing the whole C&C series. One day, while we were at Best Buy, he picked up the box for this game, said "robots killing each other, sounds cool". I was hooked from the moment he installed it on his computer. The best part of this game is, by far, the soundtrack and the way it switches between calm and energetic as the action builds or dies out. I find myself whistling the melodies, even not having played the game or heard the tracks in a while. Following suit is the lack of resource gathering. None of those nasty villagers scumming up your base. Build some metal extractors and a fusion plant and you're set. The modding community, which is pretty much dead these days, was amazing as well, long after Cavedog's demise. Although it's not really alive, you may still be able to find some of the mods (TA:Mutation) floating around the internet. Going with the modding idea, it is also super easy to modify the AI of the game simply by changing some number values.

One of the best and timeless RTS games ever made. And Jeremy Soule did the soundtrack! The only problem with Total Annihilation was simply how far ahead of it's time it actually was. Even a top end PC of the era struggled to play the game with decent framerates. Dropping the very few graphical settings to low and reducing the resolution to the minimum 640x480 hardly helped at all. Duing the later stages of the game having a large army crash against the AI's force would reduce you to single digit frames per second. A nuclear attack could potentially crash your entire PC. I had a very expensive and fast Pentium 200mmx back then and it was nowhere near capable of smooth gameplay in Total Annihilation. Skip forward a few years and my friends and I all bought Pentium 3 550Mhz machines and were able to play TA on LAN pretty effectively. There was still some slowdown but it was playable for the most part. This was with the standard unit cap of 250 per player. Having 150+ advanced fighter planes on screen did reduce the gameplay to single frames per second again, but if you had 150+ advanced fighter planes on your screen, chances are you were only seconds away from winning the game anyway, so you didn't really care. I now have an i5-2500 @ 3.6Ghz and I can play TA in 1920x1080 and the experience is astounding. Even with a unit cap of 1500, I have mothballed over 900 Vamps around my base and CTRL+ALL clicked them to wipe out the entire map and it is silky smooth (almost). The game only uses a single core so even a fast but old Pentium 4 can do this. I have to say TA was my favourite RTS of all time for over a decade but I cannot ignore the genius of Blizzard in Starcraft II. They are two very different games, and I play both equally as much. It is a shame that neither Taylors Supreme Commander or the disapointing Planetary Annihilation came close to capturing the scale and epic magic of the original. Maybe one day someone will be able to do it justice...

This game is a great game, the story is quite interesting and the skirmish mode is basically the Multiplayer mode with bots. The problem I have found is that you definitely do not want to try and run this on an early 2009 Macbook. Completely incompatible Wineskin port. Needs some major tweaks to make it run and you can't get that in a preconfigured Wineskin. Get the windows edition and get Darwine and configure it if you must play on Mac OS X. Otherwise use a virtualization solution in the ways of VMware, Virtualbox or otherwise. You'll thank yourself. This game was originally launched in the windows 98 era i belive but ran fine in NT based systems. I have successfully played the original disc versions on a windows 7 computer with only minor glitches. XP was better about it though. (review based on the game as I remember it, not the Mac edition) Gameplay wise, it's a fun game to play. Resource management, harassing the enemy commanders. various means of getting the same buildings. It's an instant classic in my book. The Kbots are quick to be built but tend to be be a bit slow to get places. The Vehicles take a bit longer to build but they don't maneuver well and tend to get caught on obstacles. The planes are resource costly but are unhindered by obstacles but the construction planes take longer to build things than the Vehicle counterparts. The boats however are less useful than anything, especially if you are driven into the sea. At that point the boats are very limited other than being long range harassing fire. or if you get a carrier ship, set a bunch of planes to guard it and it becomes a super dangerous swarm. Sound and Music are definitely really nice. very fitting music, good sounds for the explosions and shots. Not much else to say on that. All around the game is a great example of an RTS. It is also an amazing multiplayer game. You will not be disappointed if you get this game.

When this came out in 1997, it was a revelation. The use of true 3d for terrain and units was a first (we'd just had sprites up to this point). The story line is compelling. The mix of air, sea and land power meant many strategic options were possible. I'm gonna dust this puppy off again and give her another run. I've just got so many games and so little time these days. Lol. Highly recommended to anyone looking for a ground breaking RTS. P.s. it was developed by an Australian dev which is a bit different and they did a fantastic job. 😎👍

DISCLAIMER: I haven't played the GOG version a lot (yet) but enough to know that it works. This review is mostly based upon my childhood experiences with the CD version. By now, you probably know that Total Annihilation is considered one of the greatest RTS games ever, but I'd go as far as to say that it is the greatest strategy game of all time, whether turn-based, RTS, 4X, etc. This game has near perfect levels of polish, freedom and fun. One thing about the RTS genre vs other strategy subgenres is that RTS games force the player to think fast. As a result, these sorts of games are typically a true test of skill. The player has complete freedom to build up their forces. Starting with a commander, you can build up your forces as varied as you like. So long as you manage your resources, you'll be all good. TA has simple resources and simple ways of gathering them: you only have to manage your Energy and Metal statistics. However, even this comes down to strategy. For example, building storage facilities gives you access to resource surplus that can be used in emergencies. Unit-wise, there are a couple types: combat, construction, scout, transport. With combat types, you have aircraft, tanks, hovercraft, naval vessels and mechs called K-bots. Construction types can't attack but are the only kind that can build. Scouts typically don't attack but have long-range capability. Transports.. well, that one is pretty self-explanatory. Outside of units, you have all sorts of facilities and defenses you can build. From light laser turrets to nuclear missile launchers; from aircraft repair stations to the epic long-range artillery cannon called "Big Bertha". Also, when it comes to production facilities, you typically can build advanced variants that give you access to more powerful units. Overall, Total Annihilation is a phenomenal RTS that is easy to pick up but difficult to master. It's one of the best tests of skill and strategy out there. Worth it at any price.