I know I'm coming into this game years and years after it was popular so my tastes have been spoiled by bigger and better iterations of the formula since its release. Regardless, a "classic" game should be able to wow a veteran or newcomer alike and this game just didn't do it for me.

First of all, the story, or lack-thereof. Keep in mind I only played most of the way through the first, "Corporate" campaign before I just stopped caring. The writing for the mission briefings is abysmal, there are only two characters and their interactions are extremely generic. I spent more time trying to turn off that dizzying, uninspired "star-field" screensaver looping in the background than I did listening to them drone on. Every mission boils down to "go here, destroy this" or "go here, escort this". Nothing much happens over the course of the game, there is some intrigue involving alien artifacts that goes absolutely nowhere. The heroine is very unlikable, she never stands up to authority, just does what she is told and then fumes about it. How exciting.

Game play is the same thing over and over again. Scout ahead, gradually move your squads forward in increments, find enemy, engage. No matter how careful you are, at some point during each mission you will be ambushed by enemy rocket infantry that will appear out of nowhere and proceed to annihilate half your troops, or go straight for your command APC, resulting in a mission failure. It doesn't help that your units PAUSE every time you give them a command. This is the only game I have ever played that has this. In the middle of a heated firefight, this can be fatal. When a dozen things are happening at once and your vehicles are taking fire you need your soldiers to REACT, not sit there helplessly as you click madly on a location over and over.

The environments are huge and the terrain is very confusing to navigate, which is fine and challenging, except that it means two thirds of the gameplay is spent navigating and trying to find the enemy. These environments are lazily detailed and despite the gradual change from temperate to frozen climates over the course of the game there is little variety. Since there is almost no in-game music to speak of (there is some in the early missions but it is strangely absent later on) all you have to listen to is the constant droning of your units as you boss them around.

I liked the "friendly fire" aspect, which requires you to set up your fields of fire carefully. I didn't like how utterly confused my vehicles behaved if I told them to go somewhere and there was an obstacle in the way. Complete chaos as everyone tries to shuffle around each other, like rush hour in a parking lot. Meanwhile, the enemy is attacking. The dropship design of the game is also pointless. You don't start out with all your units on the battlefield, you have to call them in via dropships. But you can only drop them in specific spots, which defeats the whole purpose of a dropship. This is supposed to give you some extra layer of tactical planning but is almost completely useless since I gaurantee you 100% of the time you will have the best chance if you dump all your guys right at the start of each mission. The game occasionally nudges you into mixing it up by offering you multiple drop zones, but you ALWAYS stand a better chance if everyone sticks together.

Overall Ground Control is just a bad, rough-around-the-edges generic real-time tactical game. There is no base-building, no story beyond "kill the fanatics" and it's all just so slow and tedious. Air units are useless, enemy AA will pick them off from halfway across the map. The graphics are awful. It feels like the beta of a real, complete game. Play World in Conflict instead, that one got the formula right.

Name one RTS with a great plot? These are called real-time STRATEGY games for a reason. And besides, the last two points are completely false, but I don't want to write spoilers here.

As for "go here, destroy this" or "go here, escort this"... most RTS games go "build a base, amass a blob, attack the enemy main", with some annoying "stealth" missions in between. At least personally I find the missions in GC1 nicely varied (I actually started replaying the game a few days ago).

As for unlikeable 'main' character (Major Sarah Parker), don't blame you. Her voice is bitchy, and I hate her face. However, it doesn't matter, you get attached to your squads, which is ever better. If I lost some double combat star super vet squad that needs a wheelbarrow to carry all it's medals, I'd seriously consider restarting the mission unless it was brutally hard. Unit experience and medals beat stupid achievements in modern games any day of the week.

And finally, I don't think anyone's ever praised GC1 for it's breathtaking storytelling. That's one way to play the game, especially effective with Crayven due to jaegers and artillery, scout out all high priority targets like guana turrets, templar squads, anti-air batteries (or in main base -> power generator), take them out with arty (or lone templars with attack aerodynes), proceed to mop up en masse.

However, reading the next point, I think you're doing it wrong. Now that's just silly. I don't think I've ever received mission failure due to my APC exploding, and even less having templars go straight for my APC (maybe it's because I always keep it in hold-fire mode, so it doesn't aggro any templars in range?).

Also, if you're getting trashed by ambushing templars, that just means you failed the strategy part. Recon is important in this game. You can't just roll out with 4x tank squads into a jungle valley and hope for the best.

The thing I love about GC1 that's it's really THE MOST STRATEGIC rts I've ever played, second to none. One stupid failure on your part, and the 20 minute mission you've been playing goes to sheit. This sounds like a failure to read the manual on your part (I think it's even mentioned in the boot camp, not sure though).

[i]"Units under attack will slow down and receive an accuracy penalty as it
becomes suppressed. Vehicles will “button up” and infantry will keep their
heads down. Light units can even suppress heavy units."[/i]

If you're referring to slow maneuvering (like turning around), it's pretty obvious a jaeger squad can maneuver faster than a 113-ton heavy terradyne. Makes sense. Just... what? Go for the objectives, the enemy will find YOU (if you don't find them first). Now this is a legitimate complaint than I can agree with, however, only partly.

Your own skill & unit formations play a major role in how well you can manage your units. If you didn't notice, your squads in the bottom are in the exact same order you loaded them into the dropships. That means if you have a jaeger squad in first slot of the first dropship, that squad will be the first squad down at the bottom (aka F1), etc...

When you move multiple units in a formation, the earliest unit in the F1-F2-F3 etc... stack will always be on the right side of the formation, and the last unit in the stack will be on the left. You will never get crossing squads if you keep this in mind when moving your units manually (and afterwards together).

Now I do agree with the bad pathfinding AI however, especially around obstacles (or moving the APC between two columns of units etc...). This is my number #1 flaw in the game. Which is why both ground controls rock, they're focused on unit strategy, not building a blob. Most 'RTS' games can't even be called RTS games, really... simply because there is no strategy involved. The plot in GC isn't the stuff of novels, but it's not that bad either. Really, you shouldn't even comment on the plot until you've finished all campaigns of both ground controls as well as the GC1 expansion. They all tie together. Ending of GC2 is like in the top #3 endings of all video games. Again, that's just complete fail of strategy on your part (weirdly, that's exactly what this game is all about), aerodynes are DEVASTATING in the RIGHT hands. I'm currently in Crayven mission 11 - 'Simple Escort Duty', and my two wings of attack aerodynes wasted ~80% of all enemy units, vast majority of them hoverdynes. Both racked up close to 40 kills. Totally useless.

Aerodynes also offer extreme flexibility & mobility, capable of fulfilling any role (hence leaving more room to play with other squads).

Recon aerodynes - huge view, great LOS (since they're flying), great perception (for spotting those templars you know), fly these babies over the enemy base with afterburner or anti-aa defense and make a mental note where everything important is (possible power generators, anti-air, guanas etc...), destroy with arty, have your attack/bomber aerodynes waste everyone and everything.

Fighter aerodynes - can handle air-defense if you're running with arties instead of ocelots. Can also be easily attached to attack/bomber aerodyne wings with the guard command for easy transport/defense.

Attack aerodynes - two wings of these rape all infantry, scout, light and medium hoverdynes in seconds. Can literally turn a losing battle into victory in a heartbeat. Can easily protect itself three times with the AA defense module should you run into AA-hoverdynes. Also great for taking out templars, they can't shoot back.

Bomber aerodynes - aerial version of artillery, also destroys heavy armor iirc (which is slow with attack aerodynes).

So no, air units are not useless, it's more like you never seem to get enough of them (since they appear late in the Crayven campaign). You just need to use proper tactics to make full use of them, especially since they cannot be repaired. If you're losing all your air units to AA, you're just playing badly. For a 12-year old game, the game has aged well. Even more so if the person who figured out widescreen would share how to do it.

Also gameplay > graphics. This isn't console crud.

wixxkruppel, I couldn't agree more. Everything Westenra said was utter crap. I don't even agree to the pathfinding issues - after all, look at the pathfinding of the Command & Conquer series, it's hardly any better.

Also, the story, while not being the stuff of a novel, is hardly that bad. During the course of the campaigns, it takes nice twists and turns and actually makes the people grow on you. I can't say anything about Parker's voice, other that the voice-acting in the German version being the epitome of atrocious - and they used the same "voice-actors" for GC2, which completely killed, no, annihilated the ending which you mentioned.

Sounds like the OP just sucks at RTSes.

Older RTSes in particular actually required some amount of skill and strategy to win.

Now now, no need to be an elitist about it. I found the game lacking, and you believe my perception is somehow incorrect. I respectfully disagree. I am not "playing the game wrong"; there is no "right way" to play a game, either it pulls you in or it doesn't, and GC utterly failed to "wow" me. While your rundown of the mechanics is adorable, it is also redundant; I think what you meant to say is that "it was good for it's time, but other games since have done it better, sorry you didn't enjoy it." I can't help my own evolved tastes, skewed by years of superior RTS mechanics, any more than this game can help its terrible technical shortcomings. I patiently completed a good portion of the game before coming to my conclusion, so obviously my lack of enjoyment does not stem from an inability to grasp the staggering strategic depths of pointing and clicking pixelated units around a synthetic battlefield.

As far as "naming one RTS with a good story," ahem, Starcraft would like a word with you. Or how about Company of Heroes? Or does that not count because, like Age of Empires, it's historically based? The first couple Command & Conquer games also spring to mind-- Not just superior stories, but superior games. The funky pathfinding wasn't a deterrent, it simply gave them a sense of a charm. World in Conflict is the game GC wishes it could grow up to be. That one is a prime example of how a game about small squad tactics can be challenging without making you feel like you're moving through molasses. Dawn of War 2, on that same note. Did you intentionally lead with your weakest defense?

Ground Control's missions are 100% seek-and-destroy scenarios with a few generic escort/retreat missions tossed in haphazardly, almost like they were afraid of alienating the player's attention span. So boring. Countless other RTS titles handle mission variety a hundred times better, and that you fail to fault GC on this count is either denial on your part or simply a lack of exposure to other, better games. Don't take my word for it; sales figures speak for themselves.

And um, I hate to break it to you, but the units in Ground Control do not level-up. There is absolutely no connection to your soldiers beyond the feeling of aplomb you get on one of the rare occasions they actually obey your orders without getting stuck on the terrain or each other. If they die, they are simply replaced with the exact same units with different names before the next mission. The only satisfaction that comes from preserving them is the knowledge that you won't have to play the entire boring mission over. Compare this to a good RTS where failure is an opportunity to try out new tactics. In Ground Control, failure only brings the weary realization that you were not strong enough to overcome the game's technical faults the first time around, and since they were too lazy to put in a save-game feature, you will have to do it all over again. I have been playing RTS for decades and the amount of forethought required to succeed in GC is infantile. I completed most of the missions on the first try with one hand tied behind my back, and I only ever lost because the computer rocket-rushed my APC at the very end. Since the APC is the only unit that can repair other units, it's not like you can just keep it tucked out of the way. There is no retreat key in Ground Control, a staggering oversight in a game like this. the APC must go TO the injured unit, forcing you to expose it to enemy fire, at which point they will RUSH it the first chance they get. These are FACTS of gameplay that you apparently overlooked while you were busy being a big man, nit-picking through my post. There may be such a thing as a "stupid failure", but only if you are speaking from your own life experience-- this game trolls, and it trolls hard.

There IS little-to-no difference in the turning speed of infantry versus vehicles. They are all equally slow, and equally react like chickens with their heads cut off when fired upon. The "pinning" effect is terribly implemented. The game engine is too insufficient to support such a high-brow concept as suppression and buttoning, and it comes off as hackneyed and annoying. This isn't WWII, this is Star Wars; my units should be buff and heroic as to suit my needs, not weaker and less responsive than technology that exists today.

The entirety of the "strategy" in GC comes from countering enemy units with the appropriate unit. At least they got that part right. Because of the variety of unit types, this requires you to gradually move everything you have as a single, giant mass toward your objective, rotating whatever unit is necessary to counter a threat to the outside and more vulnerable units to the inside. This is the *only* feasible way to play the game. One dropzone, one mass, artillery and anti-air in the back, etc. Splitting teams between multiple dropzones is a recipe for failure. Since the enemy does not have an equal force in size and strength, there is no point in taking on a single threat at a time with anything less than your ENTIRE FORCE, unless you want to watch your guys whittled down to nothing every time they encounter a single turret. And since there are NEVER more than one or two routes to an objective (the huge, open maps are misleading-- there is only ever a single valley or hillside that can be traversed in a reasonable fashion, albeit gratingly slow) what the game comes down to is repeatedly forcing the player into bottlenecks that chip away at their forces, turning the whole affair into a boring slog of inching forward cautiously until rocket infantry inevitably shows up and destroys your command APC. I lost count of the number of times this happened, but I do remember it was the reason for my mission failure 100% of the time-- never because all of my other units were destroyed, or because I mishandled a mission objective, but ALWAYS because of the command APC. The MOMENT it is targeted by enemy fire the mission is over-- the units in this game simply move too slowly to make any sort of viable withdrawal. Since the game lacks a coherent Fog of War-- enemy units are just invisible, until they're suddenly not-- intuition goes right out the window.

So if air units are so effective, why not make every unit in the game air-based? Why pound the ground at all when you can just spam bombers and fighters? Why even bother with game balance? It sounds like you've played the game before and already know where all the enemy positions are. Good for you. It also sounds like you are exaggerating. For me, managing air units was a tedious cycle of making sure they were faaaaaar out of the way while ground recon scouted out and destroyed enemy anti-air, and by then I've already gotten the enemy's full attention and am fully engaged on the ground. So what is the point of air units except as cannon fodder? They don't turn on a dime, they react nearly as sluggishly as everything else and enemy AA destroys them in seconds. Don't look to afterburners; enemy projectiles will follow you across the map. Air power was an afterthought, and frankly, it should have been left out entirely. No, it doesn't sound like I'm playing the game improperly so much as you are playing it disingenuously.

It's not an issue of skill and strategy, it's an issue of crappy game mechanics impeding my ability to express my skill and strategy. I cannot emphasize this enough. Now, this is what I want you to take away from this experience: your opinion is just that, your own, and all the feverish defense of the overly-idealized game you wish Ground Control to be will not change the fact that it failed for me, a long-time gamer and seasoned RTS afficionado.

Lastly: Graphics DO matter. I'm playing a computer game, not reading a book.

It's been a while since I uninstalled it but above all what stands out in my memory is how utterly BORING the game was; no love for presentation, context, music, or user interface. It's like the developers said "Alright, we've got a basic unit tree, some randomly generated terrain and a controllable camera. Throw in a lens flair and we'll ship it." My friend and I have a theory on why some older games stand out and some don't: They may have seemed new and exciting when they were released, but as time passes and better iterations on the formula emerge it becomes clear how simplistic and dumbed down they actually were. It's like when people say, "You had to be there." I might have found the game fresh and compelling when it was released, but unfortunately I only recently discovered Ground Control after having played dozens of newer, better games, with mechanics that the developers of GC simply lacked the imagination or foresight to implement. That's not really their fault, but it does make their game, at best, a used-up dinosaur.

I'll have to agree with Westenra on most points.

What the game had was a fresh take on the strategy field by dumping resource management, which is not inherently a wrong thing, but it didn't do it in the best way. The problem with taking out resource management is that you are effectively taking out half the standard gameplay experience with it, and had better be prepared to substitute it with something else to keep the player interested.
They did not do that however, and even managed to screw up the tactical aspect in the process.
The singleplayer game revolves around re-washing the same mission concept through the whole campaign, which quickly loses its' charm. Since the gameplay is constantly the same, the only things keeping you going are the storyline and getting new units to play with. That is probably why Westenra quit at the end of the Crayven campaign, since by that time you see everything the game has to offer you and the storyline just goes into a standard blandness of "we must stop the evil dudes from getting the alien weapon".
The gameplay is lacking simply because of the terrain. I know the developers intended to make bottlenecks so that your units couldn't be on par with the enemy units in front of them, but that just means the player has to micromanage the hell out of every advance through one of these bottlenecks, which as you imagine can't be very fun in the long run (the fact that 95% of the missions follow the same type isn't helping). Alternatively the game mechanics and squad AI could just be wholly wrong for the type of terrain the game is played on. You decide.

One good thing about this though, it's the game that set Massive Entertainment on the path to World in Conflict and that is surely worth something.

Myth: The Fallen Lords
Myth II: Soulblighter

They were Ground Control before Ground Control was cool. ;)

(Nothing against Ground Control - I adore any RTS that dumps resource management)

Westenra, I'm not sure that feeding a troll is a good idea, but just to give your miserable life the satisfaction that someone actually reacted to your rant: You basically blame GC for being one of the first non-standard base-building RTS games. For later games being better at certain, maybe even many aspects. You don't even bother playing it through to make an informed opinion, because having an informed opinion is just so uncool. Well, good luck with the rest of your life.

Should you ever finish the game, you can write up a summary and your thoughts on the story. Maybe I'll even bother to read that next rant. And maybe not.

I find the attitude of a couple of "defenders" here quite obnoxious. Is it his problem that you can't see games past their release date? He even acknowledged that he had been spoiled by newer and better games of the genre, but that shouldn't make the reasons for his disappointment invalid. On the contrary, that makes his points very valid indeed, as he has experience of games that did the various things better. And I suppose if you hate a game, you wouldn't even dream of criticizing it until you've played it through? What a delightfully butthurt-ridden attempt at sarcastic civility.

Dude, if *I* hate a game, I will do my best to write up a report with informed criticism, as compared to westenra's gibberish that's actually full of factual errors. There are very few games that I ever hated, but among those is TES: Oblivion. Back in the day I wrote a comment on Amazon and clearly stated what is lacking in this game (after having played it through), especially in the German version. I made an extra point to carefully check that all the things I mentioned are actually game issues, and not screw-ups made by me.

But if *you* don't know the difference between informed criticism and a mostly baseless opinionated rant... well, sorry, but then I can't really help you.

Cool story bro.

No, I think the problem here is that someone didn't appreciate the object of your fandom. Other games have and had done way better what Ground Control tried to do – that being slower-paced rts without base building – and you get annoyed when someone points it out.

Your contribution in this thread as contrasted by Westenra's detailed feedback as to why he was disappointed has been "He's talking shit, he's trolling, he didn't play through the whole the game so he doesn't know anything!" so you preaching about good criticism does have some comedy value to it.

Well, I hope you have learned something out of it. No, I did not detect any hint of sarcasm in your reply. ^^

You don't seem to have ever played the game, especially not back in the day. Yes, I worked through
the walls of text westenra uttered, and find such a huge list of factual errors that I find it to
be too much work to compile a full list of them. Just one thing, though (as it is the easiest to
disprove): Graphics.

Westenra actually complains about the graphics of Ground control. This is the most ridiculous
thing, as "back in the day" GC was one of the best looking (if not *the* best looking) 3D RTS
compared to anything that was on the market. True, it did not have te awesome uber kewl
live-action face-palm videos that the Westwood games had, but it didn't have their awkward
ugly 2D sprites.

Also, the graphics as a whole was a "complete package", with smoke/dust, tyre tracks,
beautiful lighting... well, who am I telling this, seeing that you clearly have played this
game on max settings. Just remember how cool it was to zoom in and out of the battlefield, to
watch artillery fire their guns *and eject shells*, and all the countless other loving
detail.

Sure, there are other games now that offer better graphics, better gameplay, a better story
(but really? Are there really so many games that tell a better story than GC, provided you
*have* played it from the first to the last mission, LOL)... but to write a fair review, you have
to consider the time GC was released in, and the things that set it apart from the other RTS games
of that time.

I did, and it was ok for its time because there wasn't a whole flood of better games in its category. Today it's an example of how the rts genre periodically sheds its skin and makes its older specimens more or less obsolete.

Like I already noted, you don't seem to be able to look at the game past its release date, which makes you criticize Westenra for not complying with viewpoint A when he explicitly wrote from viewpoint B (read the very first paragraph of this thread). It's fine and well to have fond memories of something, but new players to the series don't have nostalgia to help ease any shortcomings. If an rts game released today looked and played like Ground Control, it would get bashed to no end, and that is the fate of most early 3d rts games, and old 3d games in general.

Your C&C example is funny because the graphical style hasn't actually aged much thanks to its stylized 2d looks. What do fit into the "awkward and ugly" category are GC's textures, empty environments and heavy fog, not to mention the characters. GC's graphics are largely unimpressive to say the least, both æsthetically and technically, and that's a long way from being a "factual error".

So you bothered to give me just one example why Westenra was wrong and that example was quite bad. In addition, it was his least elaborated point that he only mentioned in passing. What about the massive number of factual errors in his points about the gameplay?

Cool, glad to see I'm not crazy and that other people agree with me. Like you folks I always do a lot of research before making purchases so I'm 99% sure I'm going to enjoy something when I buy it. GOG usually never steers me wrong. My personal catalog is a three way split between old games I remembered loving and still love, old games I remembered loving but suck now that I'm older, and old games I missed out on but am willing to take a chance on because of positive user ratings or because they are a genre I love, like FPS and RTS.

I can usually tell within the first few minutes of playing if I've made a mistake or struck gold. Ground Control was a unique case for me because I continued playing through thick and thin, despite early warning signs and the quick dissipation of the initial "WOW" factor-- despite some really disconcerting quirks in the training mission alone. Because all that hype couldn't be wrong, right? Many older games start slow and pick up later thus requiring a certain level of patience. Also, I liked some aspects of it-- the sound and voice work on individual units, neato artillery that bucks with each round, rounds that arc gracefully through the air. The rush of an old-school small-squad tactical point-and-click. Little things. As I said originally, the template for a decent game is in there.

So I kept playing, even after I had to restart the first mission because the victory script failed to activate, kept playing through the generic and uninspiring mission briefings, kept playing despite the gruelingly, excruciatingly slow pace and muted missions and story "points" dragging on and on and on with no music or creative combat scenarios, kept playing expecting some sort of magical or at least intriguing mid-to-late game plot twist or distinguishing gameplay mechanic. Why? Because commanding futuristic tank battles is inherently cool, and I wanted to give this game the benefit of the doubt.

But it turns out it's just a bad game, and never gets better. <<<My opinion.>>> The last straw for me was the inclusion of a mission-imperative vehicle, the Command APC, in every level. It's weak, it's slow, it's only benefit is it serves as a bunker for infantry and repairs other vehicles. But if it's destroyed, it's game over. In a game where you already have limited support and crap is getting blown up all over the place, that's called imbalance. Why not just include repair APC's as a usable vehicle? Boom, problem solved. But no, other popular games include hero units, so our game has to have one too! And when it gets destroyed, all the other tanks and soldiers and military units still operating in the field, no matter what they are doing or how close they are to completing the objective (or more often, having already completing the objective but en route to the extraction point thirty klicks away), all those dudes just, what, say "**** it, that one chick is dead", throw up their palms and surrender?

That makes sense.

And get destroyed that APC does. Man, oh man. The game *loves* to wait until you are inches away from victory, then swamp you with OP rocket infantry that happened to be passing by and come pouring out of the hills and surprise surprise, go right for your APC which happens to be in a vulnerable position right at that moment. Every time. I was an hour into that mission where you are sent in to take out New Dawn Command (like you are in every other mission), my units spread out at a fair pace doing their thing, covering each other, not a perfect pattern but it is a game designed for entertainment and should throw you a bone once a while, BAM, my APC is destroyed by rocket infantry that materialized from the netherworld and booked it for Sarah Jessica Parker.

No. No, no, no. If you think I'm going to crawl my way through another slog of a mission you have another thing coming! You had your chance Ground Control. You tricked me into delusions of a better game that never came. You disguised your imbalanced gameplay as "difficulty" for too long. Your fanbase tricked me into thinking you could deliver. Because of that, you achieved the rare accomplishment of making me post a negative review, which I almost never do.

Wixxkruppel's stuck-up reprisal pretty much disintegrated any appreciation I might have had for this game. I can almost smell the pizza face through my computer monitor.

So, how far have you played GC? What was your last mission?

And I'm really sorry, but I have mastered GC several times now (the last time about 5 years ago), and I can only say that you must clearly suck at this game. It does require getting used to, and it is hard and unforgiving, but the feeling of having finally, finally nailed that mission is... priceless.

By the way, the same goes for Homeworld (1). Bonebreakingly hard, but just as rewarding. And the cutscenes are better, or rather are there at all. That is the one aspect that GC did not excel at.

What other RTSs of that era have you enjoyed?