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TA is the only game I consciously went out to buy a faster machine to play. Upgrading from my 133MHz to a 400MHz so I could run more units in TA.

I rarely played TA vs other people. It was always either the PvE scenarios, or skirmishes.

Against multiple AIs I would strive to take out several of them, leaving one time to build up. Then the game would quickly devolve into "hose on hose" combat where my automatic production with bottomless resources would push out toward the oncoming bot army fueled by their infinite resources.

You could see on the large map how well you were doing based on how close the hose front of clashing machines was to whose base. But that was necessary to open up space to create special armies and other techniques to get around the hose, and flank the base.

All while being blasted to splinters by bots and Berthas and Brawlers and everything else.

But get a good Goliath drop into the rear, and it's just glorious spectacle.

The whole thing, in the end, was spectacle. The sounds, the shrapnel, the rocking of the maps when some wandering commander would wander into the wrong area. Like getting winged by a far off Bertha and giving chase to enact revenge upon it.

And a special Flea scenario is hilarious fun.

Loved that game.

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I set a scenario against multiple AIs on the large metal map. The only way to survive was to quickly construct barriers between the buildings to seal off your base because the AIs weren't programmed to destroy barriers. Then came the job of hunting down the AI commanders (I played killing the commander kills all of his units otherwise it was impossible to win).

Great game!

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You know, just the other day I dropped back into RA3 for a few hours and left wondering why they set every map up so that everyone runs out of resources 15 minutes in as the collectors go empty, so nobody can really do much. Makes for battles that are really limited in scope for seemingly no reason.

Hose vs. hose sounds epic af.

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I really enjoyed TA back in the day. And I still remember the fantastic music background which dynamically changed if you went into battle. Starcraft was released after and it looked so ancient compared to TA in my view. But all my friends played SC at the time so it took over.
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I always love RTS games and am sad to see how they've largely disappeared.

some of my first experiences 'hacking' were modifying .ini files for command and conquer to make a new version of the game for my friends. it was... very unbalanced

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Not to mention "Buy 1 game, 2 OTHERS can play against/with each other for free"
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I had the most intense battles with my brother, even well into our 30s when we only met a few times a year.

It is sad that there never really was a successor that was as good. They could have lifted the 255 units limit, made the game more balanced, added a few more maps and units (but not too many), enhace the graphics (but keep it 2.5D, I do not want 3D in this kind of games) and make connectivity easier.

Cavedog released a fantasy game after that, which I wanted to like, but it was crap. And the Command & Conquer games were never for me. Tried them but never felt them.

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Supreme Commander was that follow up. Basically the same team as worked on TA, making more or less the same game but with larger maps and higher unit counts.
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I've got it. For me, I can't hope to beat the AI using low tech spam to grab wide open resources. But when resources aren't to scattered I almost always win against the AI.
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