EA, the studio behind the popular real-time strategy game Command & Conquer: Tiberian Dawn and Red Alert, will be releasing the source code for the said games alongside the Remastered Collection next month.
According to an announcement posted on Reddit by Jim Vessella, EA Producer – “Today we are proud to announce that alongside the launch of the Remastered Collection, Electronic Arts will be releasing the TiberianDawn.dll and RedAlert.dll and their corresponding source code under the GPL version 3.0 license. This is a key moment for Electronic Arts, the C&C community, and the gaming industry, as we believe this will be one of the first major RTS franchises to open source their source code under the GPL. It’s worth noting this initiative is the direct result of a collaboration between some of the community council members and our teams at EA. After discussing with the council members, we made the decision to go with the GPL license to ensure compatibility with projects like CnCNet and Open RA. Our goal was to deliver the source code in a way that would be truly beneficial for the community, and we hope this will enable amazing community projects for years to come.” You can read the complete announcement on Reddit.
So what does this mean for us casual gamers? Well, to put things in a simpler perspective, this means that modders will be able to design maps, create custom units, replace art, alter gameplay logic, and edit data. Which can drastically change the game from the way we have seen it.
As an example of the possibilities that can potentially happen, Petroglyph, developer of the remastered collection, has actually created a new modded unit to play with called Nuke Tank.
Nuke Tank came into play when the Brotherhood of Nod captured a Mammoth Tank. This is a fully playable unit in the game via a mod and it can do devastating damage.
However, not all went well. EA originally planned on developing the said games with LAN support but the development for LAN support requires actual testing via LAN. The studio mentioned that it became very challenging to do so since they might face legal issues in regard to “Social Distancing” amidst the threat of COVID-19.
Unfortunately, EA had to drop the development for now and will keep the LAN support at the top of their priority list.
Workshop & Platform
EA will be taking advantage of Steam and Origin in this matter for the PC platform. There is no confirmation yet if the remastered collection will be available for PlayStation 4 or Xbox One. However, it would be great if the remastered collection will be available for the Nintendo Switch platform.
For Steam users, Steam Workshop will work on both maps and mods. Players can also subscribe to maps and mods directly in the game’s community hub within Steam. Added to that, players can also utilize the in-game menus to browse, download, and install contents as well. For Origin users, it will be the same in-game process for downloading maps. The only difference will be the need to manually install mods into their respective folders outside the game. Once you’re in the game, players will be able to navigate to the Options / Mods tab to enable/disable mods.
Command & Conquer Franchise
If you’re new in this game, the Command & Conquer franchise is a set of RTS games produced by Westwood Studios and released by Virgin Interactive Entertainment in 1996. EA later then acquired Westwood Studios in 1998 and rendered Command & Conquer: Red Alert freeware.
EA now remastered the game and is available for pre-order in Steam. The game is set to launch this coming June 6 and both Command & Conquer and Red Alert are both remastered in 4K by the former Westwood Studios team members.
Command & Conquer Remastered Collection PC System Requirements
For the best experience a Ryzen 7 1700 or i5 4690K processor and Radeon HD 7850, GTX 660, or DirectX 11 compatible video card are recommended.
Minimum PC Requirements
- OS: Windows 8.1 or 10
- Processor (AMD): Athlon 64 X2 4600 @ 2.4ghz or better
- Processor (Intel): Core 2 Duo E4600 @ 2.4ghz or better
- Memory: 4 GB
- Graphics Card (AMD): Radeon HD 5570 or equivalent
- Graphics Card (Nvidia): GT 420 or equivalent
- DirectX: 11 compatible video card or equivalent
- Multiplayer Online Connection Requirements: Broadband internet connection
- Hard Drive Space: 32 GB
Recommended PC Requirements
- OS: Windows 8.1 or 10
- Processor (AMD): Ryzen 7 1700
- Processor (Intel): i5 4690K
- Memory: 4 GB
- Graphics Card (AMD): Radeon HD 7850 or equivalent
- Graphics Card (Nvidia): GTX 660 or equivalent
- DirectX: 11 compatible video card or equivalent
- Multiplayer Online Connection Requirements: Broadband internet connection
- Hard Drive Space: 32 GB
