Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 Preview

C&C has been around for some time and EA continues to invest into the popular franchise. After excellent games such as Command & Conquer: Generals and Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars, as well as the recent add-on C&C 3: Kane's Wrath, EA started developing C&C: Red Alert 3. The game is now very close to release. Before it hits stores though, we took the opportunity to chat a bit with the development team to learn more about the project and what makes it unique on the crowded scene of real-time strategies.

Thanks to producers Amer Ajami and Greg Kasavin (that's right, former GameSpot Editor-in-Chief) we were able to get lowdown on RA 3, covering topics such as development history, community, the game's engine, AI, co-op play, specific factions and more.

ActionTrip: When did you guys first decide you were going to make Red Alert 3?

Amer Ajami: It all depends on who you ask, really. A good number of people on our team worked on Red Alert 2 and Yuri's Revenge, so those guys were clamoring to do the sequel for a number of years. Likewise, many other of our team members consider the Red Alert games as one of their favorite RTS franchises of all time, so the excitement around a potential third game in the series has been brewing for a long time. A core group of guys split off from our team and started working on Red Alert 3 as an exploratory exercise at the tail end of The Battle for Middle-earth's development cycle back during the start of 2005. Not a lot came out of that initial push, since we all had to jump on The Battle for Middle-earth II, and then were presented with a chance to develop Command & Conquer III: Tiberium Wars. As development on C&C3 began winding down early last year, the team eagerly started pitching ideas for the next Red Alert 3 - some of those ideas having been based on the 2005 experiment - and the project began in earnest shortly thereafter.

AT: Sure, Red Alert 3 has a strong fan base, but real-time strategies are becoming increasingly overshadowed by modern-day action games and casual games. How do you see this one appealing to casual gamers?

AA: Command & Conquer games have millions upon millions of fans worldwide. The series has done a lot to gain the attention (and affection) of mainstream gamers in the last decade or so, and that's no small feat considering the somewhat hardcore nature of the RTS genre. Of the three distinct universes that fall underneath the Command & Conquer umbrella, Red Alert has always had the most mainstream appeal due to its light-hearted tone, unique style, and relative accessibility when compared to other RTS games. Certainly, Red Alert 3 continues that tradition on all three fronts. Just look at our cinematics, for instance. The Red Alert 3 cast is arguably the greatest collection of Hollywood talent in any game to date - that'll make anyone sit up and take notice. And yet the game still has the competitive and fast-paced gameplay that our more competitive members of the community demand, while still introducing new and exciting concepts like the cooperative campaign to keep things fresh.

AT: RA 3 looks great right now, as revealed in the recently released trailers. Are you using an improved version of the Sage engine?

AA: Sort of. You probably know by now that Sage was originally developed concurrently for Command & Conquer Generals, and then updated with incremental improvements for several of the RTS games that our team has released since. While Red Alert 3 is no exception, the changes that Sage has undergone in service of this project are pretty extensive. We adopted a brand new rendering engine that can take advantage of the current consoles' architecture in a much more efficient manner than our previous renderer could, and it enabled us to implement the new water technology that is such an important part of Red Alert 3's gameplay. There were also a number of other significant changes that happened under the hood to keep our engine competitive with other RTS games during the course of development. So, yes, while the game is driven by many of the underlying components of the Sage that we know and love, there have also been a lot of changes to that engine.

AT: What is the best aspect of having to play Red Alert 3 in co-op? Tell us a bit about how it works.

Greg Kasavin: Knowing you can experience every mission of all three campaigns in Red Alert 3 alongside another player is pretty exciting all on its own, though the moment-to-moment gameplay tends to be the best part. The way it works is, prior to any campaign mission, you have a choice of whether to play solo or cooperatively with a friend. In either case, the content of the mission is similar, but the experience will be quite different depending on that choice. You can play through all the missions by yourself, with the help of one of our nine co-commander characters. These guys should help make the solo experience very interesting for those who prefer a traditional single-player campaign or don't always have a friend ready to play at every waking moment.

As for co-op, while some missions require players to collaborate in specific ways, in other cases players are free to combine their starting resources and favorite tactics as they see fit. Players' starting locations and preferred units naturally factor into their co-op tactics quite a bit, and we often find players gravitating toward certain roles or objectives even when a mission doesn't strictly require them to split their attention in any particular way. Seeing all these types of tactics emerge during co-op play was rewarding during the game's development, so we think players will get really creative when playing in co-op. The best part may be that co-op play adds a completely new dimension to the campaigns, making for a lot of added replay value on top of a lengthy single-player experience.