Total Annihilation

The Good
Total Annihilation... when I first saw it, I thought it was just another C&C clone. But when I played more, I discovered that it was... well... more. The game feels good to play and there is great atmosphere of war. War with really big W. This War is played in future, and guns are now big. Really big. Graphics and sound are also very good. Units are polygon based and they look awesome. And the sound of distant explosions feels awesome. This could be the best rts-game ever.

The Bad
Unfortunately, there are millions of problems in the game. The worst is that both sides have almost identical units. There are a few differences, but changing the name and graphic doesn't make a new unit. Another problem is the resource system - the resources are virtually infinite, and if you can get enough resource input, you can, for example, put a factory creating about 100 tanks and drive them to the enemy base. Then the game balance - first it seems good. Nukes can be stopped by anti-nuke missiles, so they won't define the outcome. But then we have these cannons that can shoot from one corner of the map to another. Balanced? And the airplanes... at least they are now useful, unlike in other games, but why they must be better than land units? In a generic mission land units are for defense only - air force handles the attacking. And let's speak about defense a little more. The units can't attack what they don't see. That should be great. But radar display can be used to target and attack units unseen. So if you haven't got a few airplanes to scout out the enemy units, you'll be toast in no time. Then the difficulty level. There are missions that are way too hard. And they are not the last missions - Arm mission 8, and Core mission 6 are particularly annoying, but Arm mission 9 is then one of the easiest missions in the game. Also, most of the missions are your ordinary "destroy all opposition" missions, except a few "destroy everything but this or you'll die" missions. And "destroy all" missions tend to last long. You see, airplanes may temporarily fly out of the map - and stealth planes don't show on the radar. I, for example played a mission through in 1,5 hours. The last 30 minutes were only seeking that damn plane.

The Bottom Line
Total Annihilation had everything it needs to create awesome game, better than anything before... but it failed. It isn't a bad game, but I prefer Tiberian Sun.

The Good
The game offers a wide variety of naval and plane units. Ground units are represented by vehicles and Kbots, Kbots represent infantry. The unfortunately legendary tank rush of red alert is not repeated in this game, one unit can't survive on a attack of its own. Mobile artillery can't shoot a close range but is essential for support. The heaviest tanks such as the penetrator, bulldog and goliath need support of they get taken out by the long range cannons (big bertha/intimidator), planes are needed to take these out, early units have to be reused to draw fire off of the bigger tanks. The units are well balanced and the music while in combat gives a adrenaline rush.

The Bad
When the game is nearly at its end and two stealth planes are flying around and they have to be killed to attain victory it can be very annoying.

The Bottom Line
Yes it has stood the test of time and I still play it today with the downloadable units and good expansion packs. Also programs which allow you to make your own maps and units and profile your own AI are present on the taus.tadesigners.com site.

GET IT.

The Good
This game was one of the first games I brought totally for myself, a very selfish thing to do yes, but everyone who has played TA will know why. When you've created your base, and got things going it becomes your baby, your child, you watch it grow and over come the bad times, see it develop through the good times, and kick some ass. When you can upgrade and get better planes, bots, vehicles, weapons, you rejoice, and yet you keep the older, more relyable technology, the stuff that has seen off everything the enemy has thrown at you. You know you can rely on it, and it won't let you down. As you progress through the missions, you see your family of colonies grow and kick serious ass, you relish the opportunity to try out your latest weapon in combat, and watch it wipe the floor with any opponant it faces. Playing TA isn't playing a game, you are the commander, watching over the whole invasion of the universe. If you haven't guessed I feel really strongly about this game, anyone who doesn't like this game hasn't played it properly.

The Bad
I didn't like the fact that the game ended, and the fact that TA Kingdoms looked so damn right crap.

The Bottom Line
GO AND GET THIS GAME RIGHT NOW!!! IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY, WHY THE HELL NOT???? The possiblitlies with this game are massive, there are loads of bolt-ons for it on the net, and you can play online, what more do you want??