Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7638 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: THQ
• Released on: 2007-02-16
• Platform: Windows XP

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It may not be quite as famous as Command & Conquer or WarCraft, but for many real-time strategy connoisseurs, 1997’s Total Annihilation is more than a match for its better known rivals. This is the long awaited, unofficial, follow-up by Chris Taylor, creator of the original. As in Total Annihilation you don’t take the role of a nameless overseer, but instead you directly control a giant nanobot dispensing robot responsible for building all major buildings. From these are manufactured a dizzying array of specialised meachanoids, from infantry and artillery robots to repair droids and special construction bots.

The units in the original Total Annihilation ranged greatly in size but here the difference is profound. While many units are roughly human in scale others seem to be the size of a small village, as gigantic spider bots stroll through forests as if they were walking through tall grass. Aircraft carriers are just as massive and function properly as mobile cities with repair and production facilities. The game’s scale is reinforced even further by the new ability to zoom the camera so far out that individual units become icons on an overhead map. This is no gimmick though as you can still control multiple units on this new strategic scale, as well as deploy nuclear missiles and other weapons of mass destruction.

Total Annihilation’s superb waypoint system is replicated and improved here, allowing you to micromanage in exacting detail every movement of every unit. Patrol routes can be plotted out (as useful for repair units as for combat air patrols) as well as strategically circuitous routes around any terrain. All of which is perfect for fighting on multiple different fronts at once. After years of stasis the real-time strategy seems finally to be evolving to the next level.
HARRISON DENT

Manufacturer's Description:
In the 33rd Century, the old Earth Empire finally collapsed. As chaos engulfed the interstellar empire, the military, under the aegis of the Earth Command, stepped forward to restore order.

Acting in a severe and often draconian manner, Earth Command made the difficult decisions that politicians, mired in corruption and their own self-interest, could not. Entire worlds were abandoned, and much of the Quantum Gate network was intentionally destroyed in an effort to isolate the retreating Prime Worlds from the rest of the galaxy.

Despite the best efforts of the military, civil war erupted. After a hundred years, Earth Command was finally able to restore order and establish a new government, which was christened the United Earth Federation.

Risen, phoenix-like from the ashes of the old Earth Empire, the United Earth Federation vowed to purge itself of bureaucratic corruption and remain pure to a single task: the rescue of mankind's war-torn worlds and an end to the Infinite War. By any and all means necessary.

It has worked toward that goal by maintaining an iron grip on the new empire, creating a totalitarian government out of what might be considered the most successful military coup in human history.

Supreme Commander is the first ever RTS to deliver truly strategic as well as tactical gaming with an emphasis on scope as well as ease of use. Set in the 37th Century you command one of three races as the Supreme Commander with a single goal in mind - to end the 1000 year Infinite War and become the reigning power supreme.

Customer Reviews

Deep, absorbing, and fantastic
The spiritual successor to 1997's Total Annihilation.

Supreme Commander (SupCom) is an epic RTS game. However, do not attempt to compare it to the likes of Starcraft, Dawn of War or the Command and Conquer games.

SupCom relies on a true 3D engine - every unit, gunshot and missile has accurately calculated physics. Instead of the 2km x 2km maps that you get with C&C games, you're now playing on maps up to 81km x 81km. you're night fighting with 50 -100 units, your fighting with up to a thousand.

This is a breakthrough in RTS. It's one of the few games out there optimised for dual core processors, and if you are not yet running a Core 2 Duo, or an Athlon X2 you can expect to suffer on larger maps against more than one or 2 opponents. This game does not play nicely with old PC's so make sure you check the system requirements very carefully - notably anything older than a Geforce 6600 or an ATI 9500 do not support the Shader model 2.0 or Hardware Instancing that Supcom makes use of.

If your computer can handle it, and you like the idea of enourmously epic battles (which you can zoom in and out of at will, panning and tilting the camera) this game is for you. Supcom was designed with modding in mind, and has an inredibly strong modding community behind the game (as there was with Total Annihilation). Already we are beginning to see new maps, units and gameplay mods being released. This game will only get better with time.

Don't expect to play it on the highest settings on the biggest maps for some time to come - this is a game designed for the hardware of the future.

Epic strategy gaming at its best
Anyone who has played Total Annihilation will quickly recognize the hallmarks of the people behind that game when they play Supreme Commander. In my opinion that is no bad thing. Indeed, the successful structure of Total Annihiliation was a winning formula that has gained a dedicated following to this day.

The game revolves around two resources - mass and energy, and you must find the right balance between expanding the production of these resources and expanding your armies to crush your opponents. Whilst this sort of thing may be a tedious drag in many RTS games - it isn't really the case here. Most of the time you are directing your forces in battle or choosing which forces to build next rather than watching over your resource gathering buildings.

Battles themselves can be epic in scale, with 1000+ units on the map not completely uncommon, depending on your settings, and things get really fun when nuclear missiles start flying and giant experimental units start tearing bases apart. There is plenty of choice when building units, especially if you choose a good map with some potential for naval battles too. Perhaps a little more variety between the 3 factions' units might have been nice, as your strategies for winning are more or less the same for each. That sort of thing could be improved in an add-on (along with a map editor).

There isn't much to criticise about Supreme Commander, but there are a few minor niggles that should be mentioned. The audio side of things isn't great - with battles going on without really stirring up much in the way of sound effects (which kills some of the game's atmosphere). The AI can be lacking slightly - with units sometimes failing to respond to units well within line of sight, and sometimes enemy units have to be right up close before they appear to you as anything other than a radar blip. Also the game does demand a fairly powerful PC in order to run smoothly. But those factors haven't really spoiled the enjoyment of the game for me, and I'm still giving it a 5.

From slow woah!
At first I really didn't care much for this game, it seemed slow and I the singleplayer wasn't to fun, but then I decided the give the game a bit more time as I had heard their was a great deal to the game. I started playing the skirimish mode and online and WOW, their were way more units available to me in online/skirmish mode including the ultra units that were not in most of the single player part of the game (along with many other units) the game is very intense and loads of fun, the better I am becoming the more fun the game is getting as the better you get the speed picks way up, in fact their doesn't seem to be a limit, the games speed is completely dependent on you level of knowledge on the game. So while it may seem slow to you when you first start this will quickly change.

The game runs great on my 3200+ XP 1 Gig Geforce 6600GT and the game will run fine on any PC bought/built within the last 2 years really. I'm not sure why some report slow downs, I think most of the time it is due to people unwilling to turn down the graphics, some people apparently are unwilling to run the game on lower settings, but my 2 year old computer runs this game silky smooth on low/med settings.

Another thing that sets Supreme Commander apart is the use of air and sea, in the RTS games out that have air and sea, they really are after thoughts. You will have one or 2 air units at most a factions and you will rarely see any see units, in Supreme Commander they have put just as much focus on the air and sea as they have the land units. Furthermore their are many different formations for land, air and sea units so you can keep your armies very well organized!

Each faction also has 3 very unique gigantic experimental units.

Ranging from a enormous Independence Day like Flying Saucer with the blue laser of death and all, to a Giant Spider with a freaking laser beam on his back. To a Submarine aircraft carrier that can literally hold over 100 air units!

Supreme Commander has it's short comings, the Single player story isn't that great and the levels can look a bit bland on the bigger maps due to technological limitations of the time, you just can't make maps that big right now and pump them full of decorations. The game also has a big learning curve and even can appear slow paced at first when you don't know how to play. Despite these short comings the gameplay Supreme Commander brings is more intense, deeper and all and all more fun then really any RTS game ever made, this really is a revolution of epic proportions and is a MUST buy for anyone who considers themselves a fan of the RTS genre.