Modders have recreated much-loved 2003 real-time strategy game Command & Conquer Generals in the Red Alert 3 engine.

Command & Conquer: Generals Evolution, which released last week in beta form, certainly captures the feel and atmosphere of the original within the better-looking 2008 RTS Red Alert 3. The modders have ported almost every unit from the original game, and added some new units "to spice up gameplay a bit". You can download Command & Conquer: Generals Evolution now from Moddb.

The video below, from YouTube channel DeathMetalMarine PCMR, shows a skirmish on max settings.

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Now that everyone else has had their turn to celebrate the season with cheap games, Humble has decided it's their time to have a go and see things out with their End of Summer Sale. I'll take anything that suggests we're nearer to the end of 2020 right now.

And what better distraction is there than more games? Especially if they remind us of simpler times. Enter the Command & Conquer Remastered Collection for just £5.93. For a game that launched back in June to be this heavily discounted by 67 per cent already is quite something.

This bundle of RTS classics features fully-remastered versions of both Command & Conquer and Red Alert (plus expansion packs) with 4K graphics, reworked music, upscaled FMVs, improved UI, modern online features and in-built mod support. Altogether, Digital Foundry called it one of the greatest remasters of all time, so definitely don't skip it at this price. As a heads up, this is an Origin key and not a Steam key.

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I think it's fair to say Command & Conquer Remastered Collection was a resounding success. EA's nostalgia-fuelled real-time strategy revival was a hit with fans and critics alike when it launched in June - and it saw big sales on Steam. But as its developers continue to support the game with balance updates, tweaks and mod support, the inevitable question is this: what's next for Command & Conquer?

I've seen plenty of requests for EA to continue to work with the developers at Petroglyph Games and Lemon Sky Studios on more remasters of classic C&C games. It seems natural for EA to tackle Tiberian Sun and Red Alert 2 next. But I also wonder whether the success of Command & Conquer Remastered Collection, which, let's be honest, is the first good thing to happen to the franchise in a decade (Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight, Command & Conquer: Tiberium Alliances, Command & Conquer: Generals 2 and mobile game Command & Conquer Rivals all failed in various ways) means the powers that be at EA may now consider the time right to invest in a new, fully-fledged Command & Conquer game.

When I recently interviewed EA producer Jim Vessella, who led the Command & Conquer remastered project, to ask why the developers left in a 25-year-old exploit, I thought it would be a good chance to quiz him on what's next, where the Command & Conquer franchise finds itself, and the future of the RTS genre.

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One of the brilliant things about Command & Conquered Remastered is how it remains faithful to the original real-time strategy classic while updating it in all the right areas.

But one area the developers left alone was a 25-year-old exploit. You'd think they'd want to fix it - but not this one, because it gave players a fighting chance against the rock hard AI.

I'm talking about Command & Conquer's infamous sandbag exploit - aka the best strategy against the AI on the hardest missions.

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Kane lives! 25 years after he first played the Brotherhood of Nod boss in real-time strategy game Command & Conquer, Joe Kucan has reprised his role to mark today's release of Command & Conquer Remastered Collection.

Kucan, who seems impervious to the passage of time, appears in the fun video, below, to deliver a message to Command & Conquer fans who, if they have anything about them, will all be playing Brotherhood of Nod.

Kucan last played Kane 10 years ago in Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight. The series has been on something of a hiatus since then, despite ill-advised revivals from EA, but the Command & Conquer Remastered Collection looks like the real deal. It's developed by Petroglyph Games, which was founded by some of the people who made the original at the shuttered Westwood Studios. Expect more from Digital Foundry soon.

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The developer of the upcoming Command & Conquer remaster re-hired the voice actor behind the game's announcer to re-record her lines after the original audio tapes were lost.

Developer Petroglyph, which was founded by ex-Westwood staff after EA shut the studio down back in 2003, brought Kia Huntzinger in to re-record her dialogue for announcer EVA.

Any Command & Conquer fan will be familiar with EVA's A.I. dialogue, which notified you when units were lost, the enemy was attacking and, of course, when silos were needed. Here's a reminder of Kia Huntzinger's work for the original real-time strategy classic:

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You'd be forgiven for missing it, but ex-Westwood Studios developers quietly announced a spiritual successor to Command & Conquer: Renegade this month.

Petroglyph Games is the Los Angeles-based studio founded by the last group of ex-Westwood employees who left when EA shut what remained of the Command & Conquer developer down in 2003.

Petroglyph has released a number of real-time strategy games over the years, including Star Wars: Empire at War, Rise of Immortals, Grey Goo and, most recently, Conan Unconquered.

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EA has released the first gameplay clip of Command & Conquer Remastered - and lovely it looks indeed.

The 28 second video thrusts us right into the action, with a GDI assault on a NOD base. There are tanks, explosions and screams. Units are lost and silos are needed.

The video begins with the original visuals then transitions to the new, remade visuals, which are, as you'd expect, a lot sharper.

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Looking back on the real-time strategy boom of the late 90s, it's unsurprising that modern audiences tend to celebrate Age of Empires, Starcraft and Warcraft. Beyond being great games, these titles also told stories that feel unproblematic. They are set in either the distant past, the distant future or in the distant recesses of our minds. The Command & Conquer series, however, played with a parallel version of the real world heavily influenced by post-Cold War international relations. In 1999 Westwood Studios took that plausible real-world setting further with Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun.
Set in 2030, Tiberian Sun asks two difficult but important questions: are we better off if the "good guys" win? And, is this version of Earth, on the verge of ecological disaster, even worth fighting over? These questions, like the game's FMV sequences, could easily be laughed off by players in the halcyon days of the 1990s. Players in 2019, however, must wonder if Tiberian Sun represents a schlocky relic of a bygone era or a prescient prediction of an impending reality.

The first Command & Conquer, released in 1995, didn't just reflect post-Cold War international relations, it was enthusiastic about them. Although you could play through the campaign as either the Global Defense Initiative (GDI) or the Brotherhood of Nod, only the GDI victory was considered canon. And what kind of message did the GDI victory impart on players in the mid-90s? A Western led, United Nations-sanctioned multilateral force using superior technology destroys an anachro-terrorist cult led by a charismatic madman based in the Third World in order to secure control over precious energy resources. The game might as well have been called The Gulf War, but with alien crystals. Or, with a more succinct 90s twist, The Gulf War: Part Deux.

All kidding aside, there's a real earnestness to the depiction of the world in Command & Conquer. Coming out of the Cold War, GDI represents a real hope held by many in the West in the 1990s for a return to the old idea of collective security first explored by the League of Nations in the Interwar Period. What if international peacekeepers had the power to actually maintain peace and spread freedom? What if dictators like Saddam Hussein, or his fictional stand-in Kane, could be swiftly dealt with through cooperation rather than the grandstanding, acrimonious and often pointless politics of the UN Security Council? You could rightly argue this sort of idea represents nothing more than a neoliberal dream, best consigned to the waste bin of history. But in a world not yet burdened by the War on Terror or the Iraq War, such dreams were seen by many as not only worthwhile, but desirable.

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EA has announced that its recently revealed Command & Conquer remasters are to be helmed by Petroglyph Games, a developer founded by key members of the original C&C team at the long-defunct Westwood Studios.

EA's Command & Conquer PC remasters were first introduced back in October, following the community's angry reaction to Command & Conquer: Rivals, the publisher's free-to-play RTS mobile game. At the time, EA producer Jim Vessella assured fans that, "we heard you loud and clear: the...community also wants to see the franchise return to PC."

Now, writing in a new post to the Command & Conquer subreddit, Vessella has confirmed that EA's remaster programme will begin with Command & Conquer: Tiberian Dawn, Command & Conquer: Red Alert, and expansion packs Covert Ops, Counterstrike, and Aftermath. These will be bundled into a single remastered collection, with no micro-transactions to be found.

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