Total Annihilation Reviewed by Alex van Kaam on P200 Let's first start with the System Requirements.... System requirements: Pentium 100Mhz 16 Mb RAM 4x CD-ROM DirectX compatible sound and video card Microsoft compatible Mouse Windows 95 Modem, serial cable, or network card is required for multiplayer. Recommended system: Pentium 133Mhz or greater 24 Mb RAM 4x CD-ROM DirectX compatible sound and video card Microsoft compatible Mouse Windows 95 Modem, serial cable, or network card is required for multiplayer. The game may install without a sound card but it will not run properly. Total Annihilation is the next step after Command and Conquer, a fast and easy to learn Combat Strategy game. After installing the game and watching the introduction the first few things you will notice are that 1) it's all robots and 2) there is not really a good or a bad side... Long ago, the galaxy had known peace. Paradise was ruled with the hand of science, and the hand was that of the galactic governing body known as the Core. Ironically, it was the ultimate victory, the victory over death itself, that brought about the downfall of its Paradise and started the war that would decimate a million worlds. The process, which was called "patterning," involved the electronic duplication of brain matrices and allowed the transfer of consciousness into durable machines. Effectively it meant immortality, and the Core decreed the process mandatory for all citizens in order to ensure their safety. There were many who were unwilling to toss aside their bodies so casually, many indeed who regarded patterning as an atrocity. They fled to the outer edges of the galaxy, where they banded together to form a resistance that became known as the Arm. War began, though it was never officially declared by either side. The Arm developed high-powered combat suits for its armies, while the Core transferred the minds of its soldiers directly into similarly deadly machines. The Core duplicated its finest warriors thousands of times over. The Arm countered using cloning. The war raged on for more than 4,000 years, consuming the resources of an entire galaxy and leaving it a scorched wasteland. Both sides lay in ruins. Their civilisations had long since vanished, their once vast military complexes were smashed. Their armies were reduced to a few scattered remnants that continued to battle on ravaged worlds. Their hatred fuelled by millennia of conflict, they would fight to the death. For each, the only acceptable outcome was the complete and utter annihilation of the other. Long ago the galaxy had known peace, and it would soon know peace again. Your job is to become the commander of either Arm or Core and finish this war once and for all. Once you choose your side you will get a small introduction for your 1st mission, no big movies like in Command and Conquer, just a simple briefing in text and real voice (very clear and atmospheric). Then the real game starts. Since you are a robot, and all the Kbots, Planes, Ships and Buildings you create are made of iron and energy, you ravage each planet you come to of its natural resources. This is well "supported" by the background music, sad symphonies that really make clear there is nothing "great" about this war and what it does to all the planets... The graphics will really astonish you, all the Kbots, Planes etc. etc. are made in 3D, and it shows, you walk under trees, a Kbot walking up a hill will tilt, Kbots can't look over trees, tanks slow down going up hill, cannons will shoot against high hill tops if their target is just behind the hill. Once you build a few Solar Panels for energy and you've located some metal deposits to build your metal extractor on, you can start building Kbot factories or Vehicle plants. Each level starts with the commander (you) and maybe a few tanks or construction bots. As the commander you can build some basic structures like Kbot Lab, Laser canon, Radar, Solar Panel, Metal Extractor, Airfield, Shipyard, Vehicle Plant. More buildings become available as you get deeper into the game. Once you have your basic structures build you can create say a Construction Kbot, who can then create an Advance Kbot Lab where you create a Level 2 Construction Kbot who can then create huge power plants.... the same goes for all the factories, you start off with level 1 and as you develop more you get the option to create a factories of a higher level. All the enemies or your own Kbots that are killed in combat can be recycled, sometimes this is the only way for you to survive in the early stages of a level.... if your battle ships sink the battle ship of the enemy you can send the commander to it and he will extract the metal from the ship..... 1700 units from 1 ship can often mean the difference between wining or losing, especially if you only have 1 metal extractor that turns out 6 units and you need 1000 units for a good cannon.... Similarly, like metal, you can extract energy from living organisms like tree or bushes... there is nothing glorious about what you are doing...if you want you can start a big forest fire, burn down all the forests... it causes damage to any enemy units in there at that point, so why not All in all it is a great game, play it on easy level and you will enjoy yourself immensely, some levels will still take you 2 to 3 hours, play it on hard and you will be playing one level for days!!!! As you continue in the game you capture Galactic Gates that allow you to reach other planets and get closer and closer to the enemy's home planet... Each planet has its own characteristics, some have lots of wind, so a wind generator is great here, some are just junk yards used by the enemies, so metal enough to be found, some planets are water planets, ships are the way to wage war then while other planets have meteor storm and always seem to hit your power plants, slowing down the progress on your other building because of an energy shortage. As with all modern games it comes with Network capability, for up to 10 players, IF you have 64MB of memory... Since I don't have a network I can't comment on this, but I can imagine it being great fun... There are not many movies in the game, even the end movie is just 15 seconds... but it's enough... to see your Arm Commander standing on top of the huge Core Computer, the whole area around him devastated... So to conclude this review I think I can best use a conversation between Sue and me a week ago.. Alex: Total Annihilation is a Command and Conquer clone. Sue: There is an add-on for Command and Conquer. Alex: Ha, who needs that when there is Total Annihilation! - o -