Interview with Sean Decker for EA Russia

[Cypher[CS]]

muJe, while the design of RA3 was silly (on purpose), it's gameplay was superb.

[mujE]

muJe, while the design of RA3 was silly (on purpose), it's gameplay was superb.

Sure the Game mechanics were good like Zero Hour, I'm just talking about the game overall.

Yuri's Revenge was when the CnC label actually had some respect, check this out, the Iraqi Desolator:
deso.jpg

Red Alert 3 Iraqi desolator LOL:
command-and-conquer-red-alert-3-desolator-1_HTC_VIVID.jpg

Dude you know what was once a respectable game was turned into a joke overnight. I don't agree with comedy or childishness of it. For some people Yuri's Revenge or Red Alert 2 was too comedic. I do agree with that opinion also. I want very serious game, something that can actually be respectable.

[mujE]

Enough with Red Alert 3.
@topic.

Q1: Why is the video in Russian?

Q2: So wait a minute there is no more "Generals 2" but now simply "Command and Conquer."

I wonder what more surprises EA has in store for us, because the game is supposed to come out in 2013.

[mirza044]

I loved ra3. ra2 and yr was great but they were both cartoony..it was fine for me since redalert always had that feel..ra3 had great graphics which carried on the theme of the previous game. Even with it's funny nerdish er-nu style the core mechanics was there and gameplay was good.

You're sure about that? Think again.

[Borreh]

... two factions?

What?

[oompah]

muJe, while the design of RA3 was silly (on purpose), it's gameplay was superb.

Red Alert 3 was an excellent multiplayer game - actually for how diverse the three sides were the balance was not broken - after thousands of hours of playing I've ever heard a theme that any one side was stronger than another - there are specific situations and meta game arguments but overall RA3 was a really super game. Where it failed was online support (gamespy - joke) and patching, there were some decent bugs that never were fixed: like boats getting stuck on the coast, the soviet build, sell spam to block attacks, the misclick bug, etc...

RA3 had some design issues that turned people off like dog/bear barracks locking and resource spot squatting, plus the soviet terror drone was a deal breaker for a lot of new players etc...

That game was actually a phenomenal piece of game play design and engineering though overall

[EA_CIRE]

Let's get in here to clarify some things:

- Sean Decker's answer actually hit me by surprise. But i will give you guys a little bit more insights on how to read the "2 factions at launch" quote. "At launch" isn't really the best term to describe it - The beta will only have two playable factions, yes. This is considered launch for us, as the service needs to be up and running, obviously. The beta period is all about working on stabilizing the game and it's KPIs. But obviously we have more Generals inspired factions in the works, that will be introduced later during beta or when the game drops it's beta tag.

- Pay to win: I wrote some things to consider regarding to P2W in another thread. But again, just because you can buy SOMETHING in a store, doesn't mean it will be pay to win! There are good examples out there, that incorporate a non Pay 2 Win store. I've raised that flag within the developer team multiple times now and they are aware that a p2w store in an RTS will harm the consumer experience.

- Command & Conquer as Service: The announced Command & Conquer will indeed be a whole C&C service platform that leverages the power of Frostbite 2. We will start by visiting the Generals universe as first content. Over a long period of time we ultimately want to visit the other great C&C Universes to become part of the platform. The details on "Do i chose the universe on start" or "Can i play GDI vs Sowjets vs GLA" are not finalized yet - It's more of a rough idea - However, No exact details on the how itself.

CIRE

[Gobias]

RA3 received a lot more patches than was originally planned. So from a patch standpoint RA3 did get enough Post-Release support. The plethora of issues that still remain for the MP side of RA3 would have been a lost cause as people will always find ways around exploits and cheat in the end. A select majority in the mp community simply doesn't like to play fair and will always fight the system. For these exploits to be patched you would need a more robust post-release service in place.

They actually planned to give it less support? Dear god.

This is why I am extremely wary of how EA will manage a platform like C&C F2P. Support is dropped on a whim, and decisions are made only with short-term profit in mind. If C&C F2P is to work, we need a pledge, in no uncertain terms, that pay to win will never get anywhere close to the multiplayer aspect of the game (and no getting away with it by defining "pay to win" in some obtuse, ambiguous fashion. There should be a settled definition, agreed upon by everyone, that essentially states that any advantage, no matter how small, is pay to win). We also need a pledge that, since C&C F2P is so multiplayer focused, support in the form of balance changes and bug/exploit upkeep will be continual and constant, with no major lapses between patches. Otherwise, interest in this game will wane, just as it waned with C&C 3 and RA3, and any community that's needed for a fun gaming environment will never appear.

If EA had shown the slightest bit of continual support for RA3 or C&C 3, I think both of those games were good enough to have rivaled StarCraft 2's popularity in the multiplayer world.

[Cypher[CS]]

muJe, I personally loved RA when it was the direct prequel to TD.
And it was dead serious. Very very serious.

RA2 changed it all.
However, RA3 is a successor to RA2. RA2 and YR established the campy, comedic feel for RA. Nothing can ever be done about this anymore.
Too bad, sure. But....

[CNCGeek101]

They actually planned to give it less support? Dear god.

This is why I am extremely wary of how EA will manage a platform like C&C F2P. Support is dropped on a whim, and decisions are made only with short-term profit in mind. If C&C F2P is to work, we need a pledge, in no uncertain terms, that pay to win will never get anywhere close to the multiplayer aspect of the game (and no getting away with it by defining "pay to win" in some obtuse, ambiguous fashion. There should be a settled definition, agreed upon by everyone, that essentially states that any advantage, no matter how small, is pay to win). We also need a pledge that, since C&C F2P is so multiplayer focused, support in the form of balance changes and bug/exploit upkeep will be continual and constant, with no major lapses between patches. Otherwise, interest in this game will wane, just as it waned with C&C 3 and RA3, and any community that's needed for a fun gaming environment will never appear.

If EA had shown the slightest bit of continual support for RA3 or C&C 3, I think both of those games were good enough to have rivaled StarCraft 2's popularity in the multiplayer world.

No not at all. "You" the community were stead fast in finding launch bugs within RA3 and through the first few months of release which prompted more patches to be made and pushed out the door. So the entire C&C community who purchased RA3 played a significant role in the amount of patches that RA3 got and some of those fixed critical bugs and closed loopholes in the online space.

No game company can predict how much post-release support is needed. Usually the community has the loudest voice in determining if any post-release support is necessary due to the amount of sales said game gets within a certain amount of time. Online focused games however are almost 100% guaranteed some form of post-release support regardless of the situation until the plug is ultimately pulled and it's services are shutdown.