Daedhart

It really depends on your definition of a publisher. If it is to "publish", then all thats really required is advertisement (which you cant deny is the entire purpose of digital distribution platforms like Steam, or similar like Kickstarter). If it is to "distribute", then Kickstarter doesnt count. If it is to "control", you are mostly right. In that sense, though, I wish I shared your optimism. But, with game publishing almost completely monopolized by Activision/Blizzard, EA, Ubisoft and Square Enix, Im not so optimistic. The existence of a strong indie market as being a direct and opposite reaction to mega-publisher market control is proof enough by itself, for the indie market wouldnt need exist otherwise. In other words, the indie market exists as a dipole to the mainstream market.

You should have attempted the illusive insulting signature move finisher! The Clay Pigeon! That is where, as they are falling to their deaths, you shoot them dead mid-fall. Lol, done that on other games, not Renegade regretfully. At least I have a new life goal as I play Renegade X, right? Heheh, hells yeah. I did do that a few times, but damned if they were moving fast. Especially if I was a 500 sniper and couldnt kill them in one shot. I was good, but not that good.

Ok, just to look at the examples given... Mojang doesnt count because it was an enigma. Rare gems like that happen once in a while. After all, look at Half Life 2 and Steam. Steam was originally conceived mostly just as DRM, but things took an unexpected turn. If we look directly at Steam, well...Valve has done a major shift and is more a publisher now than a game developer. Anything that used Steam cannot claim to not have had a publisher, since that is exactly the role Valve/Steam is in. This same argument can be reused with any indie distribution platform, such as XBLA or Play Store. Kickstarter is a publisher, period. They may do things a little differently, and in most cases leave distribution to the developer, but the publisher role is still there. And Totem Arts...well, yeah they are indie and dont have a publisher. But, can you honestly say you would care if you had never been a fan of the original Renegade? When I told my friends, who are not CnC fans, about Renegade X, they were all pretty "meh". Im sure once they play the game that they will love it, but the promotion of the game is being done almost exclusively by the fans. This is true of many other large scale mods. Again, publishers are here to stay and are a necessary evil so long as money needs to be made for game development. As for the balanced gameplay discussion, it is actually curious that EA bought Westwood all the way back in 1998. That means that both Tiberiun Sun and Red Alert 2 were made afterwards. These still felt like Westwood games because they were made by the same people. When new people were brought in to develop everything afterwards, they were making games that they had no mental connection to, so I dont blame them. Just to make it clear again, I dont like EA. Im not defending them. Im merely point out that they played a large role in the CnC history. Keep in mind, though, that blame rests just as much in Westwood as EA. After all, Westwood did sell out to EA. Maybe the majority of the peeps working for Westwood didnt want to, but it happened anyway. In the end, its always about the money...

I am inclined to believe that a hill of beans in China, has done more good for C&C, than EA has. EA is like a kid who bought a 1970s Mustang, and then immediately let it run low on oil and burned the engine and always hit yellow parking lot poles and ruined the paint job and such. /Nerdrage Brutal I have no love of EA, but let me play devil's advocate for a minute. Keep in mind that, while EA does develop (and help develop) a number of games, they are almost exclusively a publisher. And even before EA bought out Westwood, EA was one of the key publishers for Westwood. Marketing is usually left solely to the publisher, which means CnC probably would never have dominated the RTS genre when it did without EA. This is a common thing in media creation; music, movies, even books. As distasteful as it is for me to say, developers probably wouldnt get anywhere without publishers. There are "good" publishers out there, like Valve, but they are a minority and even Valve can be a douche sometimes. EDIT: Oh and BTW, just to be clear, I also hate EA. I played Earth and Beyond up until Sunset. Nuff said.

Sniper v Orca/Apache It was always a good test of n00bness when Id get a 500 sniper and start shooting an orca. If they were smart, theyd back up and get close to the ground. If they were n00bs, theyd fly up. I must say, that final click to take that n00b orca down and watching the pilot fall to his death gave me a big B. I was always sad, though, since that didnt give a boink...

Im pretty sure Renegade X was given the go-ahead from EA on paper (which is why they arent allowed to take any money for the project, its part of a contract). If EA shut down Renegade X, they would be in breach of contract and Totem could legally sue. Nope, at this point the power of this game is completely in the hands of Totem. But, keep in mind this is just a multiplayer recreation of a 12 year old game. Even if EA was interested, they wouldnt bother with this project; they would build a new game from scratch (that probably included at least some single player mode). And, since EA still owns the copyright on CnC, they would be well in their power. They wouldnt need to shutdown Renegade X, nor would they need to give Totem any money for it (unless they copied the code whole-sale, which they wouldnt do). If such a scenario occurred, Renegade X would remain completely untouched (aside from the marketing overshadowing of whatever product EA eventually created). The only possibility Renegade X could be affected would be if EA lured some of the dev team to work for them. That wouldnt affect Renegade X, though, aside from maybe ending or slowing future updates.

Rank would be something that individual servers would maintain, most likely in the form of a leaderboard. It would be impossible to have an absolute rank system since each server can have different options (time limit, vehicle limit, player count limit, et cetera). Though, a clan leaderboard might be possible.

I dont think many of the basic game mechanics are changing much (especially the animations) from Black Dawn. The only issue I can think of as far as visibility is concerned is the excessive smoke effects (something I definitely had issue with in Black Dawn). But to address the color question, I fail to see what the problem is. Even if the yellow GDI tanks blend in with the background a bit on one or two maps (red tanks probably arent an issue), Id say just deal with it since you also have the HUD displayed around units youre looking at. I really think youre focusing a bit too much on mundane details. If you truly want perfect realism, I think youve got the wrong game; go play some CoD or BF.

Or the defense towers could be moved in front like on some other maps that almost completely prevents single-building point-farming without taking out the tower first. Maps dont have to be perfectly recreated. But then...the uniqueness of the maps would be destroyed. Aside from adding new units or heavily modifying the base components of the game (and potentially breaking other maps/strategies), there really isnt a whole lot that can be done aside from giving both sides the exact same units (which would be boring). IMHO, I like the skewed balance. It gives the game more personality. Sure, Nod may have the advantage on certain maps, but that just makes playing GDI all the more challenging. I play to win, but Im not so distraught about losing that I cant enjoy it. Just make up for it on the next map. Having said that, I think the ramp removal would be a good compromise on this map in particular.

No, Id say its a lulz bot, so its doing exactly what it was designed for...

I asked this on Youtube, but Ill ask it here, too: Are there plans to implement a Construction Yard on new maps for auto-repairing damaged buildings or restoring destroyed ones? Also, any plans on implementing mutants spawning from tiberium death? EDIT: Ok, one more question. Jam, why does clicking on your name take me to peanutbutterlovers.com? Peanut Butter is awesome, Ill admit...just wasnt quite what I was expecting.

Yeah, and I wouldnt mind seeing how pistols worked...assuming youre not under any NDR.

When I heard Renegade X was finally coming, I think I jizzed in my pants. Ive been looking forward to this for a long time. Hoping to get some of my real-life friends in on this action. I played Renegade religiously up to around 2005 and played on and off for another year or so. Started off playing mostly on the Pitts Renegade Server and then moved over to n00bstories, where I was a mod for a short time, and Jelly after the Pitts shut down. Back then, I went by Arconian. Was a high rated sniper for a bit, though I was known to join in the vehicle fun if my team needed it. After a couple year break I came back to Renegade, but found that my sniper skills were really rusty so I didnt play a whole lot after my initial departure. Never really got into the clan thing...