In addition, there are differences in the two sides' strengths and weaknesses, Core being stronger at sea while Arm has vastly more nimble units both in the air and on land. There's the usual base building and resource gathering (metal and energy in this case) that one comes to expect in games like this. The two warring sides are fairly similar in terms of gameplay at first glance, but their differences become more apparent the more you play the game.Īrm in general is the faster of the two sides, while Core's units can on average take more punishment. In contrast to the relatively simple and shallow story, the gameplay in Total Annihilation was, especially for its time, impressively deep. Ultimately, though, the narrative is largely there to facilitate the gameplay, and for the most part remains on the sidelines with very little presence outside of the mission briefings. Total Annihilation's narrative focuses on a conflict of galactic scale, which at the start of the game has already lasted for over four millenia, between the AI controlled machines of the Core and the human rebels of the Arm who use clones to supply their army with soldiers.

When it was released in September of 1997 it proved to be just that.

Initially Total Annihilation was just one of many similar looking games in development at the time, but as more and more was revealed of the title it became clear that it was going to be something special. In the latter half of the 1990s the RTS genre was at the peak of its popularity, with countless developers trying their hand at them. This project would soon become known as Total Annihilation. Founded in 1996 by the former LucasArts designer Ron Gilbert, the studio's first project was an ambitious RTS title headed by the then relatively unknown game designer Chris Taylor. One of the developers trying to make its mark in the genre around this time went by the name of Cavedog Entertainment. Most other developers had little to no success in trying to gain a foothold in the genre at the time, although naturally there were a handful of exceptions. Westwood Studios, which had pushed the genre into the mainstream with its Command & Conquer games, and Blizzard, which came along a bit later to provide an alternative with WarCraft and StarCraft. In the mid-to-late 90s the real-time strategy genre was dominated by two companies. By Taneli Palola, posted on 10 April 2018 / 5,221 Views

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