There is the "How is the Red Alert and Tiberian universes related?" thread but this is general discussion about the RA series.

So use this thread to talk about the Red Alert series, I suppose.

Alright, go on and hate on me, but I prefer RA2 over RA1

You're saying that RA1 was much worse than RA2? You heretic

I'd give RA1 10/10 for everything (well maybe 7/10 for the story) but I don't find RA2 that fun. 7/10 for the story and 8/10 for the rest (although the engine's poor performance could drop the gameplay score a bit).

When RA1 was released modding wasn't as popular as it is now. Gaming companies (at least WW) didn't really consider that their games would be modded. So I don't really consider the "mods" a part of the game.

I agree RA1 is better than RA2 in every way except for modding. The fact RA2 completely lost its seriousness is what puts me off; its often argued that RA1 was already a bit less serious than TD, but RA2 just completely overdoes the sillyness in every single aspect (story, voice acting, mission briefing videos and the ingame graphics look like Roller Coaster Tycoon with tanks) and with RA3 it even went further downhill.

To me RA1 is simply the prequel to TD (with no RA2 or RA3 in between; which is what Westwood intended to begin with) and although it's still quite fun to play, I think TD's gameplay is still a bit better since its factions are balanced a bit better against one another.

Red Alert is well balanced, except for infantry usefulness and vehicle speeds. Infantry is far too weak, and easily crushable by the unnaturally fast tanks. For example the rocket soldier completely lost its effectiveness against tanks, as they can dodge the missiles thanks to their speed. TD didn't have this problem, and rocket soldiers posed a threat to any tank.

TD is no better, the Nod bikes can even outrun tank shells, and an APC loaded with engineers is unstoppable early on (this would be more balanced if either the APC or the engineers had the communication center as their prerequisite). Hence why everyone condems the APC in online multiplayer.

I've always had a mixed feeling of RA1's balance. While Soviet's tanks and V2s are much more powerful than the Allied units, the Allies have things like the GPS Satellite and powerful navy units. It depends a bit on the map I think. But I agree, TD is probably the most balanced C&C.
Dodging tank shells with Bikes requires some migromanagement. I think they're fine in TD, at least they're not useless like the TS bikes. The bikes are also crushable, so they cannot do much against a large army of tanks.

I've never seen an APC + engineer rush in TD, but I think it's counterable in some way, at least with Unit Count on 10 (which is the only setting I play with anyway).

I agree with everything Bittah said. RA2 is much worse than RA1.

However RA1 is in several aspects even worse than TD and i never understood why they ruined these
-Tanks firing on infantry were inaccurate in TD giving infantry a much higher lifetime (especially rocket infantry). In RA1 they always hit 100%
-The tanks firing and hit sounds were horrible annoying (like someone playing with marbles and their recorded sounds bass raised). This was one of the first things i modded back to the TD sounds, when i got access to the XCC utils.
-SAM site is always out of the bunker. I loved the bunker logic in TD and miss it in every C&C ever since TD.
-The mammoth always uses the missiles against infantry, and not only when turning the turret towards the target like in TD. Thus the Mammoth became completely unbalanced and overpowered against rocket infantry.
-The ore mine (replacing the tiberium tree) was looking horribly undetailed. No animation and no good design.

However RA1 had also some cool new features like the improved aircraft, ships and additional/new superweapons.

well, you could just go ahead and say the entire RA ore thing was rather ridiculous

A bike is cheaper than a light tank, and much, much faster. No one buys light tanks if you can get bikes, as you can perform lightning fast hit & run attacks. I understand that if you are GDI, you should get medium tanks, as they can outrange the bikes and deal impressive damage. You never get to crush them, unless the player using them isn't paying any attention to them.



That's because it's not supposed to be a direct copy of the TD SAM.



This is actually far more realistic than requiring to turn one's turret to fire a bunch of missiles. However I agree they overdid the damage against infantry. Note they raised the vehicle's cost from 1500 to 1700, even when all the stats stayed the same, because of this.

Don't tanks do less damage to infantry in RA1 though? Although I think that TD was more realistic and better.

I love both RA1 and TD sounds, haven't got anything to complain about them. TS sounds were a bit worse (although still good) but since RA2 the sounds have been quite boring.

With heavy tanks and other things doing more damage than in TD I actually find the Mammoth quite useless in RA1. Requires more tech than Heavy Tanks, deals less damage than two heavy tanks, is much slower and costs more.

Well, as Nyer said the whole ore thing was quite ridiculous. Although it's understandable that they didn't want to change the resource harvesting system they made in TD.



I still buy light tanks and flame tanks to support SSM launchers in some situations. While bikes are good for hit & run attacks, it's hard to get past multiple advanced guard towers with them (which SSM launchers do well when supported).

My point is you can get bikes right after you deploy an Airfield. You don't require a comm. center, like the advanced guard towers or flame tanks do, nor an obelisk for that matter (SSM Launcher).

I see. Redalert is just more memorable to me. Bittah is right. I focus on the RA2 mods the most. THAT's why I like RA2. Some RA1 units were overpowered like the Cruiser. Or maybe I'm just saying that because Westwood didn't implement an AI that builds Naval yards in Skirmish. That makes Cruisers TOO easy to defeat easy, normal and hard AIs.

What do you all have against my beautiful RA2?

When it comes to games like Red Alert 2 and Yuri's Revenge, the story does not bother me what-so-ever, in-fact, the story is the last thing I care about for games. I didn't have a clue what Half-Life was supposed to be about for example, but I didn't care cause it was loads of fun. Red Alert 2 may not be 100% serious, but it wasn't supposed to be; Serious structure or not, the game was lots of fun and the engine is full of lots of possibilities.

If storylines are the strongest points here, easily Tiberian Sun and Tiberian Dawn win that criteria, but Red Alert 1 and Red Alert 2 surpass them both vastly in terms of gameplay, in all Skirmish, Campaign and Online Multiplayer (Though I'm not saying that these were all that bad in TS or TD).

Yeah I actually do like RA2/YR better than RA1. Mods are pretty good but I like some features that TS didn't have like naval forces.

...but RA1 DOES have that...

What do you have against my beautiful TS?


when it comes to CnC games my honest opinion
For the Tiberium games (which you guys will probs like) is WW did great Tib games but the EA ones were rubbish (3,TT)
However (ignoring generals which I like but arguably isn’t a "real" CnC)
I honestly think EA (just EA none of that EA/WW rubbish) did a way better job with the Red Alert games than WW did, ie i like RA3 better than the rest

RA1 was good don’t get me wrong but there were so many little nit picky bits I didn’t like about it, like i wish the graphics were a bit more than recycled CnC1 graphics
RA1:counterstrike, Just mission really i want a tiny bit more in an expansion a new unit or something for each side (same goes for covert ops)
RA1:Aftermath I really liked the units added in aftermath

RA2 Was good but a bit OTT nice campaign I suppose I just wish it looked closer to RA1 with better graphics(with out contradicting my previous graphical comment)
RA2:YR was just horrible imo and I generally cant stand the attitude of the community

RA3, the story made sense! there were a few issues however compared to the EA tib games this is great
AS for RA3 Uprising it looks really good however i still disagree with digital download hence not buy it (if i get board i might give in...)

FYI, RA2 was made by EA as well. Even though it was called Westwood Pacific at the time, it was later renamed to EA Pacific and IIRC unlike with Westwood Vegas' staff (the ones who created RA1, TD and TS), most of Westwood/EA Pacfic's staff stayed with EA and were also involved with TW and RA3.

Also, graphic-wise I think RA3 might be even worse than RA2, realism concerned. With that I don't mean "impossible" technology and such, but rather the cheerful looking scenery and such, while it's supposed to be a battlefield. I bet that if you'd rip roller coasters and other theme park attractions directly from one of the Roller Coaster Tycoon games and place them in RA3 (and RA2 as well), they wouldn't even look out of place.
I personally just like the mood of the scenery of a game (including buildings, units and especially terrain) to fit the theme of the game itself. If you say sillyness just happens to be part of the intended theme of RA2/RA3 you might be right, but then I suppose I just happen to dislike that theme (or at least in an RTS which focuses on war).

Anyhow, story put aside; I still prefer RA1's gameplay over RA2's, I prefer TD's over RA1's and I prefer TS's over TD's.

C&C3 was ok gameplay wise IMO. It wasn't as good as the WW C&Cs but I wouldn't call it "rubbish". It killed the story though.

I agree with Bittah, I like serious games much more. RA1 had a very nice serious "depressive" feel in it (just like TD and TS), while being cool at the same time. "If you fail, don't come back.."

While the Yuri side was quite unbalanced (didn't really matter for me since Allies and Soviet also weren't balanced), I think that otherwise YR was a great expansion to an okayish game. Two new campaigns, lots of multiplayer content etc.

Overally I like the Tiberium games more than the RA ones. I think that every Tiberium series' game was better than it's RA counterpart. (well, TD and RA1 are quite even, but TS>RA2 and C&C3>RA3).

Something tells me it works like this in terms of C&C.

The older the better!

It's good for modding and not much else.

^^shame on you.

It's also actually the other way round.
TS-> great story, great atmosphere, great buildings/units. unfortunately quite many bugs.
RA2/YR-> stupid story, very bad atmosphere, ugly buildings/units. quite many modding possibilities and less bugs.

I love TS but here are two features that TS SERIOUSLY needs.

-Team Alliance. You see I'm trying to make a map where 6 of my unstoppable AIs attack me. I am luckily surrounded by Core Defenders so I do not get killed so fast. I start in the middle surrounded by Core Defenders that...well defend me. One player starts with a Core Defendr and gets instantly owned in usually four seconds. It activates Paranoid(which I know can be turned off) which will send all after me. Unfortunately, the Core Defenders teamed up with the AIs as well so I was not protected. That's when about 10-15 orca bombers came and completely destroyed me. Besides I'd like to have partner by my side in my favorite C&C.

-Select Location. In YR, you can set where you start on the map. I'd like this in TS because I tried twenty times to get where I wanted to be on my map.

Those features would be nice for multiplayer but I think that pure FFA games are the most fun and exciting anyway.

While I feel that TS was really released as unfinished (lots of useless units, bugs etc.) I still like it's gameplay, atmosphere, story etc. more than RA2's. RA2 doesn't have real aircraft, and all online games I ever played were just a contest of who had the most Prism Tanks and Rocketeers in the end (so although RA2 felt finished, it's gameplay still wasn't that great).

TS aircraft lands. All RA2 has is Harriers and Black Eagles for actual aircraft. Many mods give Soviet the Mig(usually the Boris one) as a buildable unit as well as an airfield. I used to love playing RA2 online back in 2006 or so. I would get owned. I remember having a good buddy named Autoparts. Back then, me and my brother had accounts called "biggama" and "bigboy18g" I was bigboy18g as I had been young back then.

Remember, EA rushed Westwood through completing TS and missed out on features like debris from buildings for example. EA worked on RA2 correct?

RA1 and TD were Westwood all the way.
RA2 and YR were clearly the only great EA C&C. Generals isn't too bad either.

I agree about most of what you say, but RA2/YR actually has pretty nifty buildings. For example the Yuri side, I love his building styles. I'm pretty sure each building got more attention or at least detail in RA2/YR than TS. The civilian buildings not so much.