Rock, Paper, Shotgun

I was thinking only the other day that we hadn’t heard anything about that somewhat dreary-looking Command & Conquer FPS for a while, and then I spot news over at Blue’s that EA have unexpectedly put it out of its misery.

“It is with a heavy heart that I announce the end to all work on ‘Tiberium,’ effective immediately”, sez Ea’s Mike Verdu. “The game had fundamental design challenges from the start.”

Given it really wasn’t looking all that stellar (RPS readers at the time of the first footage certainly weren’t terribly taken with it), it’s probably for the best, what with C&C’s populist profile recently being boosted by all that Red Alert 3 boob-mania. The real sad news is that it could affect some folks’ jobs – here’s hoping they’re all moved onto interesting new projects. Below the cut: the trailer and some in-game footage, for old time’s sakes.
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It’s not “Command & Conquer: Tiberium”. It’s just “Tiberium.” At least Dwayne ‘ The Rock’ Johnson has the good grace to acknowledge his true heritage in his name. But what’s going on here? Are EA embarrassed by Command & Conquer now? “Don’t mention the Tiberium war…”
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The cinematic trailer for Tiberium has trundled onto the web, revealing BattleStar Galactica wobble-camera, and a transforming gun and helmet. There’s not a great deal to be said about it as we’re still a long way from any gameplay footage, but it’s interesting that the hype is beginning to gear up in this way. We can expect EA to sell this one pretty heavily in the coming months. The question is whether anyone believes it will be any good…

Incidentally, while thanking Game Trailers, I should point out that their new project, a cheats Wiki called WikiCheats has hit the web. If you’re walkthrough-authoring, or stuck on Mass Effect, then you might want to take a look.

EA have released some more details, and the above screenshot of an ED-209*, to announce Tiberium, their squad-based FPS set in the C&C universe.

Chris Plummer, executive producer at EA Los Angeles, said: “After two years of pre-production, it is exciting to finally reveal this game and its rich fiction to the world. We’ve put a lot of effort into evolving the tactical shooter experience by taking core gameplay compulsions like commanding, choice and dominating your enemies and delivering them in first-person. Some of the weapons and mechanics are truly innovative for a first-person game. We’re very proud to be part of a project that has the potential to really make a mark on the canon of sci-fi fantasy fiction.”

A bunch of stuff like orbital ion cannon strikes and capital ship bombardments will apparently be included in the game to give it the sense that you’re on that C&C futuristic battlefield.

And I can’t help but feel dreadfully apathetic towards this one, sorry guys.

* “Can’t think of a robot design? Then why not try new ED-209! It’s like you don’t even have to try!”