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From no to WOAH!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 34 / 35
Date: February 25, 2007
Author: Amazon User

At first I really didn't care much for this game, it seemed slow and I the singleplayer wasn't to fun, but then I decided the give the game a bit more time as I had heard their was a great deal to the game. I started playing the skrimish mode and online and WOW, their were way more units available to me in online/skirmish mode including the ultra units that were not in most of the single player part of the game (along with many other units) the game is very intense and loads of fun, the better I am becoming the more fun the game is getting as the better you get the speed picks way up, in fact their doesn't seem to be a limit, the games speed is completely dependent on you level of knowledge on the game. So while it may seem slow to you when you first start this will quickly change.

The game runs great on my 3200+ XP 1 Gig Geforce 6600GT and the game will run fine on any PC bought/built within the last 2 years really. [...]

Furthermore the fact of the matter is the factions are actually pretty unique, it doesn't seem that way at first because they have the same type of units in usually all the same spots across the tech trees. What I mean by that is take a tech 1 land factory for example they all produce a bot/scout/mobile anti-air/tank and artillery. So you would think they were all the same, you would be dead wrong. Every single one of those units happen to vary drastically from faction to faction.

I'll use the tank as an example

The Aeon Tank- is very slow, has a very long range, does heavy damage, but has a long reload time. It also has a very small health bar.
Special ability: It can hover over water...

The Cybran tank- is very fast, has a short range, does low damage, but fires at a very fast rate. It has a moderate amount of health
Special ability: is able to repair other units and structures, can also help engineers build.

The UEF tank-has moderate speed, moderate range, does high damage and has a moderate reload time. It also has a very high amount of health

So as you can see in that example those 3 units which if you just looked at the tech tree would have you believe are identical are ACTUALLY completely different, they are as different as night and day! And thats using a Tech 1 unit example, in Supreme Commander their are 4 tech levels an the units get more and more unique the higher up the tech tree you go.
So actually the units from faction to faction in this game are very unique.

But even if they were not this game literally has more depth in one faction then most RTS games with their expansion have across all of their factions. Each faction in Supreme Commander has over 40 units and structures, thats more then Starcraft with broodwar has with all of it's faction combined!

Also every single unit has it's purpose, their is no unit or structure in this game that are useless because the game is very well balance, unlike RTS games like Red Alert 2 were all you have to do is build Mammoth tanks once you get to them. In Supreme Commander you have to use mixtures of many different unit types to be successful against any good opponent
Another great thing about this game is how well it scales, say you want to play a quick 10 minute game, all you have to do is pick one of the very tiny maps in which their are plenty of, theirs also gigantic maps, bigger then you've ever seen for when you want to play a much longer game. The game in total has nearly 50 maps for the Multi-player alone!
One of the best things about Supreme Commander is just how wonderful the UI is, of course theirs the zoom you already know about. The User interface itself can also be moved all over the screen, you can put the User interface on the top, bottom, left or right side of the screen, additionally in the new patch that just came out their is an option to run a mini UI for those people who complained the UI was to big, well now you have the option of a much smaller one.

The que system in the game is fantastic, it really puts every other RTS to shame, in most RTS games you have to wait for a building to finish to give your builders their next order, in Supreme Commander you simply hold shift and you can lay out the build tasks for a builder to infinity, you can also use this same feature when giving order to any of your war machines so you can give them very complex routes.
Another thing that sets Supreme Commander apart is the use of air and sea, in the RTS games out that have air and sea, they really are after thoughts. You will have one or 2 air units at most a factions and you will rarely see any see units, in Supreme Commander they have put just as much focus on the air and sea as they have the land units. Furthermore their are many different formations for land, air and sea units so you can keep your armies very well organized!
Each faction also has 3 very unique gigantic experimental units.
Ranging from a enormous Independence Day like Flying Saucer with the blue laser of death and all, to a Giant Spider with a freaking laser beam on his back. To a Submarine aircraft carrier that can literally hold over 100 air units!

Supreme Commander has it's short comings, the Single player story isn't that great and the levels can look a bit bland on the bigger maps due to technological limitations of the time, you just can't make maps that big right now and pump them full of decorations. The game also has a big learning curve and even can appear slow paced at first when you don't know how to play. Despite these short comings the gameplay Supreme Commander brings is more intense, deeper and all and all more fun then really any RTS game ever made, this really is a revolution of epic proportions and is a MUST buy for anyone who considers themselves a fan of the RTS genre.

Really Great!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 38 / 41
Date: March 06, 2007
Author: Amazon User

When I first bought this game I wasn't sure about it, the game seemed much to complex for it's own good and everything just went slow because I didn't get it. Despite this I stuck with it, watched the tutorials and other players replays and learned all the games great tools that help you manage the game and wow the game got a billion times more fun and faster.

I have a relatively old computer, going on 2 years and after hearing what a system hog people were saying this game was I was pleasantly surprised to see it runs smooth even with tons of units on the screen yes I have to run the settings on low, but another great thing about this game is it's support the games only been out a couple of weeks an there are already 2 great patches that solve a great deal of issues people were having. In the latest patch they even seemed to have made the game look much better on the lowest settings. One example of the great attitude the developers have is that they took the safedisk protection out in the latest patch, because many people were having problems with it.

The game also has some fantastic unit AI, some of the best I've ever seen, yes they can get a bit confused if you give them outrageous tasks, like say trying to send 1000 units at once through a very tight choke point, but if you use the games fantastic order queue system that lets you give any unit extremely complex routes then everything will be dandy.

The best thing about Supreme Commander is the sheer depth of the game, his isn't your grandpa's CnC game were all you had to do is mindlessly throw tanks at your opponent, oh no you need to mix a great variety of units and structures for defense and offense to be successful over land air and sea.

The online client is better then battle.net! The online setup, an ELO chess based ranking system, team rankings, clan rankings, built in clan support, insane statistics that go as far to tell you how many of what unit types you have built, had destroyed, destroyed, your success with what. The numbers it collects are just insane! Add the replay vault, at the end of every game it asks you if you want to upload the video to the replay vault, a system that allows you to quickly look up popular replays and such, you can even right click on somebody's name and look at all their replays in a blink of an eye. You can even customize the coloring of ever aspect of the GPGNET client. The online system of this game surpasses even Warcraft 3's maybe not in look, but in content by miles.

I haven't played the single player so I can't comment on that, but just on the multiplayer alone, if you're a fan of the RTS genre this is a game you MUST buy.

A worthy successor to Total Annihilation.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 23 / 24
Date: February 23, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I am a long-time fan of Total Annihilation, so I had to pick this game up immediately. It is very worthy successor. It uses very similar gameplay, but expands it with enormous maps, original campaigns, and some unique "experimental" weapons. It takes a long time to clear a map (2 hours minimum), which I prefer to short scenarios.

The hardware requirements are pretty high, but it runs well on my [...]PC. I did have problems with the sound being out of sync, but I just had to update the drivers for my Creative SoundBlaster Audigy 2 ZS. Make sure to update your drivers! It doesn't run well at the highest graphics settings - I am tempted to upgrade my PC just for this game (P4 3.4 GHz, ATI X850, 2 GB RAM).

Supreme Disappointment

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 78 / 123
Date: March 22, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I'm a huge Starcraft, Warcraft, and C&C fan, so you know where I'm coming from...

Not since the days of Ultima have I seen so much hype for a game; it makes me wonder what the magazines actually previewed.

This game has a rediculously huge flaw - although the maps are indeed massive, the game is completely unplayable if you are zoomed in to see the detail of the units. Unless you have some sort of liquid-cooled ubersystem, your gameplay will consist of watching green, red and blue dots battle each other. I'm not kidding. I have 2 monitors, which the game thankfully supports. One monitor is dedicated for displaying a world map while the other is where the action takes place.

If you read the same articles I read, you are probably expecting some amazing AI in the single-person game. Don't bet on it. Like just about every other RTS game on the planet, your enemy does a rush attack within about 10 minutes. If you build up massive defenses right away, you will stave off every attack. Then, simply build the top tier units over the next hour and rush till you win.

As for the three single-player scenarios, these are woefully disappointing. You see, each of the three races have the same sort of tech-tree, so if you've played one race, you've played all three. The problem is that each of the campaigns treat you as if you've never played the game before. So even if you work your way to the third campaign, your first mission consists of learning how to gather resources and build units. What an insult to the customer. Why not assume the campaigns will be played in order and make them successively harder? For the first half of each of the campaigns, the more powerful units are unavailable. In fact, you don't even get to build the toughest units until the very last mission of each campaign.

In my opinion, the most ground-breaking game in recent history has been Dawn of War. The races in that game are very different. In some cases, the tech trees are downright unique.

What a let-down this game was.

This is such a great RTS!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 20 / 21
Date: February 20, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Supreme Commander has its roots in the old (but great) Total Annihilation game. If you liked TA, you will like Supreme Commander even more. Probably the thing I like the most about this game is the intuitive interface for commanding your forces. Using the mouse-wheel it allows you seamlessly zoom in/out of the battlefield. But, the cool addition is that wherever your cursor is located; the scroll automatically zooms to the coordinate. I wish Google Earth would implement that feature too! I've only played the demo, but the tech trees are intuitive and seem to be fairly well balanced. Like others have said Supreme Commander uses the same type of ranking system that was used in the highly successful HALO2 online play. This system is based on the ELO statistical system, which was originally created for chess rankings, but works quite well with online games! I truly enjoy auto-matching with equivalently skilled players much better than "join a server and hope your good enough" online play.

The only downside I can see to this game is if you do not have a fairly high-performance system, you may have difficulty running this game. So, I would recommend running the demo before you buy the game to make sure your system can handle it at the level of detail you would like to play it.

Have fun!

Great remake of an awsome classic

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 20 / 23
Date: March 05, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I have been watching this game develope for the past 6 months and I have to say that I am extremely glad that I bought it. This game is a Real Time Strategy masterpiece when it comes to game play, and its graphics are quite amazing. The game itself is a beast 8GB installed, and really enjoys running your cpu to its max. If you are a real gamer, this game will take your hardware and run all out. With a maximim of 8000 units running at once on an area that is 2500+ square miles, this game can require some serious processing power and takes RTS to a new level. But don't let that scare you, because it can also run quite well on lower end systems, and you can play smaller scale battles if desired.

I have read other reviews about how this game has some issues with AI and in general, but that is true with all games that are released in the first couple of weeks. The AI will do exactly what you order them to do. Granted, sometimes it takes them a second to respond, but that is computing power, not the game play. Also, this game requires good micro management because of the way the economy is designed, and if you give up too soon without learning to manage the system, the game can be not fun.

Over all, I give this game 5 stars because it is challenging and has a lot of promise for the furture.

A fantastic successor to TA

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 16 / 17
Date: February 27, 2007
Author: Amazon User

You do not need to have played Total Annihilation to appreciate Supreme Commander. SC really follows in the footsteps of TA, but goes miles beyond. I'm not just talking graphics, but real quality of gaming. I have always loved RTS as a genre, but never really found a game that played as naturally as SC. The new "tactical zoom" feature is really a lot more useful than it sounds. The system for resource management is hands down the best I've ever seen. The campaigns are very well thought out, and the voice acting and writing is pretty good (this is a pet-peeve of mine with a lot of other games). Skirmishes are fast paced throughout, and there are some pretty awesome units at the top of the tech ladder to break down even the most tense of stand-offs. Finally, and most importantly (for me at least) the online community, while not huge, is definitely active.

There are, of course, some minor issues. I won't even deign to call them flaws. The different factions are not varied enough for many peoples' taste, and, of course, you need a real beast of a computer to get everything the game has to offer (visually).

Overall, this game has that which makes great games great. Like Star/WarCraft, Command & Conquer, or Age of Empires (and of course, Total Annihilation), SC requires a balanced approach, yet there are an infinite variety of strategies to pursue. I can tell you, I won't be buying another game for a looooong time--not until the expansion pack comes out!

Supremely Flawed

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 19 / 22
Date: August 15, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I was a great fan of Total Annihilation. I'm a fan of the RTS genre in general. I played SupCom online for a couple months but ultimately I have to confront the fact:
This game stinks. I desperately tried to enjoy it but I can't honestly suggest it to other people. I played for as long as I did hoping it would improve with patches, and while they fixed a lot of technical problems, the gameplay problems still persist.

The game *engine* is fantastic. It looks awesome. The battles are great. The units look fabulous and there are some fun and unique takes on some of the high tech units (the ones always featured in screenshots).

The problem is the gameplay is just horrid, both for online and offline play.

First of all, you should have dual core to play this game. They have done a lot of performance improvements since the game's release, but if you want big games on the big maps, you need dual core. Consequently, trying to do 3v3 games online is a nightmare as no manner how much you stress that everyone in the room needs dual core and they all say they do, invariably one player will not have it and the gameplay will bog down to intolerable levels. Online multiplayer gaming can frequently become unplayable unless you just stick to 1v1 on smallish maps.

The game has Vista problems (or Vista has problems with this game). It tends to crash on Vista during big games. So don't use Vista if you can avoid it. This is just another way big 3v3 matches end up failing -- if someone doesn't bog the game down with their slow computer, someone will crash out because they're using Vista.

The economy is unique and horrible. The economic model in the game is similar to Total Annihilation but with a couple of differences: map control quickly becomes almost completely meaningless and base defenses are vastly improved over what they were in TA. TA was largely a war of attrition against your enemy -- he builds 2 fusion plants, you kill 1. He builds 3 more, you kill 2 more. Due to the improved defenses of SupCom, that doesn't happen. By the time you can break through your opponent's defenses to destroy his fusion plant, you might as well skip the fusion plant and blow up his Commander instead, ending the battle.

So typical long games degenerate into both sides hunkering behind their defenses until one side can launch a single, fast, devastating attack that breaches the defenses and immediately ends the game. The long, continuous back and forth battles of TA are gone, I am sad to say.

On smaller maps, you won't get to that point, and you can have some good gameplay, but then you're not playing the game that was sold to you on the box and in the screenshots. You're doing low tech rushes on small maps and you're not going to reach the cool units proudly displayed to you in the magazine reviews.

All of this leads to a shrinking community, too. I made it as high as top 50 for my 1v1 ranking and it got to the point where I just couldn't find a ranked game to join. I sit there for literally 10 minutes "searching for game" and there's no match, because nobody near my rating is playing ranked games anymore. They all quit or they're all playing non-ranked games because ranked games on small maps honestly aren't that fun and don't represent the gameplay sold on the box. There are top players who have posted screenshots of themselves with 1 hour timers or more, waiting for a match.

This review makes me sad, because I loved TA and I wanted to love SupCom, but it's just not happening, and I don't think you're going to see any further sweeping changes to this game that will ever bring Ranked gameplay back into popularity. You can find people playing custom player-made modifications and maybe you can get some enjoyment out of that, but regular ranked gameplay is DOA and that's too bad.

Maybe the next game, Forged Alliance, will fix some of the problems, but I probably won't bother at this point. Between the way this game released and the company's reaction to gameplay suggestions on their official forums (bans), I don't see myself trying another GPG product until they can prove they've really turned things around.

An impressive new RTS with an excellent graphics engine

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 22 / 29
Date: April 18, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Yes, it's true that you need a relatively updated computer system with a decent graphics card to get the most out of Supreme Commander, but the requirements are not that high or unrealistic by todays standards. I run a basic Windows Vista PC with a Pentium Dual Core processor and a DirectX 9 nVidia graphics card (7900GS) and it runs great, and fast. If your computer is older, or has an outdated video card, don't expect to get the most from this game. If your PC is relatively up-to-date, then you will enjoy this game very much.

The gameplay of Supreme Commander is quite good, with a lot of depth and online gaming options. But the most impressive part of the game is the graphics engine that allows you to zoom out to get an entire world view, or zoom in to view individual units up close and personal. This makes setting up a strategy and micro-managing your units quite easy, and then allows you to zoom right into the action to get a great ground level view of the mayhem you unleash.

The combination of ground, air and naval units are nicely balanced, and you often need to use all three wisely to complete missions in the single player campaigns.

The stories in the single player campaign are well written. The voice acting and CGI cut scenes are also well done.

I highly recommend this game to fans of other classic RTS games like Command and Conquer, Starcraft or Age of Empires.

This is the next step in RTS gaming (along with THQ's other new World War II RTS game, Company of Heroes), so upgrade those old systems and start your gaming at the next level. You won't be sorry.

Don't believe the haters. This game is fantastic.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 8
Date: June 07, 2007
Author: Amazon User

People busting on this game couldn't be more off on their critiques.

Granted, I am probably reviewing this game from a completely different standpoint. I got this game, barely touched single player, and do nothing but multi player.

First, yes, the game has steep system requirements. You need a dual core processor, a good amount of RAM and a decent video card to get running in a playable state.

Second, I haven't touched the single player very much. All I know is that multi player is fantastic in this game. GPG has been updated several times and the level of depth offered by this game is huge. There is no one strategy that will win this game in multiplayer. I've tried many different strategies and have won and lost with all of them. Not a single battle has been the same as the others. The maps are huge and the battles are incredibly rewarding between two equally skilled players.

The interface is fantastic in this game as well. Unit AI is almost a non issue because the path to a target can be set by zooming out and using the shift key to set checkpoints for a unit. This interface is an evolution of the already fantastic TA interface and is ahead of anything other RTS games have. Patrols can be setup up for units coming out of factories, attacks on a target can be coordinated so that air land and sea units arrive at the same time to have max impact.

I look forward to going home everyday after work and unwinding with a game. The battles are rarely ever short and they are great when players reach a stalemate and have to start getting creative to win. I've beated better players by outsmarting them.

For example, I was up against a better player who was outproducing me with his factories and had a clear numerical superiority. I took a transport, construction units, and a stealth field generator and landed them behind his lines, hidden from his radar, but in plain view in a spot he wasn't looking. I build a missle base and launched a decisive attack that destroyed his commander and gave me the win.

That's what I love about this game. It's never over till its over. If you love RTS games, you have to get this one.

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