Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath Preview

After many years of wait and anticipation, EA finally released Command & Conquer 3 onto the public earlier this year. The game was a critical and commercial hit, offering intense and innovative RTS gameplay and bringing in those fans that had waited and waited for the new title in the beloved franchise. Now, EA is readying their first expansion pack for the game and they certainly aren’t about to take it lightly. The team is crafting a story that will span twenty years, from the Tiberian Sun days to C&C 3 and beyond. Not only will Command & Conquer 3: Kane’s Wrath be epic in terms of story, but the gameplay will be bumped up significantly, including a new Global Conquest mode and many new units to keep things fresh. Fans of the C&C series should be prepared for Command & Conquer 3: Kane’s Wrath when it hits next spring.

The storyline in Kane’s Wrath is divided into a three act campaign, with the backstory focusing on the Tacitus, which was a big catalyst for some of the conflict in Tiberium Sun. The first act will start you out during the years of Tiberium Sun, while the second act will take place during the events of the Command & Conquer 3 campaign. The third and final act will deal with the events that transpire after the C&C3 campaign.

Aside from the huge new campaign, the game will feature tons of new units. Among them are the GDI Hammerhead gunship, which is a futuristic helicopter with the main boon that it never needs to return to home base to reload weapons, a GDI Shatterer (a hovercraft outfitted with a sonic emitter), and the Nod “Awakened” units, which are cybernetic infantry units with EMP blasts in tow.

Another interesting feature is the use of subfactions. Depending on how you choose your subfactions to fight for you, you’ll be able to have increase firepower not only by gaining their units but also a bump up in your own units as well, gaining upgrades like missiles and grenades.

One of the biggest additions to the Kane’s Wrath formula will be the Global Conquest mode, which is a brand new mode that allows you to essentially create and customize an army and take them through a persistent world. The details were still a little scarce on this new mode, though it showed a lot of promise for how the game could be played.

Xbox 360 gamers will get an added bonus when picking up the stand-alone expansion in the way of a new radial interface. This will streamline the controls even more than they were in the original game, and make for an easy and intuitive console control scheme.

With a huge new campaign and tons of units and new features, Kane’s Wrath should be quite a substantial upgrade that no C&C fan will want to miss. Check it out spring 2008.