Kane is Real Pt12. Kane is Dead

and the rest of C&C along with him.

Forget the expansion pack, there is really serious doubt as to whether there is actually going to be one. I have just woken up.

I thought C&C4 was bad, but the final episode of Battlecast Primetime really hit it home on just how bad things are at EA LA.

Just as C&C pioneered the era of Real Time Strategy gaming back in 1995, Battlecast Primetime pioneered the concept of a community based monthly video for a computer game series. It's essentially a Sportscenter for C&C. And the show was really good. It started concurrent with C&C3 Tiberium Wars, and went on through the Kane's Wrath expansion pack and Red Alert 3. The dialogue was witty, and the contents were spectacular. There was plenty of humor, advertisements, and jokes. Content included game replays, interviews with designers, coverage of C&C events, etc. The show ran for over 2 years and with 25 episodes. The final episode just came out yesterday, and i is terrible. What is usually a 30 minute long show has now been reduced to a 10 minute showing of 10 replays. And even APOC, community manager for C&C has apologized on the official forums, stating that the budget has just become so bad that they were not able to deliver the 'epic' finale to the television series. Looks like epic finales just aren't EA's thing.

Sportscenter for C&C. This episode has the Ackerman Girl song.

So I guess the whole issue has been boiled down to money. The franchise just isn't making enough money to justify EA's spending. And now they're cutting back on everything. And there's a lot of inhouse politics going on as well. Remember the supposed Tiberium FPS that was cancelled?

Anyhow, Tiberium was cancelled. C&C4 was completed on a tight budget that restricted the developers to making a shitty campaign, the launch event that I went to was held in a tiny dingy internet cafe hidden right at the back of a dilapidated shopping mall in London, as opposed to the migdnight launch event of RA3 at Trafalgar Square, and now Battlecast Primetime ends with a fizzle instead of a bang. Do I even dare to dream of the possibility of an expansion pack that will redeem C&C4?

Let's see. Budget for expansion pack. $10. Maybe $15. Knowing this, EA would just make 2 new units, slap on an expansion pack title and sell it off anyway. That's what they're very good at. Churning out crap. So thankful they had the right mind to cancel Tiberium. I really don't know what to say if they release an expansion pack that makes C&C4 any worse off than it already is. If they can't make a good expansion pack that will redeem C&C4, then don't make any at all. I'd rather they not create a new all-time low for the series. It's achievements like this that only EA can do.

So I guess, the C&C franchise is dead for now. EA LA and the gaming industry are going through some difficult times. So hopefully, the series will be reborn in the future, with renewed direction and vigor and promising talent. Just like how it died off at Generals, and then came back to life years later with C&C3, which was EA LA's best RTS game.

Command & Conquer under EA Los Angeles. Bye :'(

"Only time will tell. Sooner or later.....time will tell." -Einstein, Red Alert 1 intro.