Combined Arms is a freeware Real-Time Strategy game, built on the open source Open RA engine, that effectively works as a Crossover between the two Tiberium and Red Alert series of Command & Conquer (minus the final game in each series). Five factions, with four subfactions each, are playable in total: the two main factions in each series, plus the Scrin from Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars (Yuri's faction in Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 has been folded into the Soviets as a subfaction). Each faction has four unique sub-factions and incorporates units, structures, powers and upgrades from multiple games, recreated in the Tiberian Dawn and Red Alert art style.
The game can be downloaded from Mod DB
. Information on the various factions can be found here.
This game contains examples of:
- Art Evolution: In addition to the new units and assets, the existing ones from Tiberian Dawn and Red Alert 1 have been given new animations and a general facelift compared to the original games.
- Building Location Restrictions: Buildings must be constructed within a large radius around a Construction Yard or neutral Forward Command.
- Color-Coded Armies: In the campaign, the default colours for each side are gold for GDI, blue for the Allies, red for the Soviets, and purple for the Scrin. Like in the original Tiberian Dawn, Nod sports grey on most of their units, and red (the same shade as the Soviets') on certain others, all buildings and the radar minimap (a combination not possible in skirmish). In Chapter VI, the Scrin rebels sport a bright teal/cyan color.
- Civil War: In Chapter VI, Nod travels to the Ichor Hub via a portal unwittingly opened by GDI when they destroyed the Scrin Mothership at the end of the previous chapter. Kane himself personally leads the expedition in search of an ancient device left behind by a long-destroyed Scrin resistance movement which can turn the apparently corrupt green and blue Tiberium into a purified white form. He succeeds in finding and activating the device, spreading purified Tiberium across the Scrin homeworld and instigating a civil war. Nod joins in and helps the rebels of this war against the Overlord's loyalists.
- Civil WarCraft:
- Emancipation, the third Chapter V (GDI) mission, features Scrin Masterminds who have taken control of GDI bases and turned them against you. The first objective is to kill the Masterminds while keeping the mind controlled GDI units' casualties to a minimum.
- Statecraft, the first Chapter VII mission, is a Soviet versus Soviet battle.
- Reckoning, in Chapter VI, is a GDI and Scrin (Rebel) versus Scrin (Loyalist) battle. The singleplayer version is a non-player version, where you control GDI forces assisting your Scrin ally against the Scrin enemy; the co-op version allows up to two players to directly control the Rebel Scrin.
- Composite Character: The GDI subfactions incorporate elements from the USA faction in Command & Conquer: Generals.
- Crossover: This mod combines elements from five (or six, depending on how you look at it) out of eight mainline games in the Command & Conquer RTS series (Tiberian Dawn, Red Alert, Tiberian Sun, Red Alert 2 and Tiberium Wars, and to some degree Generals and Renegade) into one game:
- All factions from the Tiberium and Red Alert series are playable (minus the Empire of the Rising Sun from Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3, and Yuri's faction is present as a Soviet subfaction rather than full-fledged faction), so there could be Nod and Allies vs Scrin and Soviet matches or any other possible combination. Many such matchups are featured in the campaign.
- Each faction's roster (other than the Scrin, who only appear in Tiberium Wars) includes units from multiple games, with units from later games being higher on the tech tree and sometimes outright being upgraded from units from earlier games (for example, the Soviet Red Alert 1 Shock Trooper and V2 Launcher upgrade into the Red Alert 2 Tesla Trooper and V3 Launcher). Elements from the USA and China in Generals, which do not appear as fully playable factions, are also present, such as the GDI Tomahawk Launcher or the Soviet Overlord Tank. Elements from Renegade include a Nod Comanche based on the one Sakura used, and the Stealth Tank being able to upgrade into a heavier version modeled after its counterpart in that game.
- Defog of War: Aside from normal scouting, every side has one support power (or in case of GDI, two) that removes shroud from the map: the Soviet Spy Plane, GDI Recon Drone and Nod Hack Satellite remove shroud in a pattern around the target point, the Scrin can use Resource Scan to reveal areas surrounding resource fields everywhere on the map, and the Allied GPS Satellite periodically reveals the whole map when their Tech Lab has been built. The GDI Upgrade Center's Advanced Radar, available with the Seek and Destroy strategy, unlocks the Advanced Radar Scan support power, which reveals the location of enemy structures and units through the fog of war.
- Discard and Draw: Numerous upgrades' bonuses are offset by penalties, ranging from increased cost or reduced stat(s) to the outright replacement of a special ability (like with the Leecher's Coalescence upgrade). In the UI, they're distinguished by the yellow (instead of green) border around their icon.
- Escort Mission: In Displacement, the first objective is to protect four convoys of trucks that move along a predetermined path and cannot be directly controlled. Letting the Scrin destroy too many of them would end the mission in failure.
- Evil Tainted the Place: In Chapter VI, Kane reveals from his further studies on the Tacitus that he had learned that the green and blue Tiberium are actually, as he describes them, "corrupted abominations" brought about by the Scrin's abuse of the crystal, and that he had uncovered the existence of a Tiberium purification device hidden somewhere in the Ichor Hub by an old resistance to the Scrin Overlord's rule in an attempt to Fling a Light into the Future.
- Hazmat Suit: All human factions can outfit their infantry with hazmat suits, which protect them from radiation and Tiberium.
- Hero Must Survive: The following heroes must be kept alive in these missions, or you'll be looking at the Game Over screen: Tanya in Relativity, Yuri in Domination, the Mastermind in Subjugation, the Commando and Tanya in Duality, Kane in Illumination and Yuri and the Prodigy in Jailbreak.
- Hold the Line: The main objective in Convergence is to prevent ten waves of Scrin ships from breaking through your own base.
- Mutually Exclusive Party Members: Every faction has a set of three mutually-exclusive upgrades: Allied coalitions (Sweden, Greece, South Korea), Soviet doctrines (Infantry, Armor, Artillery), GDI strategies (Bombardment, Seek and Destroy, Hold the Line), Nod covenants (Wrath, Zeal, Unity) and Scrin allegiances (Loyalist, Rebel, Malefic). Since only one of each can be chosen per game, it's impossible to field side-by-side units unlocked by different choices.note
- Original Generation: Every faction has a few completely original units to supplement those that originate from the official Command & Conquer games, including navies for GDI and Nod (whose home series has no naval combat, so they could fight the Allies and Soviets on equal footing in naval maps) and a substantial expansion to the Scrin roster (which only has one game to draw from, unlike the other four).
- Protection Mission:
- The first objective in Supremacy is to defend Temple Prime for 22 minutes from Soviet assaults.
- In Purification, the Liquid Tiberium Processing Plant must be protected from the Scrin until all five shipments have been received.
- In Schism, after the Scrim Tiberium Purifier is secured, it will need to be protected for 1.5 minutes as the enemy launches a relentless attack from all sides.
- Rate-Limited Perpetual Resource:
- Ore drills and Tiberium trees, which are found in the middle of many resource fields and cannot be destroyed, continuously pump out resources on the ground, though the rate of replenishment is slow enough that expanding out is still important.
- Oil Derricks provide a slow trickle of income to anyone who captures and owns one. Although Oil Derricks don't provide a lot of money compared to mining, they can provide a clear economic advantage to players who can hold them, especially in the late game when ore, gems and Tiberium become scarce.
- Reduced Resource Cost:
- With the exception of England, USA, PsiCorps and Traveler-59, every subfaction has a selection of units and/or buildings that are built with a discount.
- The neutral Oil Refinery makes all of its owner's units 10% cheaper. This bonus stacks multiplicatively with the Soviet Industrial Plant's discount for vehicles and aircraft.
- Strategic Asset Capture Mechanic: Tech buildings are structures that don't belong in any faction and cannot be built but are instead pre-placed on the map and can be captured by Engineers.
- Timed Mission:
- In Containment, you have 20 to 40 minutes (depending on difficulty) to destroy the Atom Bomb Silos before they could fire.
- In Zenith, the Soviet missile silos must be destroyed before they could launch.
- Veteran Unit: Combat units can gain experience by killing enemies and get promoted once the total cost of their kills reach three (for Veteran rank) and six (for Elite rank) times their own.