If you're an experienced player what keeps you coming back to Supreme Commander? What did they do wrong for the second game? Are you still unsure whether to purchase the game? Let me know your thoughts!
They did so many things wrong with the 2nd one, that it's difficult where to start. Mind, I am not a pro, just a normal player who enjoyed the campaigns and did play a little online. Main problem probably was, if it can be summarized, that they dumbed down the complexity of the game (specifically: how the economy works and unit variety). Hence, people that loved the first SC got turned off by that, while people who were not really interested in the first one, did not even bother to buy / play it. So in the end, this decision to simplify everything did not cater to anyone. I even gave SC2 a try, but the moment in the first mission, when 2 experimentals showed up to take a leisurely stroll through the base, I realized that those T4 units did not mean anything anymore, and the whole gameplay feeling in general was so off, that I just refunded it that very moment and never felt the need to come back.
@@thee0581 That's interesting to hear, thanks for sharing your experience. Maybe they thought the complexity of the originals put off more casual players and they tried to appeal to a more casual player base - and ended up pleasing nobody!
@@twiglets2 That's exactly what I think has happened (and I read about it somewhere, but can't remember where it was). The "pros" and fans of the first SC just stayed with it since the community was alive and well, and the "casual" playerbase never picked it up. It also did not help that I think it was developed for console at the same time, hence you had overly large symbols console players could recognize on TV, but that was very offputting for PC players.
Just going to parrot what do many have already said, forged alliance is hands down the best RTS I've ever played. The FAF community adds so much more to the original game though, especially support for larger teams, a while lot of quality of life improvements and more mods than you could dream of, including some very competitive AI that keep the game interesting even 15 years later.
Forged Alliance is the best RTS I have ever found. It has infinite replayability, because you can change up the AI opponents on a huge number of maps. Every game is different, so you learn to alter your play style on the fly. I started with Supreme Commander, then bought Forged Alliance as soon as it came out. I have returned to playing it again and again over the years.
That's great to hear Dan, it's not often such a game comes along! Did you ever try Supreme Commander 2? I'm intrigued that it's nowhere near as popular as Forged Alliance.
Try LOUD mod if you enjoy playing against AI on huge maps. It massively helps with performance issues and can run 5000 units real time without any lag (0 sec delay). It is rebalanced unfortunately by mod creators in some ways that I do not enjoy cause I am more familiar with FAF balance. It is manageable tho and you can add a lot of additional units from Total Mayhem or Black Ops unit packs that are purposefully balanced by mod creators so they are not destroying balance. All mods included in LOUD are tinkered in order to work perfectly with their AI and balance methods.
@@LevtNow Thanks for the recommendation, it's great to see LOUD being mentioned as FAF has been mentioned many times already. Whether it's FAF or LOUD, it's great to see gamers have multiple options to keep this game going into the future.
Really nice review for a casual player of Forged Alliance. I would just add that even for solo play FAF add some nice quality of live feature. SO if you don't want to exclusively play loud project or other on moddb I would suggest to play whit faf and not the base game. ;) On a side node I'm currently participating in the Sanctuary project a indie game that try to be the successor of Forged Alliance and ad the approval of Chris Taylor the director of Forged Alliance. Have a nice day :D
Official support for the Forged Alliance ended quite quick, only 1 real patch was released. FAForever was supporting game for more than 10 years BIG quality of life improvements, UI scaling for modern screens (4k support), balance, performance, AI improvements, multiple AI developers and AI tournaments, random map generator (it is very good), FAF's map maker is much better than the original one (credis to ozonex), automatic mod and map downloads from the mod and map vault where you can search for maps and leave feedback, coop campaing, custom sctipted maps (survivals, missions, minigames) Unit packs that add ton of units, 1 more original faction, 2 more factions from TA GIGANTIC UI IMPROVEMENTS, original game didn't even allow for key rebind Visual improvements, engine improvements, many iterations of balance improvements 16 player support and with some mods 32 players support adaptive maps (amount of reclaim and resource spots is adjustable) New game modes (basicly mods but some mods require more than just putting files in mod folder so they can't be easy distributed without breaking your game and FAF puts them is separate instances so it does not break stuff) Now working on shaders and more engine improvements Rating system and moderation also FAF unites lots of players together so it is easy to find support, modding support and everything Frequent tournaments with money prizes there is like 1 new unit called t3 mobile aa... introduced because t2 mobile aa can't hit t3 air reliably and in old balance whoever wins air could just bomb t2 antiair of attacker and then bomb the rest of the attack and air can attack anywhere... (well i guess that info only matters for those who played on old patch for years and seen how meta evolved into rush of t3 air)
I can't believe they stopped supporting the game so quickly, a good thing FAF is around then. 32 players sounds insane, have you ever done that? My PC would melt
@@twiglets2 if you don't build much stuff it surely will be fine. Game's net code and p2p architecture will become more of a problem, and the fact that game stop and wait if someone loses data/packets during the game...
@@twiglets2 ive seen 16 player matches regularly with high level players, so no turtling, but rushing, and a lot of units on the map. with modern cpus not a problem. single core performance increased a lot in the last decade. it can get slow, especially when 1000 air superiority fighters are dishing it out, but after that fight it runs smooth again.
@@certaindeath7776 ASFs were fixed in one of recent patches btw. No more -10 speed while 1k on 1k asf fight, if game was around 0 before fight it probably won’t go below -2 while fighting, if -2 no lower than -4 etc.
@@MrVladko0 true, i read about that, but completely forgot, that they fixed something, the slowdown had something to do with the range indicators, and fixing that made the game even smoother.
i started playing in 2009 and i still come back to it every few months or so. whats keep me coming back to supreme commander is the balance. if the enemy can build a nuke and still fight you off then you did something worng.
That's interesting as you so often hear the reason an RTS is bad or frustrating is because the balance is bad. It's refreshing to hear of a game that has a GOOD balance - it seems to be a rare quality!
For those curious, there is a large online multiplayer community via the FAF launcher, heaps of mods etc and always game lobbies going. Don't attempt MP via the in-game launcher, use the FAF launcher and you'll find heaps.
Forged Alliance is my favorite RTS of all time. The thing I love the most about SupCom is the sheer sscale of units colideing at each other, starting small at the beggining at ending up as a chaotic battlefield with thousand and thousand units killing each other from small T1's to gigantic T4. The only RTS that comes to my mind that had such a scale was Sins of Solar Empire. Also very complex economy system and factions diversity in looks, unit differences and strategies.
I haven't tried it myself but have heard many good things about FAF. Can you reliably find multiplayer games on there or do you still have to wait around for others?
this remains the benchmark for traditional RTS, nothing even comes close, unless we start comparing slightly different genres and consider games like company of heroes, total war, civilization, etc.. which we really shouldn't, because its apples and oranges. supreme commander has aged like fine wine, even graphically, the simple and clean aesthetic is timeless. it should be noted that many developers have tried to improve upon the formula (planetary annihilation, ashes of the singularity, etc) but none have managed to succeed, so far..
Well made video. Though you just forgot to add one crucial detail in my opinion. Reclaiming mass on the map, and from the wrecks of the battles is additional but instrumental part of the economy.
Thanks for highlighting reclaiming mass. I must confess that by the time of constructing the video I had only just begun to appreciate how good reclaiming mass can be! I'm still very much a beginner but damn this game is addictive.
Thanks for doing a video on my fav RTS, If hardware wasnt such a limiting factor in the day i think it would have been more popular. Always happy to see more exposure and you even gave a shout-out to the community run platform FaF. Thanks !
I totally agree, I watched the trailer so many times when it came out but always knew my system didn't stand a chance of running it. Felt like a kid again when I eventually fired it up. So good to see FAF as active as it is, a shame more old games don't have such things! SC is very lucky to have such dedicated fans (but fully deserves them!)
A few players have said this to me, and it's not until now that I really appreciate how bloody awesome these games are! I haven't tried SC2 though, is that just a bit crap?
@@twiglets2 i didn't even know SC2 existed, Thanks ! looking at steam seems a lot of folk like it., with a few die hards lamenting an apparent loss of depth and features but with others pointing out that mods rescue it, Maybe you should apply your expert hand and particular review style to it as a comparison we can trust ? including the plunge into FAF mod
@@murphymagic33 It's an interesting one, I've seen the same reviews as you and it's a real mixed bag. I suppose we should expect big fans of the original to be unsure about a sequel. I do have it in my Steam library just need to fire it up at some point.
The reason we call supcom pinnacle of RTS is because no RTS after it even attempted to reach its level of grandeur. Supcom is a big investment in development but RTS in later years rarely have a dedicated shareholder and company to make something as epic. It's the industry itself that prevents something the level of Supcom to exist. More importantly, the very foundation of Supcom is about scale, to distinguish true RTS from the lesser RTT game which Chris Taylor (Supcom lead designer) argued about. Pretty much, he tried to make a game to prove his point. To be the pinnacle is the sole purpose for Supcom to exist. You don't get a better reason to say a game is epic more than that. An important note: there was still several few hidden features that the video didn't explore. These features are those that would make RTS players smile and often time only show themselves when you were trying out the game. Even if you don't like to play, you can watch several matches of supcom first to get a general understanding of the scale. There are a lot that couldn't be told with words.
I’ve been playing these games for years and it’s been a joy to play it. Things I like about it is the base building and building massive armies of destruction and just watching armies go out each other with just all of these lasers and guns it’s awesome
I felt like a kid when playing it, the kid that couldn't afford a computer to play the game when it originally release. Finally, I can experience the awesomeness!
I’ve been playing this game with my dad and siblings for years. It’s always a blast and never gets old. I’ve personally been playing since I was 10, and always find myself revisiting it every few weeks.
it's been a long time since i've played the game but it's the best rts i know. The units are cool, you can have many, the experimental units are awesome. Maps are huge. If I had more time, I would also actively play FAF and not just watch recordings.
i never understood why games like age of empires is so popular, when there is SC:FA. SC is way better in terms like overview, advanced unit commands etc. played cossacks with friends some time ago, which is similar to aoe, but more units on the field, and i quit after kicking their asses in a MP game, and said i am never gonna touch that game again with its close in zoom level without overview, and no unit command chaining available.
I have to admit I've found it difficult going back to other games since SC mostly due to the zoom (or lack of). I've heard it described as the best RTS ever made, and now I've given it a proper try I have few reasons to disagree with them. Why AoE and CoH are so popular instead? I really don't know! Perhaps it simply comes down to marketing, not the quality of the games themselves? SC definitely deserves to be more well known than it is in my opinion. Cossacks ain't that bad! :D
My introduction to SupCom was SupCom2 on Xbox 360, was very pleased early on so I acquired the original(again, on Xbox360) had many great times... burnt out a console or two. Thoroughly enjoyed it. I've always loved watching FA and FAF content, dreaming of the day I can join in the fray, even with videos where people affectionately bully the person recording. I still miss Brink of course.
I've not met many gamers who play this game or similar games on console. I'm assuming you enjoyed the experience! But I always thought the controls would be tricky on console?
I got there eventually, thank you for the recommendation! It was a pleasure, I had not played this game at all and I'm glad i have (regret not having done so sooner). I can see why players say it's the greatest RTS as I really can't fault it myself. Do you play either FAF or LOUD mod? I seem to remember you recommended one before but I might be wrong.
I'm glad to hear it! I had assumed that due to the mass deposits being spread across the map it would force you to expand to be competitive. I guess if you can get those nukes and artillery you can cause damage from the safety of your base, or am I misunderstanding?
@@twiglets2 Yes, you can cause alot of damage. They are usually refered to as "end gamers" because they are so powerful. In a 1 on 1 game turtleing might be harder tho since you will be at a serious disadvantage economy wise.
@@olfens Thanks for offering your expertise. it's interesting to me but I'm sure potential new players will find this useful when reading through the comments too.
I must confess I didn't realise how insanely popular it is all of these years later. My system didn't have a chance of running it back in the day so I had to miss out unfortunately. It's great to see the longevity though.
For those coming back to supcom there's a new game in the making called Santuary: Shattered Sun which basically is the next supreme commander. The developers are working together with and pulling inspiration from the original supcom developers, and the game feels both original and retaining all that we love about the original game.
one correction for you is that FAF client is for both PVP and modding. PVE is very much active in that community, and the patches improve the gameplay immeasurably
I must have poured multiple thousands of hours into this game. I think it is the best, most fun RTS ever made. There are also many cool mods released for it. The game is dirt cheap these days. If you love RTS, then you want this game in your collection.
Thanks for the feedback Franz. I knew at the time that FAF was important (very important!) but I didn't quite appreciate HOW important it was. So many comments are saying how good it is and it's basically why people are still playing the game. It's great to see and if I could turn back the clock it definitely would have had way more coverage in the video. Perhaps a standalone video is required!
You haven't lived until you've fired a stack of tanks from a fortress-sized cannon or built an end-game flying Roomba and cleaned out an opposing base.
Yep! Forged Alliance was an expansion of the original Supreme Commander, but it's big so pretty much it's own game. After Forged Alliance came Supreme Commander 2 but that isn't as popular, Forged Alliance seems the most popular version of the game.
Hello! Thank you for the suggestion, I've been keeping my eye on Planetary annihilation: Titans, is that the version you would suggest? I will look into it
@@twiglets2 well that the DLC. The question is will you do both or will you do review like how you did supcom? I just want to know if PA stand the scrutiny. For imo interesting Idea. Terrible execution
@@nuruddinshah684 It looks like you can buy both on Steam, I will take a look but it seems reviewing the DLC too would be the best plan - thank you for the suggestion
Thank you for this video, one piece of information is missing that makes this game unfortunately very very sadly so not worth the time: all RTS are single core games, meaning, there is little to no multi threading on any RTS out there and this stalls any late game significantly in case just one person does not have a CPU that is at least 3,7ghz, and with CPUs these days becoming very efficient running at ~3ghz per core, this makes it efficient for multi threading games, but very poor for RTS games. So a new multithreading engine needs to be created for RTS to flourish again. One more thing: forged alliance forever was a really nice addition to the gaming community, as steam has no interest in the games performance itself and they totally suck at improving game performance, in fact steam even breaks games intentionally to force players into playing newer titles, that suck, supreme commander 2 sucks hard, is a very very lean version of forged alliance and planetary annihilation is a sad excuse for both a forged alliance or total annihilation successor. Forge alliance forever though has lost most of the lead developers years ago and has patched the game beyond belief, breaking many game balances, performance fixes and mods in the process.
@@rafaellouro3120 Simplified is an understatement, Tech isn't maintained building side, you research it, and if you want another faction mid match, have to capture an engi AND build the research station. Also the balance skewed heavily in Cybran favor and Illuminant have almost zero navy, but a ton of hovering land units(one can't attack while hovering across water for some awful reason.) Oh, dedicated turrets are weaker than factory mounted equivalents...
@@twiglets2 They did a rework of resource expendatures and building worked in the game, completely altering the play style. They also completely demolished unit diversity, even entirely removing the navy from the Aeon faction. Seraphim are not present in the game, removing one of the factions and therefore making the game even less diverse in it's cast. They also implemented a research system, which while interesting at the time, it fails to bridge the gap left by the poor unit diversity. The combat in SupCom2 essentially boils down to whichever army has the most units. Experimental are massively underpowered, and the games are much shorter than the epic battles of FA.
This is the first I've heard of that game, reading some reviews now and people are talking about using planets to destroy other planets, it sounds mental haha
@@SableTwoSeven one could say that they took it a little overboeard with the scale aspekt of that game and the subsequent balance problems but im no expert on PA
I also recommend the even newer "version" of SupCom: B.A.R - Beyond All Reason which is free to play and amazingly optimized and sweet gfx, it's predecessor is Zero-K, this is the lo-fi version, basically, and then there is the classic, Total Annihilation.
If you're an experienced player what keeps you coming back to Supreme Commander? What did they do wrong for the second game? Are you still unsure whether to purchase the game? Let me know your thoughts!
The thing that keeps me coming back is that the game is very unique for all the games that i know
They did so many things wrong with the 2nd one, that it's difficult where to start. Mind, I am not a pro, just a normal player who enjoyed the campaigns and did play a little online. Main problem probably was, if it can be summarized, that they dumbed down the complexity of the game (specifically: how the economy works and unit variety). Hence, people that loved the first SC got turned off by that, while people who were not really interested in the first one, did not even bother to buy / play it. So in the end, this decision to simplify everything did not cater to anyone.
I even gave SC2 a try, but the moment in the first mission, when 2 experimentals showed up to take a leisurely stroll through the base, I realized that those T4 units did not mean anything anymore, and the whole gameplay feeling in general was so off, that I just refunded it that very moment and never felt the need to come back.
@@thee0581 That's interesting to hear, thanks for sharing your experience. Maybe they thought the complexity of the originals put off more casual players and they tried to appeal to a more casual player base - and ended up pleasing nobody!
@@twiglets2 That's exactly what I think has happened (and I read about it somewhere, but can't remember where it was). The "pros" and fans of the first SC just stayed with it since the community was alive and well, and the "casual" playerbase never picked it up. It also did not help that I think it was developed for console at the same time, hence you had overly large symbols console players could recognize on TV, but that was very offputting for PC players.
@@thee0581 Ah, I never considered the idea that they scaled UI elements the same on both platforms. Yikes.
Just going to parrot what do many have already said, forged alliance is hands down the best RTS I've ever played.
The FAF community adds so much more to the original game though, especially support for larger teams, a while lot of quality of life improvements and more mods than you could dream of, including some very competitive AI that keep the game interesting even 15 years later.
Forged Alliance is the best RTS I have ever found. It has infinite replayability, because you can change up the AI opponents on a huge number of maps. Every game is different, so you learn to alter your play style on the fly. I started with Supreme Commander, then bought Forged Alliance as soon as it came out. I have returned to playing it again and again over the years.
That's great to hear Dan, it's not often such a game comes along! Did you ever try Supreme Commander 2? I'm intrigued that it's nowhere near as popular as Forged Alliance.
Try LOUD mod if you enjoy playing against AI on huge maps. It massively helps with performance issues and can run 5000 units real time without any lag (0 sec delay). It is rebalanced unfortunately by mod creators in some ways that I do not enjoy cause I am more familiar with FAF balance. It is manageable tho and you can add a lot of additional units from Total Mayhem or Black Ops unit packs that are purposefully balanced by mod creators so they are not destroying balance. All mods included in LOUD are tinkered in order to work perfectly with their AI and balance methods.
@@LevtNow Thanks for the recommendation, it's great to see LOUD being mentioned as FAF has been mentioned many times already.
Whether it's FAF or LOUD, it's great to see gamers have multiple options to keep this game going into the future.
@@twiglets2 I kinda made an oopsie cause LOUD was mentioned in video and I wrote this while watching xD. Nice vid tho!
Play Battle for Middle Earth 1 and 2 and the expansion of the 2 Wrath of the Which King. Superb game.
Really nice review for a casual player of Forged Alliance. I would just add that even for solo play FAF add some nice quality of live feature. SO if you don't want to exclusively play loud project or other on moddb I would suggest to play whit faf and not the base game. ;)
On a side node I'm currently participating in the Sanctuary project a indie game that try to be the successor of Forged Alliance and ad the approval of Chris Taylor the director of Forged Alliance. Have a nice day :D
Thank you for that additional insight - very helpful to have that in the comments for new players to see.
Best of luck on the Sanctuary project!
Official support for the Forged Alliance ended quite quick, only 1 real patch was released.
FAForever was supporting game for more than 10 years
BIG quality of life improvements, UI scaling for modern screens (4k support), balance, performance, AI improvements, multiple AI developers and AI tournaments, random map generator (it is very good), FAF's map maker is much better than the original one (credis to ozonex), automatic mod and map downloads from the mod and map vault where you can search for maps and leave feedback, coop campaing, custom sctipted maps (survivals, missions, minigames)
Unit packs that add ton of units, 1 more original faction, 2 more factions from TA
GIGANTIC UI IMPROVEMENTS, original game didn't even allow for key rebind
Visual improvements, engine improvements, many iterations of balance improvements
16 player support and with some mods 32 players support
adaptive maps (amount of reclaim and resource spots is adjustable)
New game modes (basicly mods but some mods require more than just putting files in mod folder so they can't be easy distributed without breaking your game and FAF puts them is separate instances so it does not break stuff)
Now working on shaders and more engine improvements
Rating system and moderation
also FAF unites lots of players together so it is easy to find support, modding support and everything
Frequent tournaments with money prizes
there is like 1 new unit called t3 mobile aa... introduced because t2 mobile aa can't hit t3 air reliably and in old balance whoever wins air could just bomb t2 antiair of attacker and then bomb the rest of the attack and air can attack anywhere... (well i guess that info only matters for those who played on old patch for years and seen how meta evolved into rush of t3 air)
I can't believe they stopped supporting the game so quickly, a good thing FAF is around then.
32 players sounds insane, have you ever done that? My PC would melt
@@twiglets2 if you don't build much stuff it surely will be fine.
Game's net code and p2p architecture will become more of a problem, and the fact that game stop and wait if someone loses data/packets during the game...
@@twiglets2 ive seen 16 player matches regularly with high level players, so no turtling, but rushing, and a lot of units on the map.
with modern cpus not a problem. single core performance increased a lot in the last decade. it can get slow, especially when 1000 air superiority fighters are dishing it out, but after that fight it runs smooth again.
@@certaindeath7776 ASFs were fixed in one of recent patches btw. No more -10 speed while 1k on 1k asf fight, if game was around 0 before fight it probably won’t go below -2 while fighting, if -2 no lower than -4 etc.
@@MrVladko0 true, i read about that, but completely forgot, that they fixed something, the slowdown had something to do with the range indicators, and fixing that made the game even smoother.
i started playing in 2009 and i still come back to it every few months or so. whats keep me coming back to supreme commander is the balance. if the enemy can build a nuke and still fight you off then you did something worng.
That's interesting as you so often hear the reason an RTS is bad or frustrating is because the balance is bad. It's refreshing to hear of a game that has a GOOD balance - it seems to be a rare quality!
For those curious, there is a large online multiplayer community via the FAF launcher, heaps of mods etc and always game lobbies going.
Don't attempt MP via the in-game launcher, use the FAF launcher and you'll find heaps.
How?
@@okccitizen4400 Download forged Alliance Forever - search faforever in google and you'll see it :)
On the Topic of Forged Alliance Forever: FAF also sports a map and mod vault with community created maps and mods for easy access
Thanks for the additional info, I'm assuming the majority of the healthy player numbers are using FAF, so awesome
You can also play the original and custome campaign in Co-Op.
And it also supports ladder mode!
@@kackfresse84 That's awesome thanks for sharing that, Co-op on this game must be awesome
@@MoDlegion The game that keeps on giving!
btw FAF (forged alliance forever) has mod support as well. it has tabs like steam workshop for mods and maps. you can easily manage your mods there.
Forged Alliance is my favorite RTS of all time. The thing I love the most about SupCom is the sheer sscale of units colideing at each other, starting small at the beggining at ending up as a chaotic battlefield with thousand and thousand units killing each other from small T1's to gigantic T4. The only RTS that comes to my mind that had such a scale was Sins of Solar Empire. Also very complex economy system and factions diversity in looks, unit differences and strategies.
@ivanvoloder8114 Such an amazing game! Personally I think it could be the best RTS ever made, but that's a bold claim!
The game is still alive, there is a large community on a community server called Forged Alliance Forever with a lot of graphics and balance update.
I haven't tried it myself but have heard many good things about FAF. Can you reliably find multiplayer games on there or do you still have to wait around for others?
@@twiglets2 they are definetly enough player to find games.
this remains the benchmark for traditional RTS, nothing even comes close, unless we start comparing slightly different genres and consider games like company of heroes, total war, civilization, etc.. which we really shouldn't, because its apples and oranges. supreme commander has aged like fine wine, even graphically, the simple and clean aesthetic is timeless. it should be noted that many developers have tried to improve upon the formula (planetary annihilation, ashes of the singularity, etc) but none have managed to succeed, so far..
Well made video. Though you just forgot to add one crucial detail in my opinion. Reclaiming mass on the map, and from the wrecks of the battles is additional but instrumental part of the economy.
Thanks for highlighting reclaiming mass. I must confess that by the time of constructing the video I had only just begun to appreciate how good reclaiming mass can be! I'm still very much a beginner but damn this game is addictive.
Ah Supreme Commander, literally the reason to own an i7 LGA 1366 proc (had an OC'd 920 to an easy 3ghz) at the time. :)
FAF client is the only way to play supreme commander highly recommended. 100s or players always online playing
Thanks for letting everyone know. It's useful to hear from people who use it and are happy with it. Long live SCFA!
Thanks for doing a video on my fav RTS, If hardware wasnt such a limiting factor in the day i think it would have been more popular. Always happy to see more exposure and you even gave a shout-out to the community run platform FaF. Thanks !
I totally agree, I watched the trailer so many times when it came out but always knew my system didn't stand a chance of running it. Felt like a kid again when I eventually fired it up.
So good to see FAF as active as it is, a shame more old games don't have such things! SC is very lucky to have such dedicated fans (but fully deserves them!)
of course its worth it, SC and SCFA are amazing, best RTS ever
A few players have said this to me, and it's not until now that I really appreciate how bloody awesome these games are!
I haven't tried SC2 though, is that just a bit crap?
@@twiglets2 i didn't even know SC2 existed, Thanks ! looking at steam seems a lot of folk like it., with a few die hards lamenting an apparent loss of depth and features but with others pointing out that mods rescue it, Maybe you should apply your expert hand and particular review style to it as a comparison we can trust ? including the plunge into FAF mod
@@murphymagic33 It's an interesting one, I've seen the same reviews as you and it's a real mixed bag. I suppose we should expect big fans of the original to be unsure about a sequel. I do have it in my Steam library just need to fire it up at some point.
Thanks for how you review! The 30 sec overview is excellent!! Thanks 🙏
@@Ltleon2k2 glad to hear it! I've had good feedback on that so will continue to include it
Excellent essay.
Really well thought out and delivered.
Instant Sub and Like.
Thank you I'm glad you enjoyed it! Let me know if there are any other games you would like me to look at, more than happy to take suggestions.
The reason we call supcom pinnacle of RTS is because no RTS after it even attempted to reach its level of grandeur. Supcom is a big investment in development but RTS in later years rarely have a dedicated shareholder and company to make something as epic. It's the industry itself that prevents something the level of Supcom to exist.
More importantly, the very foundation of Supcom is about scale, to distinguish true RTS from the lesser RTT game which Chris Taylor (Supcom lead designer) argued about. Pretty much, he tried to make a game to prove his point.
To be the pinnacle is the sole purpose for Supcom to exist. You don't get a better reason to say a game is epic more than that.
An important note: there was still several few hidden features that the video didn't explore. These features are those that would make RTS players smile and often time only show themselves when you were trying out the game.
Even if you don't like to play, you can watch several matches of supcom first to get a general understanding of the scale. There are a lot that couldn't be told with words.
Best. RTS. Ever.
Good to note that forged alliance forever is still blooming player run community for such an old game
I didn't get a chance to play it myself but for a game to have such community support is amazing, something most RTS games could only dream of!
I’ve been playing these games for years and it’s been a joy to play it. Things I like about it is the base building and building massive armies of destruction and just watching armies go out each other with just all of these lasers and guns it’s awesome
I felt like a kid when playing it, the kid that couldn't afford a computer to play the game when it originally release. Finally, I can experience the awesomeness!
and if you are bad player like me 😅 you can always enjoy Gyle casting some matches 🙂
Oh I hadn't heard of Gyle while making this video. Thanks for mentioning them, it looks like a very cool channel!
I have been convinced! Installing now. :D great video, thank you!
I'm glad you found it useful, let us know how you get on!
I’ve been playing this game with my dad and siblings for years. It’s always a blast and never gets old. I’ve personally been playing since I was 10, and always find myself revisiting it every few weeks.
it's been a long time since i've played the game but it's the best rts i know. The units are cool, you can have many, the experimental units are awesome. Maps are huge. If I had more time, I would also actively play FAF and not just watch recordings.
Watching the recordings is still a great way to support the game, but hopefully you find some time to pick it up again soon.
i never understood why games like age of empires is so popular, when there is SC:FA. SC is way better in terms like overview, advanced unit commands etc.
played cossacks with friends some time ago, which is similar to aoe, but more units on the field, and i quit after kicking their asses in a MP game, and said i am never gonna touch that game again with its close in zoom level without overview, and no unit command chaining available.
I have to admit I've found it difficult going back to other games since SC mostly due to the zoom (or lack of). I've heard it described as the best RTS ever made, and now I've given it a proper try I have few reasons to disagree with them.
Why AoE and CoH are so popular instead? I really don't know! Perhaps it simply comes down to marketing, not the quality of the games themselves? SC definitely deserves to be more well known than it is in my opinion. Cossacks ain't that bad! :D
Very well done friend! I enjoyed this detailed review, it helped me extremely!
@ToasrwdOmega I'm glad it was helpful!
My introduction to SupCom was SupCom2 on Xbox 360, was very pleased early on so I acquired the original(again, on Xbox360) had many great times... burnt out a console or two. Thoroughly enjoyed it.
I've always loved watching FA and FAF content, dreaming of the day I can join in the fray, even with videos where people affectionately bully the person recording. I still miss Brink of course.
I've not met many gamers who play this game or similar games on console. I'm assuming you enjoyed the experience! But I always thought the controls would be tricky on console?
Happy to see you actually covered one of the games i did talked about, hope you find it enjotable
I got there eventually, thank you for the recommendation!
It was a pleasure, I had not played this game at all and I'm glad i have (regret not having done so sooner). I can see why players say it's the greatest RTS as I really can't fault it myself.
Do you play either FAF or LOUD mod? I seem to remember you recommended one before but I might be wrong.
@@twiglets2 never heard of LOUD, but i did mention FAF for the multiplayer aspect
seems like a very underrated channel. +rep
Thank you, hope you enjoyed the video. Any suggestions for future games / subjects are always welcome :)
Being a turtle can win you the game in Supreme Commander if you manage to build, among other things, nukes or T3 artillery. Turtles will enjoy.
I'm glad to hear it! I had assumed that due to the mass deposits being spread across the map it would force you to expand to be competitive.
I guess if you can get those nukes and artillery you can cause damage from the safety of your base, or am I misunderstanding?
@@twiglets2 Yes, you can cause alot of damage. They are usually refered to as "end gamers" because they are so powerful.
In a 1 on 1 game turtleing might be harder tho since you will be at a serious disadvantage economy wise.
@@olfens Thanks for offering your expertise. it's interesting to me but I'm sure potential new players will find this useful when reading through the comments too.
Supreme commander has by far the best combined arms warfare I've seen in an rts
I must confess I didn't realise how insanely popular it is all of these years later. My system didn't have a chance of running it back in the day so I had to miss out unfortunately. It's great to see the longevity though.
For those coming back to supcom there's a new game in the making called Santuary: Shattered Sun which basically is the next supreme commander. The developers are working together with and pulling inspiration from the original supcom developers, and the game feels both original and retaining all that we love about the original game.
@kasper_rubin thanks for the heads up!
I'll save you your time.
Is it worth it?
*YES!*
Hell yes!
YES! YES IT IS!
Glory to the Princess! Purge the heretics of the way!
Best RTS evuuurrr
one correction for you is that FAF client is for both PVP and modding. PVE is very much active in that community, and the patches improve the gameplay immeasurably
Thank you for the correction - much appreciated!
"Turtling won't win you the game"
Me : laughs in Mavor
I'm glad I said that as a few others have told me how to win as a turtle which makes me happy :D
@@twiglets2 also FaF has coop and more missions than the base game, id definitely recommend checking it out.
Of course it is bc its the best RTS ever made still to this day!
I'm glad to hear you're still enjoying it!
so this is like machines at war 3 but 3d. sounds cool honestly
I must have poured multiple thousands of hours into this game. I think it is the best, most fun RTS ever made.
There are also many cool mods released for it.
The game is dirt cheap these days.
If you love RTS, then you want this game in your collection.
Well said!
Best game ever with a great active community. Come to FAF !!
It's great to see how passionate people still are for the game and the community, I wasn't expecting it when I started playing / researching the game!
Good video. Placing some more focus on FAF would have been great as it is the defacto way to play the game today
Thanks for the feedback Franz. I knew at the time that FAF was important (very important!) but I didn't quite appreciate HOW important it was. So many comments are saying how good it is and it's basically why people are still playing the game.
It's great to see and if I could turn back the clock it definitely would have had way more coverage in the video. Perhaps a standalone video is required!
Great video, thank you so much!! So this decade old game has no problem running on modern operating system like Windows 11?
@simonchoi973 Not that I'm aware of, it runs absolutely fine on Windows 10 so I see no reason for windows 11 to be an issue
@@twiglets2 thank you once again!! 😊
You haven't lived until you've fired a stack of tanks from a fortress-sized cannon or built an end-game flying Roomba and cleaned out an opposing base.
Haha Roomba!
I played supcom and the addon since release and i still haven't played any of the campaigns.
Why is this video 15min long and not 10sec with a giant Yes? ..
@botmistick7788 Damnit, I knew I was doing something wrong!
so is "supreme commander" and "Supreme commander forged alliance different games?
Yep! Forged Alliance was an expansion of the original Supreme Commander, but it's big so pretty much it's own game. After Forged Alliance came Supreme Commander 2 but that isn't as popular, Forged Alliance seems the most popular version of the game.
Hello
Will you do a review on Planetary annihilation ?
Hello! Thank you for the suggestion, I've been keeping my eye on Planetary annihilation: Titans, is that the version you would suggest? I will look into it
@@twiglets2 well that the DLC. The question is will you do both or will you do review like how you did supcom?
I just want to know if PA stand the scrutiny. For imo interesting Idea. Terrible execution
@@nuruddinshah684 It looks like you can buy both on Steam, I will take a look but it seems reviewing the DLC too would be the best plan - thank you for the suggestion
@@twiglets2 DONT FORGET TO GET IT ON A SELL.
Nice Game :DDD
A great game!
Thank you for this video, one piece of information is missing that makes this game unfortunately very very sadly so not worth the time: all RTS are single core games, meaning, there is little to no multi threading on any RTS out there and this stalls any late game significantly in case just one person does not have a CPU that is at least 3,7ghz, and with CPUs these days becoming very efficient running at ~3ghz per core, this makes it efficient for multi threading games, but very poor for RTS games. So a new multithreading engine needs to be created for RTS to flourish again.
One more thing: forged alliance forever was a really nice addition to the gaming community, as steam has no interest in the games performance itself and they totally suck at improving game performance, in fact steam even breaks games intentionally to force players into playing newer titles, that suck, supreme commander 2 sucks hard, is a very very lean version of forged alliance and planetary annihilation is a sad excuse for both a forged alliance or total annihilation successor. Forge alliance forever though has lost most of the lead developers years ago and has patched the game beyond belief, breaking many game balances, performance fixes and mods in the process.
Looks like ZeroK
How have I never heard of that game before? Looks very interesting indeed!
Bro already messes up his build he moving his com to much
Yea, and those 6 batteries on 2:40 hit me hard.
+193 FAF!
Best stategy game in the world all the rest is just plain trash when you compare them with supreme comander
I've not played SC2 but it seems players don't enjoy it. Did they just screw it up for the second one?
@@twiglets2 They had to program it to be compatible with xbox so it came a "simplified" game i think
@@rafaellouro3120 Simplified is an understatement, Tech isn't maintained building side, you research it, and if you want another faction mid match, have to capture an engi AND build the research station. Also the balance skewed heavily in Cybran favor and Illuminant have almost zero navy, but a ton of hovering land units(one can't attack while hovering across water for some awful reason.) Oh, dedicated turrets are weaker than factory mounted equivalents...
@@twiglets2 They did a rework of resource expendatures and building worked in the game, completely altering the play style. They also completely demolished unit diversity, even entirely removing the navy from the Aeon faction. Seraphim are not present in the game, removing one of the factions and therefore making the game even less diverse in it's cast. They also implemented a research system, which while interesting at the time, it fails to bridge the gap left by the poor unit diversity. The combat in SupCom2 essentially boils down to whichever army has the most units. Experimental are massively underpowered, and the games are much shorter than the epic battles of FA.
@@Deepkeel Well that sounds....a bit crap!
Have you ever played Planetary Annihilation:Titans?
This is the first I've heard of that game, reading some reviews now and people are talking about using planets to destroy other planets, it sounds mental haha
@@twiglets2 oh it is. Basically a newer version of Supreme Commander. I own it on Steam. Quite fun, even if I'm bad.
@@SableTwoSeven one could say that they took it a little overboeard with the scale aspekt of that game and the subsequent balance problems but im no expert on PA
Bad game! Supcom crushes it
@@jacobg2134 does SC have an active multiplayer community still? Always heard amazing things about that game.
I also recommend the even newer "version" of SupCom: B.A.R - Beyond All Reason which is free to play and amazingly optimized and sweet gfx, it's predecessor is Zero-K, this is the lo-fi version, basically, and then there is the classic, Total Annihilation.
Thanks for the recommendations!