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Is there something the C&C community should know? Mail it to MacMark@t-online.de and let's all read it here!
[2003-02-22]
32-player-mode - FreeCNC team interview
One of the FreeCNC programmers is dreaming of a 32-player mode in FreeCNC. Other very interesting features are planned. Read the english interview that the german Holarse guys did with Tim and zx64, two of the FreeCNC programmers.
[2003-02-19]
Ladder canned but chat channel up
I asked Ted:
Ted answered:
- The C&C ladder will be going away, but the chat channel should definitely be up. We'll take a look at it.
-VT
Thus after exactly five years of CNC ladder, it's closed. We're now back in the past when there was playing on WChat, but no ladder. The first winners of the ladder in March 1998 were Mastablue for GDI and Rquiem for NOD. In late January 2003 the ladder went out of order and according to Ted the ladder will go away at all. What's left for us is Case's ladder.
[2003-02-10]
Ted starring in CNC
I asked Ted:
- Hi Ted,
the ending movie of CNC shows your name as part of the cast. Is this really you? Which movie sequence is the one you act in?
Regards,
MacMark
Ted answered:
- Yeah, I was the guy typing in the chair, and then I think I got killed – or something. It’s been a while
So Ted was the "NOD Officer" in the CNC movies. This confirmed my older news Westwood workers in C&C movies.
[2003-02-04]
Ladder will be fixed and Westwood will be closed end of March
I asked Ted a few days ago by email:
His answer is:
- Mark,
Westwood has been closed. While the game lobbies will remain operational, the status of the ladders for the older games is unknown.
I'll see if we can fix this for now.
I mailed back:
- Hi Ted,
what does "closing" mean? Are Westwood and the Westwood people now a full part of EA?
I noticed that the CNC chat channel on WChat is not available. Only RA and Monopoly chat are visible.
Many players (okay not that many like for your newer games) but faithful players would be happy if the CNC ladder would stay alive.
Regards,
MacMark
Update of [2003-02-08]
Westwood moves to California
Ted answered:
- Westwood has been a part of EA for the past 5 years, but they are closing this office and moving some of the personnel to California to continue working on our C&C titles.
I'm not sure what we can do about the ladders, but I will take your concerns under advisement.
-VT
I mailed back:
- Hi Ted,
I'm sorry to hear EA is closing the original Westwood Studios. But I'm glad that at least some of you can go on with their work. And from what I know California is not that bad ;-)
Will you move too and can I reach you by email then?
I wish you and the other people I knew at Westwood the best!
Regards,
MacMark
[end of update section]
Update of [2003-02-10]
Ted unsure about his own moving
Ted answered:
- I should have the same email address for a while. As for moving to CA, I'm not sure I will or not. Still looking at all my options...
-VT
[end of update section]
I guess "game lobbies" refers to the game chat channels. It looks like we will still be able to play CNC and chat on WChat. We will get the ladder fixed one more time at least. But we can only hope that the ladder will stay alive in the future.
I did some research on the web and found this:
- After reporting that third-quarter profits were up 48% over the previous year's, Electronic Arts announced that it was consolidating its Los Angeles, Irvine, and Las Vegas developers into a single development studio, to be located in new offices in LA. Since the Las Vegas unit was, for all intents and purposes, Westwood Studios, this means Westwood will be closing its doors.
The main reason cited was that, with the release of the massively multiplayer space game Earth and Beyond this past October, Westwood had no new projects in the works. Westwood founder Louis Castle will most definitely be making the transition to the new LA studio, as will an undisclosed number of others working on the Command & Conquer franchise. The fate the rest of Westwood's roughly 100 employees is not known at this time.
EA Pacific in Irvine, which has been handling the C&C franchise for the last year, including the soon to be released Command & Conquer: Generals , will be left mostly intact after the move. Currently the group is beginning work on an expansion pak to Generals .
The current EA Los Angeles is the developer of the Medal of Honor franchise, and has remained housed in the Dreamworks Interactive offices since EA bought MOH from Dreamworks some years back. The consolidation will enable the MOH team to move into the new offices with the other EA developers.
In fact, EA is pushing its new LA studios as huge, uber-studio. Although a specific location has not yet been decided on, it will apparently be located not far from several major film studios, and eventually employ more people than any EA studio besides the company's main headquarters in Redwood, CA.
In any case, Westwood Studios, creators of the classic PC RPG series Legends of Kyrandia and Land of Lore , all but invented real-time strategy games with Dune: Battle for Arrakis , and, of course, gave us Command & Conquer , will no longer exist as of March 31.
I'm sorry to hear that EA is closing Westwood Studios (and some other EA owned studios) to build a big new studio in Los Angeles. I wish my friends at Westwood Studios the best and hope they can continue their work somehow, maybe in the new L.A. based studio.
In case we would lose CNC online gaming at WChat, we had to move to Kali or use FreeCNC if it get's it's own online gaming service in the future.
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