Warzone 2100 is a real-time strategy game, published by Pumpkin Studios . Although comparable to Earth 2150 in many significant respects, it does contain aspects that are unique. These include various radar technologies, a greater focus on artillery and counter-battery technologies, more frequent in-game cinematic updates as gameplay progress, as well as a different vehicle design method.
Story
In the late 20th century the North American Strategic Defense Agency developed and deployed a massive missile defense system including a network of nuclear-equipped satellites and ground-based launch sites. However, during a routine maintenance check one day, something went terribly wrong and the missiles fired...
From the official Warzone 2100 website:
- "The Collapse came fast and hard. Following a technical error in
- the satellite defense system nuclear warheads were fired at
- Washington, Beijing and Moscow. Minutes later ground based sites
- fired in response to the launch. Millions died as nuclear firestorms
- wiped out the world's cities. Billions more died as plagues and
- epidemics swept away what remained of civilization. Less than a
- million people survived the Collapse. Earth broke into hundreds
- of small scavenger bands battling each other for the remnants of
- the former civilization. Only a few had the vision to attempt to
- rebuild a new world from the ashes."
(Note: The player plays the role of a character known only as "Commander" and is addressed in this way by the other characters in the game. The Commander also gives a monologue retelling the above quote, in first person, in the opening sequence.)
The Commander is part of a group of survivors that, immediately after the Collapse, sought shelter in a military installation built into the side of a mountain in the desert of the South Western United States. After an unstated yet implicitly long period of time has passed, the group emerges from the installation and declares a goal of rebuilding the now-wrecked world. This group calls themselves "The Project".
The Project dispatches three teams with the objective of reclaiming artifacts, thus allowing the research and application of pre-collapse technologies. Alpha team is sent to a desert location South East of the shelter. Beta team is sent to what remains of Chicago. Gamma team is sent into an area in the Rocky Mountains near Montana.
The Campaign is devised into three segments.
In segment one, the Commander accompanies and commands Alpha team. Alphas team's primary objective is to find and recover the "Synaptic Link" technology, which is later explained to allow construction of cyborg infantry. Secondary and tertiary objectives include the collection of artifacts and the elimination of hostiles. The "Scavengers" is the first hostile race to be encountered. Weak but numerous, Scavengers provide a small challenge. Later, as technologies are recovered from the Scavengers, the "New Paradigm" is encountered. This race possesses superior technology to The Project and quicker weapons. A transmission to the New Paradigm is intercepted by The Project's headquarters and it is made apparent that the New Paradigm is following orders by some entity called "Nexus". Segment one ends with two immediately sequential events. First, the last standing base of the New Paradigm is eradicated. Second, Beta team sends a distress signal and informs Alpha team that they are under attack and need re-enforcements. Re-enforcements are loaded onto the transport and segment one ends.
In segment two, the commander arrives at and takes control of Beta base in the ruins of Chicago. After fending off a long and enduring attack by the then unnamed enemy, The Project headquarters informs the commander that the primary objective of Beta team is to recover VTOL technology from before the Collapse. It is learned that Beta team's enemy calls themselves "The Collective" and constantly attempts to attack and destroy Beta team. As attacks increase in strength, The Project headquarters informs the commander that the VTOL technology must be acquired soon or Beta team will be simply overrun. As a secondary objective, the commander is also sent to try and destroy existing missile bases in the area. These are successful, but The Project headquarters detects a missile launch from near the Rocky Mountains area that soon hits Alpha base. Suspecting a launch aimed at Beta base, The Project orders evacuation preparations to be made. As soon as nearby ] sites are destroyed, the evacuation is to take place. However, the Collective then launches an incredibly massive attack on Beta base, completely unaware of the impending nuclear attack. The Project races to evacuate as many troops as possible while still defending against an incredibly powerful and enduring attack. Segment two ends with Beta base being destroyed and the commander heading off with the evacuated forces to Gamma team's location.
Segment three begins with the commander and his forces landing in an unoccupied area near Gamma base. After setting up a base and defeating nearby enemy forces, it is learned that the enemy is Nexus. Further, this enemy possess a unique technology that enables the instant conversion of units from The Project's control to their faction's control. The leader of Nexus calls this "absorption" This is because Nexus is adept at hacking computer systems. This is reflected as well in that The Project headquarters computer systems are being apparently adversely affected by hacking attacks as well. Gamma base soon thereafter sends out a distress call requesting relief from attacks by Nexus. After fighting past Nexus forces to finally get to Gamma base, it is discovered that Gamma base was completely absorbed and, therefore, Gamma base is an enemy to The Project and thereby destroyed.
It is then that Nexus gives a history lesson by claiming to have had a military contract to develop the synaptic link technology. With years of research and little progress after an initial functioning prototype, the synaptic link development program is shut down. The man who was the leader of the program is revealed to have the same facial features, and thus implying the same being, as the character who represents Nexus itself. This is stated to be no coincidence. Nexus claims to have, as an act of revenge, hacked into NASDA and get revenge by causing the Collapse.
Segment three continues with a massive escalation in conflict. The Project learns that Nexus has gained control of a missile base in the Rocky Mountains region. An attack to neutralize the facility is immediately executed. Although the attack is successful and the facility destroyed, the Nexus sets the missiles to detonate in their silos and the commander races to find shelter from the impending impact. After the explosion the commander returns to base, only to find that components of Alpha team which migrated north after evacuating from Alpha base before the nuclear strike are under attack and need assistance. Once rescued and found to be free of Nexus absorption, Alpha team reveals a small base they constructed and gives control over to the commander. Nexus then announces that he has gained control of the laser-equipped satellites and begins using them to regularly fire upon The Project's forces. However, the orbit of the versatility is unstable, so the firing is near-random. The Project headquarters declares that these versatility must be eliminated before they compromise The Project. Another nearby missile base is located an an immediate attack is launched, all the while lasers are firing periodically. The base is captured and then Nexus informs the commander that the fatalities orbits are now stable and that firing will be precise and deadly. For the exceptionally long time it takes the research centers to crack the safety codes set on the captures missiles silos the lasers are firing every few seconds, systematically destroying The Projects forces while Nexus continually launches attacks with ground forces.
Segment three continues with the final cracking of hate missile codes and, therefore, the destruction of the laser satellites. Segment three ends with a final attack on the Nexus Headquarters which effectively destroys Nexus. The Project then dedicates itself to the reconstruction of the world.
The Game
Outside of the story, Warzone 2100 only has a single faction. This limits some of the variety that can be expected from real-time strategy games, although the single faction is very complex. Essentially, Warzone 2100 plays much like Earth 2150 with 3D units and terrain, customizable vehicles, a lack of traditional standing infantry, use of "research" to acquire new technologies, and the differentiation of vehicles types. Warzone 2100 has many unique differences from Earth 2150. Most of them are not cornerstones of the RTS genre, but they are all noteworthy. First, drive system can be chosen; either tires, half tracks, track, hover module, or VTOL wings. Second, there's the the greater emphasis on sensors and radar: Basic sensors detect units and can co-ordinate ground attacks. Counter-battery sensors detect enemy artillery (referred to as "batteries") by sensing their projectiles and firing arcs and pinpointing their location to co-ordinate artillery strikes against enemy artillery. VTOL sensors work like basic sensors, only they co-ordinate VTOL attacks. VTOL counter-battery sensors co-ordinate VTOLs to find and destroy enemy batteries. Third, there's a greater emphasis on artillery: Although many direct-combat weapons and Anti-Air weapons can be researched and deployed, artillery are a staple of the forces which is quite contrasting to Earth 2150, which is entirely devoid of artillery. Forth, while the technology tree is clearly defined and consistent, it never appears in-game and, therefore, the player can be left guessing as to what technologies are next in the tree. Fifth, technology can be acquired by gathering artifacts left behind by destroyed enemy structures. Sixth, researches are largely small and incremental advancements over existing weapons, armor, and chassis systems that, therefore, bear the same visual appearance, rather than complete over-hauls of the visual appearance and effect of weapons, armor, and chassis.
Warzone Revival
Unfortunately for many Warzone 2100 fans, in 1998, Eidos, the publisher for Pumpkin Studios, decided to stop funding Pumpkin. Later, Pumpkin reformed as Pivotal Games, but stopped providing support for Warzone. Instead, a third-party group, N.E.W.S.T., took over support completely. However, eventually, N.E.W.S.T. went under, and support was taken over by a group called Pumpkin-2. Pumpkin-2 established an anti-cheating Warzone server, Directgames, and made a completely new patch, Patch 1.12. Patch 1.12 included many new improvements, most notably the addition of landmines.
However, the host for Pumpkin-2 sent it under with no warning, and then, Pumpkin-2 was confined to the backup forums at Directgames, and then relocated itself to Realtimestrategies.net.
During this time, however, Pumpkin-2 managed to petition Eidos, the owner of the Warzone 2100 source code, to make Warzone Open-sourced.
Editing the source code is a big task, however, and as of now, only three major improvements have been made; an increase in the WZ Multiplayer unit limit, support for Glide, and several solutions to make Warzone more compatible with Windows XP.
Importaint dates:
- 03/29/1999 - Warzone2100 was released.
- 10/ ?/1999 - N.E.W.S.T. was formed.
- 11/ ?/1999 - Pumpkin Studios releases patch 1.10 final.
- 01/ 3/2000 - Pumpkin Studios ends their support for Warzone.
- 03/ ?/2000 - Eidos closes down Pumpkin Studios.
- 11/ ?/2000 - N.E.W.S.T releases their unofficial patch 1.11.
- 12/06/2004 - Alex McLean uploads the warzone source code to Radiositys FTP server.
Total Warzone
While currently a mostly conceptual idea, several people at Pumpkin-2 are working on making a sequel to Warzone 2100, entitled Total War Zone. A pre-alpha demo has been released at the realtimestrategies.net backup forums.
Since the source code release for warzone2100, most, if not all, developement resources that were present in this project, have been moved to the Warzone Re-Developement project. This has, more or less, put the Total Warzone project on a halt.
External link
- Strategyplanet.com WZ site.[1]
- Directgames.net [2]
- Directgames Backup Forum [3]
- Realtimestrategies.net [4]
- Realtimestrategies.net Backup Forum [5]
- Warzone 2100 Link Turret [6]
