Green.. Becomes Round...

The insignia of abandoned souls, brought back into the light by those who give a care.

The year is 2007, and Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars is released to the public. As time passed after wards, the C&C 3 Mod SDK, which allows owners of the game to modify it in a various number of ways, becomes available for download and use. Time passes once more, and September 21st arrives, marking the release of what can be considered the greatest example of what can be done with the SDK: The Forgotten.

The Forgotten is an immense modification of C&C 3, to the point where one could call it an unofficial expansion pack of the main game in terms of content. The mod's main features include a brand new faction, new maps for playing against the computer or other people online, and a full single-player campaign with high definition full motion videos (videos involving real life actors). Let us start by taking a closer look at the new faction, one that is literally the main focus of the entire mod: the Forgotten (yes, the title is named after them). The Forgotten themselves are a group of individuals that are afflicted with Tiberium-based illnesses (Tiberium is the main source of income in C&C 3, story-wise it is an economical gift as well as an environmental curse to humanity and Earth in general), and have been mutated and shunned from society as a result. As the years came and went, the mutant population become more and more fed up with being abandoned and ignored by humanity, to the point where one particular mutant, Salvador Trogan, decide to take action. By uniting many of the Forgotten under his banner, Trogan would take the newly unified force and use it to strike at the ones who had shunned them in the first place, thus begins the campaign of their namesake.

The Forgotten are not the most advanced faction in the game by any means, however this is easily remedied by the uniqueness and sheer versatility of their units and structures. For example; just like with the main factions, the Forgotten need power plants in order to keep their bases up and running. The main twist is the ability for the player to add certain defensive weapons or a power upgrade to each power plant, with one add-on per plant. This means that one could build a couple Forgotten power plants in front of their base and add some pillboxes and rocket cannons to each one, there-by giving the enemy player a rather nasty surprise. Another, equally humorous example is the War Camper; a transport vehicle that can carry a single unit and utilize a rocket turret to defend against aircraft and lightly armored vehicles, allowing it to double as a hit and run attack vehicle if enough of them are present. Imagine the look on your opponent's face when he or she notices the lack of base power, only to find that was caused by a group of modified mini-vans. I have not even scratched the surface on this faction in terms of unit and structure composition, but I feel that you may something to like in their inventory of destruction.

The campaign itself is five missions long, with high definition full motion videos playing before, during, and after each one. The mission number is admittedly small, but this is mainly due to the fact that each one is not exactly a 'walk in the park' so to speak. Let me explain: mission one requires that you locate and capture a TV tower while busting through all of the enemies that stand your way, including (but not limited to) an entire enemy base. After that is done, your next objective is to defend said tower from wave after wave of increasingly difficult enemy attacks until the timer runs out. Note that this is only the first mission in the campaign, so you are particularly limited in terms of what units and structures that you can build, which only adds to the challenge. As for difficulty settings, I kindly suggest that those of you who are new to Real Time Strategy games should set it to easy, as the higher levels can be overwhelming for those who have not-so-good reaction times. As challenge as I make it sound, the campaign does not seem to be horribly impossible by any means, you just have to use your heads and you'll see the ending in no time.

Now that the single-player aspect of the mod has been described, let us now take a gander at what its like to fight against the Forgotten when a computer is controlling it. While not incredibly competent at the lower difficulty settings, the AI itself is just smart enough to keep a beginner on their toes on easy and even more so on normal. Hard and brutal on the other hand are a different story all together, as the AI for each of them is much more intelligent, and is prone to making players pay for messing up even a little bit. The brutal difficulty is the meaner of the two, as it can easily steamroll your base if you are not prepared for such an occurrence. Thankfully though, even a brutal AI can be defeated by a player who is at least a tad competent, though it is safe to say that a total newbie may want to start on easy or normal first.

The new campaign levels, skirmish maps, and all of the Forgotten's forces and buildings look absolutely gorgeous; incredibly large Tiberium canyons dividing huge chucks of the landscape, mutated dog-like creatures with bits of Tiberium growing out from their bodies, a giant underground monster destroying everything within the reach its tentacles, Ion Storms ravaging the surface and anything that is unlucky enough to get struck by the lightning, a large structure that is loaded to the brim with Tiberium crystals of multiple colors and sizes, the list goes on. I could continue to give countless other examples of the Forgotten's graphical quailty, but that would be one blog post all together in terms of size. Instead, I will put it in more simpler words; the sheer amount of details put into this mod's overall look is simply incredible. This is especially true if you consider the fact this is simply a modification of an already existing game, created through the use of its adjacent SDK among other fine programs

If you have played Real Time Strategy games before, then playing The Forgotten shouldn't be too hard to be honest. But if you are not exactly experienced in sending virtual armies to blow up a bunch of other armies, then I suggest that you play C&C 3 first, so that you can get a feel on how an RTS plays out. Of course, you could also throw caution clear out the window by playing The Forgotten campaign on hard if you really want to, just try not go into it thinking that its going to be easy, otherwise you will see a mission failed screen more often than not. Since this is a modification of C&C 3, that particular game has to be installed and patched up to 1.09 in order to get the mod set up properly so that you can play it. For more information regarding The Forgotten, simply go to its main site.

I leave you now with not one, but two videos for your viewing pleasure: