1. The source code for Red Alert 2 is rumored to be lost a very long time ago[0], so the fact that the Chrono Divide team was able to achieve this is quite amazing.
2. The Mental Omega mod project[1] is going strong, so RA2 is still worth playing today. Hopefully it will work in this browser-based version.
Mental Omega is rumoured to have the source code (and all tooling for the game) which is why their mod is so all encompassing beyond any reasonable limits of what the TS/RA2 engine is capable of
Video Game asset and source control retention was _terrible_. Hell, it's still terrible.
Prior to ~2010 we were simply deleting source code and assets for finished projects; either because they weren't owned by the developer due to a publishing deal, or because the developers didn't want to reuse their garbage code. Same follows for assets, often they were owned by the publisher and not the developer, but if the developer did happen to own them they'd rarely see reuse in future projects. And publishers didn't catch on to the value of data retention until remakes started to make serious money.
Nobody said every copy was lost, they said the copies in whatever repository Westwood handed over to EA were lost. There might still be a copy on one of the individuals involved in development's machines/backups/etc.
I loved Red Alert 2 so much at release. Always was the pinnacle of (single player) RTS for me. The over-the-top characters, the cheesy story, the terrain interactions...
Everything afterwards felt lame and was geared too much towards multiplayer balance, which does not interest me the least.
I love that they don't take themselves too seriously in this series. RA3 had some hilarious cutscenes with characters barely holding it together (the Soviet Premier was an underrated Tim Curry role IMO).
He looked up! It's vital to mention that in this moment, renowned character actor Tim Curry, to highlight the fact that he was going to space, chose to look up!
Starcraft becoming uber popular in Korea I think really hurt the RTS genre. I did play RTS games online when I was younger. But I think you're right, Everything went from lets make a fun game with a cool campaign, to lets make an Esport. Company of Heroes 1 to 3, Dawn of War 1 to 2, Age of Empires 1,2,3 vs 4. You can really see this.
I think the campaigns of StarCraft II are amazing (never played Broodwar unfortunately). However I kinda agree that StarCraft's success hurt the RTS genre, because it's just so freaking good. 15 years since release and there are still tournaments played, it's fun to watch and projects like Stormgate have a really hard time, because SC2 is the bar and it's super difficult to reach. In terms of unit legibility, responsiveness, balance, etc. The bad thing is, it's not an approachable game at all, it mainly is interesting in the competitive/eSport scene.
If I watch YT videos a la "New RTS games 2025/2026" there are very interesting projects which give me hope that SC2 is not the end of RTS games.
A lot of the new RTS games I think just end up trying to be StarCraft but not. Grey Goo for example was one that came out a few years ago and it was just Starcraft with a new skin. I am not saying Starcraft is a bad game, its a fantastic game (though I do prefer Warcraft). But it kind of sucks the air out of the genre.
Starcraft and Starcraft II, and Warcraft I,II,III had great campaigns. So it is kind of ironic that a lot of the games copying them cut the campaigns for the esports focus.
I think you're stretching your point too far if you think Grey Goo was just a SC clone... Grey Goo is clearly in the the C&C branch of RTS more than the StarCraft branch, and of course made by Petroglyph. It's macro-heavy base-building, not micro-heavy, even as the Goo, it doesn't play the same as SC at all. It's also more than a few years old now (10)... On release the focus was the campaign, it didn't even release with replay or observer mode for multiplayer.
Tempest Rising is a newer RTS (this year) that's also in the C&C style, its highlight is the campaign. (Multiplayer I think is basically in the go-to-discord phase already.) The real problem is that RTS is just an unpopular genre, whether it's taking design inspiration from the C&C branch or the SC branch.
The first StarCraft was Blizzard North at its peak. I recall how difficult it was to win just sending all your troops towards the enemy, because every unit had a comparatively cheap counter.
It was particularly visible in how, if you edited the map so that every pile of resources was 50k, so essentially endless, you'd arrive at a stalemate.
> It was particularly visible in how, if you edited the map so that every pile of resources was 50k, so essentially endless, you'd arrive at a stalemate.
Given (effectively) unlimited resources within base distance, Zerg undoubtedly have a fairly substantial advantage and will probably win. Assuming comparable player skills, of course.
Their remax time is 1/3-1/4 that of Protoss/Terran, they can tech-switch near instantaneously, and they have some of the most powerful endgame meta. This was true for SC1 and Brood War, and it's even more true for current SC2.
StarCraft was actually built by Blizzard Entertainment (formerly Silicon and Synapse), Blizzard North (Condor) were the team behind Diablo and Diablo 2.
If you think Grey Goo for just Starcraft with a new skin, check out Stormgate. They went so far to replicate almost all UI elements and put them in similar spots. With even things like the top ability bar which resembles Spear of Adun/coop commander interfaces in SC2.
There's a lot of things going against the RTS genre.
They're technically challenging to make and creatively hard to balance.
The public doesn't want to pay $60 upfront for a campaign when fun freemium games exist.
The UX does not work well on controller so a huge amount of console players will be out of reach.
Games tend to be quite long and because it's not team play matchmaking matters a lot. This push multiplayer into being highly competitive and not pushes out the casual players.
Seems like Clash Royale likes are the best we've come up with to modernize the genre but of course its very different.
The bottleneck is webgl. I'm not sure why exactly but firefox is pretty well known to have significantly worse webgl performance than can be achieved with chrome.
I would guess because the GPU world is messy and full of broken drivers full of hacks and workarounds, so it is rather a miracle that FF works so good, with the few engineers they have left.
(If you are on a chrome based browser, open chrome://gpu to get a glimpse into the work they have been doing just for your GPU and plattform)
Which is why sadly Web 3D never took off beyond ecommerce and visualisation tooling, with game studios rather focusing on streaming.
While on native games the engine can workaround the driver issues, Web 3D APIs are at the mercy of the browser sandbox, where studios don't have access to possible workarounds due to lack of feedback on API performance.
Since you broached the topic, I've got an open curiosity about projects like that: if I manufactured entirely new assets, completely independently from the source game (possibly not even matching the source; like a different "skin" or "theme"), and then used those assets in a "clone" (in all but assets) of the source game, would that run afoul of IP law? I'm aware that anything can be litigated, but is there some quirk of IP protection for that kind of thing, or would I be able to use the cloned source with completely new assets without really infringing on anything? Does the cloned (re-coded? recomposed? clean-roomed?) source cause issues or create some kind of legal link from the original assets to the unrelated ones?
Again, just idle curiosity. No actual intentions here, so just wondering if anyone has some deeper knowledge on the subject.
Game mechanics are not considered copyrightable[1]. If you had a clean room implementation with your own significantly different assets, it would be allowed.
However, the exact definitions of "significantly different" and "assets" is where things start to get fuzzy. While you could definitely make a very similar RTS game, exactly how similar can you get? EA doesn't own "military-themed RTS", but they probably do own "Soviets vs Allies with about 5 different unit types, air transports, and tesla coils." Getting even more fuzzy, are unit abilities considered assets, or game mechanics? It'd have to be worked out in court.
My gut feeling is these clone engines would probably lose in court. I think the specific expression of the general game mechanics being cloned here probably would constitute infringement. But there isn't much upside to the IP owners to pursue enthusiastic hobbyists cloning a 20+ year old game in a non-commercial way, so they let it slide.
[1] "Although Amusement World admitted that they appropriated Atari's idea, the court determined that this was not prohibited, because copyright only protects the specific expression of an idea, not the idea itself." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari,_Inc._v._Amusement_World...
I'm sure if EA could undo their release of Red Alert and C&C as open-source, they would.
OpenRA simply downloads a copy that it loads for the purpose of assets, but the engine is completely new, and it is very different from the orignal Red Alert. At this point, I don't think a single unit acts exactly the way it did in the original game. It's endlessly being rebalanced.
IIRC if you make entirely new assets you're good to go. OpenTTD (Open source version of Transport Tycoon Deluxe) has its own custom made assets, but can also be used with the original if you own them.
Not sure it's ever been proven definitively in court, though. And if you "made" custom assets that were exactly like the original ones only with a 1px color difference or something I'm sure you'd fall foul of it. What counts as different "enough" is always debatable.
Oh, awesome! Yeah, this is a great example of something that I would have guessed would kind of be "over the line" being that it looks similar enough to be an issue. I'm glad it's not, though! But, either way, it's a perfect practical example of what I was wondering about, so thanks!
It would probably be the usual clean room reverse engineering rules: one guy describes the assets to be cloned, and then another guy who has never seen the originals uses that documentation to create the replacements.
Once you've seen the originals, you're contaminated and no longer suitable for the role of doing the replacement work.
https://freedoom.github.io/ does that for the still proprietary DOOM assets. Though the DOOM engine itself is open source, so a slight different situation than Command and Conquer.
Man, what a waste of resources. It'd be funny if the client side just did a hash of the "uploaded" files, told the server the hash, and then the server can compare the hash and use the server copy of the assets, to save bandwidth. But as "What colour are your bits" (1) say, that'd still probably not be legal.
Oops, it's a browser based game, you still need the assets on the client side, i.e. in your local memory... never mind
It patches the game with a modernized UX, implements a new client-server multiplayer networking model, allows you to play the game on systems which don't support it like macOS, and adds better support for modding. Overall it just updates the experience to meet modern gaming expectations.
This game was a big part of my childhood. I ran a somewhat popular modding site for it, "RA2 Factory" (as well as "Tiberian Sun Factory"). I spent more time honing my dev skills building these sites as well as modding editor tools than I did actually playing with any mods though.
I even visited their studios in LA during a cross-country Amtrak trip. They were very kind, especially the community manager (whose name escapes me). I was given a tour and allowed to play Yuri's Revenge before its release. They gave me a Dune 2 box and C&C poster which I still have somewhere.
2. The Mental Omega mod project[1] is going strong, so RA2 is still worth playing today. Hopefully it will work in this browser-based version.
[0] https://forums.revora.net/topic/107344-red-alert-2-engine-so...
[1] https://mentalomega.com/
So if they had it they'd would have almost certainly included RA2 in that as well.
Not arguing with you, just saying if that's true, it's insane.
Prior to ~2010 we were simply deleting source code and assets for finished projects; either because they weren't owned by the developer due to a publishing deal, or because the developers didn't want to reuse their garbage code. Same follows for assets, often they were owned by the publisher and not the developer, but if the developer did happen to own them they'd rarely see reuse in future projects. And publishers didn't catch on to the value of data retention until remakes started to make serious money.
Everything afterwards felt lame and was geared too much towards multiplayer balance, which does not interest me the least.
I love that they don't take themselves too seriously in this series. RA3 had some hilarious cutscenes with characters barely holding it together (the Soviet Premier was an underrated Tim Curry role IMO).
barely holds laughter back and takes a break
SPACE!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1Sq1Nr58hM
If I watch YT videos a la "New RTS games 2025/2026" there are very interesting projects which give me hope that SC2 is not the end of RTS games.
Starcraft and Starcraft II, and Warcraft I,II,III had great campaigns. So it is kind of ironic that a lot of the games copying them cut the campaigns for the esports focus.
Tempest Rising is a newer RTS (this year) that's also in the C&C style, its highlight is the campaign. (Multiplayer I think is basically in the go-to-discord phase already.) The real problem is that RTS is just an unpopular genre, whether it's taking design inspiration from the C&C branch or the SC branch.
It was particularly visible in how, if you edited the map so that every pile of resources was 50k, so essentially endless, you'd arrive at a stalemate.
Given (effectively) unlimited resources within base distance, Zerg undoubtedly have a fairly substantial advantage and will probably win. Assuming comparable player skills, of course.
Their remax time is 1/3-1/4 that of Protoss/Terran, they can tech-switch near instantaneously, and they have some of the most powerful endgame meta. This was true for SC1 and Brood War, and it's even more true for current SC2.
They're technically challenging to make and creatively hard to balance.
The public doesn't want to pay $60 upfront for a campaign when fun freemium games exist.
The UX does not work well on controller so a huge amount of console players will be out of reach.
Games tend to be quite long and because it's not team play matchmaking matters a lot. This push multiplayer into being highly competitive and not pushes out the casual players.
Seems like Clash Royale likes are the best we've come up with to modernize the genre but of course its very different.
We’d start the game up in one computer, then pop the CD out and start it up in the next one, and so on.
I do remember having to install IPX to play over LAN.
Oh well.
Then again, the demo is only usable for those with existing assets.
Can't, for privacy reasons.
I would guess because the GPU world is messy and full of broken drivers full of hacks and workarounds, so it is rather a miracle that FF works so good, with the few engineers they have left.
(If you are on a chrome based browser, open chrome://gpu to get a glimpse into the work they have been doing just for your GPU and plattform)
While on native games the engine can workaround the driver issues, Web 3D APIs are at the mercy of the browser sandbox, where studios don't have access to possible workarounds due to lack of feedback on API performance.
Minimum specs: Memory: 4GB (8GB recommended)
The original ran on 128 MB or even less.
When you have a large ship, like the Aircraft Carrier or Dreadnaught, you'll notice that its rotation is much smoother than in the original game.
Edit: Oh maybe you do have to have the assets now? I swear last time I used it, it was all online :/
[0] https://www.openra.net
Again, just idle curiosity. No actual intentions here, so just wondering if anyone has some deeper knowledge on the subject.
However, the exact definitions of "significantly different" and "assets" is where things start to get fuzzy. While you could definitely make a very similar RTS game, exactly how similar can you get? EA doesn't own "military-themed RTS", but they probably do own "Soviets vs Allies with about 5 different unit types, air transports, and tesla coils." Getting even more fuzzy, are unit abilities considered assets, or game mechanics? It'd have to be worked out in court.
My gut feeling is these clone engines would probably lose in court. I think the specific expression of the general game mechanics being cloned here probably would constitute infringement. But there isn't much upside to the IP owners to pursue enthusiastic hobbyists cloning a 20+ year old game in a non-commercial way, so they let it slide.
[1] "Although Amusement World admitted that they appropriated Atari's idea, the court determined that this was not prohibited, because copyright only protects the specific expression of an idea, not the idea itself." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari,_Inc._v._Amusement_World...
OpenRA simply downloads a copy that it loads for the purpose of assets, but the engine is completely new, and it is very different from the orignal Red Alert. At this point, I don't think a single unit acts exactly the way it did in the original game. It's endlessly being rebalanced.
https://www.openttd.org
Not sure it's ever been proven definitively in court, though. And if you "made" custom assets that were exactly like the original ones only with a 1px color difference or something I'm sure you'd fall foul of it. What counts as different "enough" is always debatable.
Once you've seen the originals, you're contaminated and no longer suitable for the role of doing the replacement work.
Oops, it's a browser based game, you still need the assets on the client side, i.e. in your local memory... never mind
(1) https://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/23
If they could distribute them, they would.
They have a whole section of their website where they list the features. https://chronodivide.com/#features
If looking for gameplay like this, OpenRA does play a few games without original game assets. I don't think RA2 though.
I even visited their studios in LA during a cross-country Amtrak trip. They were very kind, especially the community manager (whose name escapes me). I was given a tour and allowed to play Yuri's Revenge before its release. They gave me a Dune 2 box and C&C poster which I still have somewhere.
Love it, can’t wait to poke at it from home later.
Yuri's Revenge when?
Also, if that's a non-profit fan project, why is the source code not available?