Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight
Electronic Arts
PC
Tiberian Twilight takes this idea and runs with it.
A player can choose from three mobile construction vehicles, or Crawlers, which are deployed to the battlefield and produce all units and structures in the game.
Crawlers can build and store units while mobile, but have to plant in the ground to deploy them.
There's no true base building or resource harvesting here.
Instead, players have a limited supply of command points that each unit takes a share of.
Hit the ceiling and nothing more can be created until something is destroyed or decommissioned.
It's a very different feel from older C&C games, which encouraged massed armies, compared to this game's smaller strike forces.
Each side's Crawlers are a mix of three capabilities: Offence, which pumps out tanks and other ground-attack vehicles; Defence, which focuses on infantry units and can build and power structures; and Support, which produces airborne and other specialised units.
Playing the game in any mode earns experience points that increase the player's rank, which unlocks more advanced units, upgrades and special powers across the board.
It's a lot like the experience system in recent Battlefield games.
And just as in those games, this puts players who've just started out at a serious disadvantage against players who've unlocked more powerful toys to play with.
The online and skirmish modes also take a cue from Battlefield - Crawlers can be rebuilt if destroyed, and victory is gained by controlling strategic nodes for long enough to rack up 2500 points.
Tiberian Twilight requires players to log in for every session and maintain a constant Internet connection.
If that connection is interrupted during play, progress and experience past the last checkpoint won't be saved - an aggravating copy-protection trend in recent PC games
