Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 Interview: The Soviet Faction
The Red Army rises again in the upcoming strategy sequel. We have details on the new campaign, the units, and the vacuum imploder superweapon.
Those Soviets are up to their old tricks again. After suffering through a debilitating war against the Allies in the first two Command & Conquer: Red Alert games, the Red Army has had enough. Using a time machine, the Soviets go back in time and eliminate Albert Einstein and all the future weapons that were created as a result of his scientific breakthroughs. And it works. In the alternate future, the Soviets have an advantage over the Allies, only an unexpected thing happens. While the Soviets and Allies have been engaged in war over the years, the Empire of Japan has been free to develop its military might unimpeded, and now there's a new threat to Mother Russia from the east. To understand the plight of the Soviets, we sat down with Red Alert 3 executive producer Chris Corry. Here's what he had to say.
GameSpot: Red Alert 3 begins with the premise that the Soviets went back in time to eliminate Albert Einstein to give themselves an advantage over the Allies. Tell us about the consequences of this action.
Chris Corry: Can you think of any science fiction story where going back in time didn't have some sort of unintended consequence? This is the crux of the Red Alert universe and the central theme of the Red Alert 3 fiction. By going back in time, the Soviet leadership hopes to erase Einstein from the timeline, and in fact they actually pull it off. When they return to the present day they find that the man most responsible for the technological successes of their adversaries, the Allies (comprised of the US and the Western Europeans), is gone and Moscow has been restored to its former glory. And indeed, the Soviets appear to have the upper hand in their war against the Allies.
But their elation lasts all of 90 seconds before they come under attack by a mysterious new superpower, a mighty army spawned by their own unnatural tampering with the space/time continuum: The Empire of the Rising Sun. Driven by their emperor's belief that it is the empire's divine destiny to rule the world, the fantastical forces of Japan have launched an all-out offensive against the Soviets.
Whoops!
GS: In this alternate history, the Soviet war machine continues to grow. Tell us about the new Soviet units in Red Alert 3.
CC: For starters, we sought to retain enough of the Soviet units from the previous Red Alert games that the faction would still feel familiar and satisfying to returning players. Red Alert fans will be thrilled to see the return of classic units like the Apocalypse Tank, the Terror Drone, the Kirov Airship, the Tesla Trooper, and the mighty Dreadnaught battleship. But we've put a satisfying new spin on these returning units. Since every Red Alert 3 unit now has a secondary ability, we get to show people a new side to their old favorites. For example, the Apocalypse Tank now has a magnetic harpoon that you can use to ensnare other units and draw them into the gaping shredder blades that adorn the front of the vehicle.
Of course, there's no shortage of new units either. The Stingray is an amphibious fast-attack Tesla boat, armed with a powerful electrical attack. Fire off its secondary ability in the ocean, and it unleashes a dramatic storm of tesla energy, dealing devastating area-of-effect damage to everyone in the vicinity. And give the Stingray a move command onto land, and it sprouts lobsterlike legs, leaping out of the water and becoming a dangerous (albeit slow) light tank.
Although it's making its first appearance in a Red Alert game, the Twinblade gunship is an homage to the classic real-world Hind helicopter gunship featured in big-budget Cold War blockbusters like Rambo III and Red Dawn. Our version has two main rotors--it must be twice as cool, huh?--and can unleash a brutal rocket barrage on unsuspecting units and structures. It's also an able troop transport--watch out for that Twinblade/engineer rush!
GS: The Soviets have traditionally been labeled the "bad guy" faction, at least by us patriotic Americans. What strategies serve the Soviets, and what kind of player do you think will enjoy using this faction the most?
Chris Corry: Hold on there, buster! Bad guys?!? It all depends on your point of view. We love all three of the game's factions. The game has three campaigns, one for each faction, and when you play the Soviet campaign you'll quickly learn just how dastardly those Allied capitalist pigs can be (not to mention the ruthless techno-cultists leading the Empire of the Rising Sun).
The Soviet faction is conducive to heavy armor tanking tactics, with a healthy dose of electricity thrown in. In the early game you can get a lot of traction out of scouting with War Bears, and their secondary roar ability is perfect for incapacitating any level-one infantry they may stumble upon. The early application of Terror Drones means that unless your opponent is on his toes, you can quickly sneak devastating antivehicle capabilities behind enemy lines. Slipping a Terror Drone into one of your enemy's harvesters is a sure way to elicit howls of frustration--and to win a quick economic advantage.
The Soviets have some fearsome level-three technologies that tend to emphasize hard-hitting artillery tactics. The V4 rocket launcher can deal horrific damage from land (try out its secondary MIRV mode to cover more territory); the lumbering Kirov Airship can drop an enormous payload of bombs on an enemy's base (and never needs to return to the hangar for a fill-up); and the Dreadnaught battleship can literally wipe out any undefended base that was foolishly built too close to shore.
The Soviets have some very capable aircraft, but keep in mind that it generally takes longer to tech up and access them. It takes a skilled player to pursue an aggressive Soviet air strategy and be successful.
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