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Comment by liotier | Hacker News Reader

OpenRA's Red Alert is Red Alert as it was in player's dreams. The game is just as fun as it once was: fast, fun and limited in scope - but adapted to contemporary connectivity and display resolution.

OpenRA's killer feature is the extremely fast installation of a reliable cross-platform game that anyone can understand in ten minutes, that works in even the most skinny hardware... The perfect combination for an impromptu LAN party, where having fun with friends right now is more important than gaming depth and graphical sophistication.

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They did some neat game mechanic tweaks, especially of the previously useless units: mechanics and thieves being able to revive and capture vehicles. Keeps the spirit of the old game but makes it more fun.

That epic moment when your thief manages to capture the Ukrainian bomb truck and sends it right back to the enemies base!

Ukrainian bomb track in RA?

Ukraine is one of the two playable Soviet factions in OpenRA. The nuke truck is a unit exclusive to Ukraine.

>The nuke truck is a unit exclusive to Ukraine.

I now see what the creators did there. I didn't think about it when I was a kid.

You,didn't think about it as a kid because the original Red Alert didn't include a nuke truck. Although one of the expansions (Aftermath?) did, it wasn't exclusive to Ukraine.

The nuke truck was made the Ukrainian unique unit only in OpenRA.

There was also a nuke truck in RA2, but it was exclusive to Libya.

This!

Russia and Ukraine were the two Soviet factions in the OG Red Alert

I like this plan. I’m going to try it when I play against my kids next.

Do they have an option where you can steal Russian tanks by using a tractor?

Not with tractors, but allied factions can do that with mechanics by capturing destroyed soviet tank husks. This is a worthwhile tactic because the soviets have bigger, more expensive tanks than allies.

> did some neat game mechanic tweaks

Original RA had a tendency to devolve into tank spamming. That takes skill. But it's closer to tactical than strategic. Does OpenRA deal with this in any way?

Play it with seasoned players. You’ll quickly get a sense for the Meta. It’s not tank spamming, I can promise you that.

I've played it a bunch, and it really is the perfect LAN party game:

Quick to download, quick to install, no real setup or tutorial section, cross platform, runs on anything, timeless graphics, easy to understand gameplay, lots of custom game options including AI, etc. And of course, it's fun.

I've tried to find the FPS equivalent of this, but it's been much harder, surprisingly.

Original Unreal Tournament is a pretty good one for this, I copied the install to a thumb drive on high school and played it on school computers all the time. Same with GZDoom

OpenArena used to be my go to FPS for impromptu LAN parties. Works on Mac, Windows, and Linux and it's easy to get a local server up and running. Plus it works great on ancient Thinkpads.

If you can get a modern remake of Quake I or II it would fit the bill. I have one on my USB memory stick that's forever been part of my keyring, just in case there ever is the need for a spontaneous fragfest.

Except for the original menu UI which is unmatched in atmosphere even today. It's the one thing that keeps me using the old RA2 instead.

RA2 was ace, but Yuri's Revenge, one of the greatest expansion packs IMO. Added so much more value to the game.

Totally!

Yuri was completely unbalanced in Multiplayer though.

Yield to me! Their will is my will!

There's been attempts to re-balance him using memory injection to overcome INI file editing limitations without much success

Hopefully Tiberian Sun and Red Alert 2 can be added to OpenRA one day. It seems like it's something the lead developer of OpenRA works on in his spare time, when he's not fixing bugs or tweaking things in OpenRA itself

Any opinion on Mental Omega?

Installing that game was a trip. I took the discs to a friend's house and we didn't realize the volume was cranked on the computer so we closed the drive and it boomed

WARNING

MILITARY SOFTWARE DETECTED - TOP SECRET CLEARANCE REQUIRED

His mom was very curious as to what the hell we were getting in to.

I still get goosebumps when I hear that intro sound.

ENCRYPTION CODE REQUIRED - YOU HAVE 30 SECONDS TO COMPLY.

WHERE IS THE DAMN BOOKLET?

> YOU HAVE 30 SECONDS TO COMPLY.

Not RA specific, but this is by far one of the best game design tricks.

Players are so trusting that if you tell them they need to hurry up they will.

ED209?

There is also Chrono Divide for MP in browser, which was on HN not long ago.

Can it be deployed as a web app? Might reduce the friction even further for new players

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