Let's ignore the fact that I am using maths to calculate stuff for my board game, and observe RTS as a whole in computer games.

Back to the question. If you think so, please tell me how.

For me it is more of a "how much variables can I add until the game can't be balanced any more?"

After all, Rock/Scissors/Paper is balanced, but not an RTS. For an RTS, we need to add some adjustments so it becomes real time.

Before you continue posting in this thread. And to prevent weird discussion items where you only talk out of personal experience of just a few games. I suggest to read these articles to know more about it.

A little warning, they are long, very long. And that's how RTS balancing works.

http://gamebalanceconcepts.wordpress.com/2010/07/07/level-1-intro-to-game-balance/#comments

While I consider a different story to be incorrect, when comparing with the official explanation on the blizzard wiki. Even then I find the game acting different than expected.

Here are some examples of explanations:

Whereas Armor, Piercing Damage and Basic Damage are the 3 variables that are used in the game.

And negative values occurring in a step are considered to be 0 instead.

Halves are rounded upwards.

Explanation 1:

Basic Damage minus Armor. A negative number becomes 0.

Now Piercing Damage is added.

Result is divided by 2, where a halve is rounded upwards. This is called the minimum damage.

The maximum damage is 2 times the minimum damage. This means that a result of 5, gives 2.5, which is 3, which gives 6 as the true maximum damage.

Explanation 2:

The same as 1. But now, the only 2 choices are the minimum or maximum damage. There is no continuous line. Whereas 3-5 would give 3, 4 or 5. In the second explanation it is either 3 or 5.

Explanation 3 (official wiki):

Basic Damage is divided by 2. This number is rounded upwards when needed and is the minimum Basic Damage. We only have 2 choices in this again like in the second.

Then both the minimum Basic Damage and the Basic Damage minus Armor.

Now we have 2 remaining numbers as choices.

Piercing Damage is divided by 2. This number is rounded upwards when needed and is the minimum Piercing Damage. We only have 2 choices; this half number or the whole.

Thus the first choice and second choice are added up now.

Explanation 4:

Same as 3, but Armor also serves with half or full.

Explanation 5 and 6:

Same as 3 and 4, but everything is continuous again. Sigh.

Who has the correct answer? So I decided testing!

Additional information, got this from a site that has a major flaw in one of the calculations and kept that flaw.

Unit Cease-fire cycles peon, grunt, ogre 25 skeleton 35 mage 40 archer 65 submarine 100 destroyer 120 cannon & guard tower 150 dragons 190 catapult 200 juggernaut 230

Thus even though this info is nice to have. I wonder if it is correct. Maybe it was created by tests. Then it could be influenced by the game speed just like in Dune2.

For this, having the source code would be nice.

However, a simple test shows me that the guard tower and cannon tower are completely different. The guard tower shoots about 3 times faster. Shame on that person who posted on that site in the first place.

Testing in Warcraft 2:

Test 1:

1 Piercing Damage. And attacked 0 Armor.

Actually, out of the 20 attacks, 6 happened to be 2 damage while the rest was 1. Thus a total of 28 damage while expecting only 20. How weird!

Another particular thing that I noticed is that how other units all have #-## as damage indicator, this unit had only a 1. Thus the game actually knows that there should be no other option. I would have expected 1-1.

Test 2:

Same as test 1, but instead of Piercing, I used 1 Basic Damage.

Once again, 2 damage in one strike occurs on a regular basis.

Test 3:

That same 1 Basic damage against 20 armor. The result was constantly 0.

Even 1 armor gives constantly 0.

Test 4:

30 basic damage against 20 armor.

The results in damage returned are: 6, 8, 5, 7, 7, 8, 9, 8, 7,10, 5, 7, 9, 9, 7, 5, 5, 5, 7, 9, 10, 8, 10, 10

Thus a yes or no choice in 50% or 100% damage is false. Explanations 2, 3, 4 and 6 are definitely scrapped now. Since all damages are under 10. This means armor itself is not random.

Test 5a:

1 piercing against 1 armor.

50 shots place 75 damage.

Test 5b:

2 piercing against 1 armor.

50 shots place, again 75 damage.

Ok, that is really odd. Somehow 1 and 2 piercing damage become the same value.

Test 5c:

2 basic against 1 armor.

50 shots placed 75 damage once again.

Could it be that there is an error in rounding the numbers upwards?

I think the only choice to find out what it really has to be is to look into the source code. But how to do that? Who has this power amongst you?

Meanwhile, I have come up with a little theory myself on how it could work. Regarding having just 1 basic or 1 piercing damage against 0 armor. However, if you continue to look at other tests. It is clearly false.

The game takes 50% of this 1. And randomly chooses anything between 0,5 and 1.

Once decided. The game then multiplies this with 2. There for having a number between 1 and 2.

The rounding only happens after the multiplication? Thus it then becomes either 1 or 2 damage. In the long run, we have 1,5 on average.

The reason why this is false is because we are supposed to get the same treatment with 2 damage or more.

By random, we have anything between 1 and 2.

Once decided. The game rounds this to 1 or 2.

There is no multiplication.

Perhaps the statement in the third explanation is correct. Before the numbers are chosen. This 0,5 is rounded upwards to 1. And the new maximum damage is 2 times this 1. Thus 0-1 effectively becomes 1-2. While 2 gives the exact same result.

If this is true, then all the other odd numbers used in the calculations are influenced by this.

The worst one is the 3 piercing for the footman/grunt compared to the 4 piercing for the knight/ogre.

Both get a minimum of 2 and a maximum of 4? This calls out for a test.

Well, that test escalated quickly. They indeed give the same, exactly the same destructive power. 600 vs 600.

The question of course is, does this count for basic damage too?

Well, yes it does! Again 600 vs 600.

However, I took the liberty of combining 3 piercing with 3 basic. And 4 piercing with 4 basic. The outcome? While the first one does 450 damage, the other one reaches 600.

What happened there?

If I think about it, the only explanation would be that piercing is halved. And basic is halved. Then they are added up. And only after that, we have the rounding upwards.

Thus 50% of 3 is 1,5. We have 2 x 1,5 for piercing and basic. Thus 3 in total for the lower limit. 6 is the upper limit.

50% of 4 is 2, we have 2 x 2 = 4 for the lower limit. 8 is the upper limit.

The question is, is it possible to make 7 as an upper limit?

By having 3 piercing and 4 basic. We get 1,5 + 2 = 3,5. This is 4. So with the knowledge that we have. The upper limit would become 8?

With 4 piercing and 3 basic. We get 2 + 1,5 = 3,5. Same story, right?

Let's test it.

And thus after testing, we got twice 600 vs 600 damage in total. So the story is true indeed.

All I can say now is that using odd numbers is a bad thing to do in that game. You can't really track the true balance.

But wait, there is more. What about upgrades?

For the archers/axethrowers, we have +1 with each upgrade. And even +3 for the archer upgrade.

Not only that. Ships have +5 for each upgrade as well. These are odd numbers too!

With 6 piercing and 3 basic damage. It is obviously clear that the true damage against 0 armor would be 3 + 1,5 = 4,5

=5 and 5-10.

After 1 upgrade, we have 7 piercing and 3 basic. 3,5 + 1,5 = 5. Again 5-10.

After another upgrade, we have 8 piercing and 3 basic. 4 + 1,5 = 5,5 = 6. This time 6-12.

The +3 for the archers gives 11 piercing and 3 basic. 5,5 + 1,5 = 7. Now we have 7-14.

According to this theory, the very first upgrade is useless unless you do the second one as well.

Or, we do this upgrade and go for the +3 immediately afterwards. Ignoring the second upgrade.

Then we get 10 piercing and 3 basic, 5 + 1,5 = 6,5 = 7. Which also gives us 7-14.

Ignoring the second upgrade saves us 900 gold and 500 wood.

Of course, the story goes differently when facing structures. Well, I think that all basic damage would completely be nulified.

No upgrades gives 6 piercing, 3-6

+1 gives 7 piercing, 4-8. This time, the upgrade does have use!

+2 gives 8 piercing, 4-8. This time, the second upgrade has no use at all.

+5 gives 11 piercing, 6-12.

+4 gives 10 piercing, 5-10.

On a side note, other melee units will be having more armor with upgrades. This means that you only are dealing with your piercing damage. Thus it is important to use all upgrades by the humans. Yet the Orc's can still choose to ignore the second upgrade since it has no use against any armored unit. Unless, you use axe throwers to deal with 0 armored units like peasants, mages or balista's. But against those, you might as well use ogre's and grunts.

True formula of Warcraft 2:

Basic Damage - Armor = Remaining Basic Damage.

Piercing Damage + Remaining Basic Damage = Total Damage

0,5 x Total Damage = 50% Damage. This is rounded upwards.

50% Damage x 2 = 100% Damage.

A random value is chosen between 50% Damage and 100% Damage. This includes the 50% and 100%.

Ok, the editing ends here. Comments now please.

Interested in sharing experiences? Even if you think it sucks. I am all ears

I for one, am enjoying it right now. Unlike PvZ2, I will stop with the game when it gets too much pay to win for my taste. Other than that, it too has a good single player game. But also upgrades for units like in C&C Rivals. At first meaningless, but if you encounter someone without upgrades. Let's just say that RPS doesn't matter much at that point too.

The big difference between Rivals and AoW3?
AoW3 is a real RTS game.

They still force you a bit to play a bit online. But the first few are obviously AI that you play against. You can still go back to the single player campaing whenever you like. Gaining money and gold by grinding. Eventually, you should be able to get all upgrades and missions. I have yet to test this though.

Another big plus is that it doesn't whine about you playing the game. Also, commercials are a choice. Not a forced upon thy.

Which is actually a good thing this time.

Back in the 90s I used to muck around with Doom 2 and Civilization 2 modding but never finished any of my projects, but in recent years I've been getting back into it (call it can early midlife crisis lol) and released a GZDoom enhanced version of my old Star Trek Doom level and also a new Quest for Glory IV - 3D Hexen mod too. Much to my surprise both got a lot of media attention with the QFG4-3D one in particular getting coverage on Rock Paper Shotgun and in PC Gamer Magazine which was awesome. The great response inspired me to also get back into my old Civilization 2 editing as well (also 20 years too late lol).

Why am I posting about this here in a place full of my fellow Dune and C&C fans? Well after months working on a huge Heroes of Might & Magic 2 Civ2 scenario I decided to turn my attention over to one of my other favourite franchises for some more fun Civ2 scenarios, the Command & Conquer and Red Alert universe! I started coming up with some pretty crazy ideas for huge Red Alert 2 Siege of New York scenario where you’ll be battling it out in city streets between huge sky scrapers however despite learning a lot from working on the HoMM2 scenario I wasn’t quite game enough to start that just yet. I’d also been thinking about a dark and moody scenario set in the C&C Tiberium universe and noticed that a fellow named Wonx2150 had already made a scenario in that universe but just hadn’t really done any proper graphics for it so I decided to take the easier route and remaster his Command & Conquer Africa scenario first to build up more experience before taking on the big Red Alert 2 scenario.

I created a ModDB page for the project with dev diaries covering stages of development. Figured I’d post them here too so here’s the first two! Stay tuned for dev diaries for the Red Alert 2 scenario here in the future too!

In this first dev diary I look at changing Civ2’s terrain and cities to look like C&C2 as well as importing some cool new units.

C&C Dev Diary 01 – New terrain & units for the Civilization 2 – Command & Conquer Scenario:
https://www.moddb.com/mods/civilization-2-command-conquer-scenario/news/new-terrain-units

In the second dev diary I ask for some fan input and finish off importing all the new C&C unit graphics.

C&C Dev Diary 02 – Finishing all terrain & units for the Civilization 2 – Command & Conquer Scenario:
https://www.moddb.com/mods/civilization-2-command-conquer-scenario/news/finishing-all-terrain-units

I’m on the Hunt for big Civilization game series total conversion mods & scenarios with a particular focus on Civ2 & Civ3 (but am now expanding to Civ4, 5, 6 & spinoffs) relating to a whole bunch of my favourite fantasy & scifi movie/TV/gaming franchises (including Dune and C&C!). Been posting in a few different Civ forums and getting great feedback, plus whenever someone has told me about an awesome scenario that’s disappeared over the years I’ve managed to track it down and bring it back from the dead to CivFanatics/ModDB/InternetArchive hosting, so helping me has helped the community. Hell in some rare cases I’ve even filled a gap by making the scenario myself haha!

Anyway I figured it was finally time to hit some of the other communities out there for help too (since fans of Civ and these franchises are everywhere haha). Many have already been found so make sure you check my list in the link below BEFORE making suggestions to save yourself time & effort lol!

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/scenario-hunt-mars-alphac-c-c-ra-dune-mom-col-moo-doom-b5-strek-swars-sgate-homm.657805/

At this stage I'm looking for Civ scenarios relating to...

- Mars / Lunar Colonization
- Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (& other alien world colonization)
- Command & Conquer / Red Alert
- Dune / Arrakis
- Master of Magic
- Sid Meier's Colonization
- Master of Orion
- Heroes of Might & Magic
- Babylon 5
- Star Trek
- Star Wars
- Stargate
- Apocalypse (After WW3 / Fallout / Mad Max / Judge Dredd / Doom / Terminator / Zombies)
- Lord of the Rings
- Game of Thrones
- The Elder Scrolls
- Warcraft & Starcraft / Warhammer & W40k
- Final Fantasy
- Civilization Crossover Mods (Make a Civ game look like another Civ game)

If you're unable to help then that's fine, as maybe my list will still help you find something cool!

.

Although sadly it's creator Implode has gone AWOL and the project has been inactive for a while now..

But hopefully one day he'll return to it, or someone else will finish what he started due to it being opensource...

In order to receive a bit more rewards than others. You can link your account to mine, by downloading it here:

https://aow3.gear-games.com/?referrer=appmetrica_tracking_id%3D169878688668608468%26ym_tracking_id%3D9244786356244504827

Take a look to see if you like the game. There are plenty of single player missions, 50 for each faction so far. The first 6 are really tutorial (aimed at the americans, kek) And if you don't like it. Let me know in the game. You will automatically understand how, once you have played the game.

Apart from regular features associated with the then-newborn RTS genre, some interesting things were planned for this game:

Quote

There were several interesting systems in Hard Vacuum. Some made it into future RTS games and some did not.

• Supply Lines: When you built a mining tower on a resource deposit, there was no need to manually build and manage drones to carry the minerals back and forth. Instead, a road was built from your base to the mine. Drones were automatically created when the mine had a full load and sent along the road to your base. Enemies could blast your supply line and interrupt your flow of resources. So protecting fixed supply lines became a bit part of the strategy.
• Variable Height Terrain: This was a 2D tile-based game intended to run on 386 and 486 machines. We had a full system of variable height terrain. Units on higher ground would have targeting advantages over units on lower grow
• Deformable terrain with flowing water and lava: You could blow huge holes in terrain with artillery in order to divert streams and lava. Drop a water bomb on a city and watch it wash away an entire troop. Drop a dirt bomb to create a mountain.
• Walls: Walls played a huge part in the game to give large defensive barriers to attack. These existed in Dune2, but were extended in HV
• Player created landscapes: Walls, base building, supply lines, and advanced terrain modification all contributed to a game where players built intricate maps during game play. We couldn't afford to spend lots of money building maps so instead we had to create fun systems that let players create unique and interesting combat situations.

The other day my mates and I tried out OpenRA C&C2 Shattered Paradise for the first time and had a new game of OpenRA RA2 Rominov's Vengeance as it had been a couple of years since my last video (note: we're lousy players haha).

Shattered Paradise really felt like a love letter to Command & Conquer 2 Tiberian Sun as there's just so much extra stuff. The new playable factions are awesome!


Rominov's Vengeance is even more awesome than the last time I played as they've added so much extra stuff to the Red Alert 2 experience, the biggest being C&C Generals like commander powers which are quite fun to use.

It's a free (technically shareware) DOS RTS game, lovingly copied almost verbatim from Command & Conquer and Red Alert (and not in the least ashamed of that mind you!) by Chris Jones, better known for being the author of the Adventure Game Studio toolkit. If you look past the "programmer art" level graphics (that aren't very bad, actually), it's a fully-fledged game with a single-player campaign (only one side though), skirmish mode against up to three AI opponents, and functional multiplayer mode. There's even an equivalent of Red Alert's rules.ini.

The author accepted registrations, which would endow the user with a mission builder, a unit editor and a campaign editor (no idea if anyone registered). But otherwise the unregistered game is fully featured and has no limitations. Oh, and it fits on a single 3.5" floppy disk too. It's a bit tricky to get it work with sounds in DOSBox though, but a pre-installed version is available here. Make sure you use the current SVN build of DOSBox, not the latest stable version (0.74-3) from the DOSBox website.

I wonder what project they are working on while they put Earthbreakers on hold.

https://explorminate.co/dominus-galaxias-kickstarter-has-launched/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jwG4D-fCsg

Over the last few months they’ve been doing a really good behind the scenes series called ‘Night City Wire’ with heaps of amazing new gameplay footage.

Known facts (quoted from Wikipedia):

Like most games in development, the known facts for Tiberium Wars are few and far between. Although information on Tiberium Wars is still shaky, EA has released enough information for C&C fans to get a general idea of the game and its development.

The plot

The story begins in 2047, and the world is in an even worse condition than in Tiberian Sun. The spread of Tiberium continues to the destroy the Earth, and the world has been divided into different zones. 20% of the Earth's surface is Tiberium-infested and inhospitable "Red Zones", 50% of the Earth is "Yellow Zones", areas where Nod is present and where Tiberium hasn't fully taken hold but is encroaching on the population, and the rest of the Earth is "Blue Zones", where it is safe to live and where GDI is present. The GDI is still trying to prevent the spread of Tiberium and convert the Yellow Zones to Blue Zones.

In March, Nod fires a nuclear missile at GDI's orbiting headquarters, the Philadelphia, destroying the fulcrum of GDI's military power. Since the end of the Second Tiberium War, Nod has built up its military into superpower status, and is now supported by the majority of the world's population through aid and propaganda. In no shape to handle the Nod offensives led by Black Hand shock troops around the globe, GDI commanders take charge, rallying their demoralized troops, hoping to win a victory over Nod (as in previous C&C games, no victor is specified).

Known units and structures

Concept artwork of GDI Zone Troopers crossing a Tiberium field

Enlarge

Concept artwork of GDI Zone Troopers crossing a Tiberium field

GDI

    * GDI ORCA Gunship (Preview screenshot/article, PC Gamer issue 149)

    * GDI ORCA/ORCA Scout (Preview article, PC Gamer issue 149)

    * GDI Firehawk Fast Attack Jet (Preview article, PC Gamer issue 149)

    * GDI Zone trooper, a heavilly armed soldier in a power armour suit who is immune to tiberium and who also has short range jumpjets (Preview screenshot, PC Gamer issue 149) could be a replacement for the Wolverine from Tiberian Sun. It is possible that the power armour suit is an evolution of the Mobius Suit seen in Renegade.

    * GDI light infantry

    * GDI grenadier

    * GDI rocket soldier

    * GDI commando

    * GDI Mammoth Tank, main heavy tank equipped with dual 150mm guns that can be upgraded to rail guns, will also have dual rocket pods to take on infantry and aircraft; an onboard engineer will slowly bring it's health back to 50% when damaged

    * GDI Predator Light Tank, can be upgraded to have missile launchers on a side mount (Preview screenshot, PC Gamer issue 149 & 1st of June's 06 Podcast)

    * GDI Mystery buggy (Preview screenshot, PC Gamer issue 149)

    * GDI Mystery defense turret (Preview screenshot, PC Gamer issue 149)

    * GDI Juggernought artillery unit (Official C&C 3 forum)

NOD

    * Nod Stealth Tank (Preview article, PC Gamer issues 149)

BOTH

    * Tiberium Havester for both races (third faction unknown) will go back to Tiberium Dawn's design with claws "like a scarab beetle" (1st of june's 06 Podcast)

    * Side bar and construction yard method of building bases and units (third faction unknown) (1st of june's 06 Podcast)

UNKNOWN

    * Unknown Faction Mystery Green Soldier (Preview screenshot, PC Gamer issue 149)

    * It is also known that Mechs, first introduced in Tiberian Sun, will make a return in Command & Conquer 3.

    * Other familiar units will also be returning, although EA is staying tight lipped about which units those may be.

Third side speculations

Once the player has completed both the GDI and Nod campaigns, they will be able to play a third mystery faction. The current speculations are:

    * The Forgotten: Appearing for the first time in C&C History in Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun, the Forgotten have been an integral part of the entire Tiberian storyline. The Forgotten were led by Tratos, until he was killed. Other major characters include Umagon (Dies from divination, as previously mentioned), Ghost Stalker and the Mutant Hijacker. In Tiberian Sun's expansion, Firestorm, the leader of The Forgotten was murdered by CABAL. The fate of the other two major Forgotten Characters remains unknown.

First seen in an internal EALA monitor and leaked by a visitor of the official BFME Community summit, this image is named 'Scrin Primal' by the developers of the C&C Franchise

Enlarge

First seen in an internal EALA monitor and leaked by a visitor of the official BFME Community summit, this image is named 'Scrin Primal' by the developers of the C&C Franchise

    * The Scrin: Appearing for the first time in Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun in the form of a huge alien ship and later (Although earlier by game chronology) in Command & Conquer: Renegade as a crashed flying saucer, not much is known about these beings, except that they are somehow connected to CABAL, Kane, Tiberium and its origin and distribution. Scrin technology is used in the Nod Banshee.

    * CABAL (Computer Assisted Biologically Augmented Lifeform): Appearing in Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun and its expansion-Firestorm, CABAL is Nod's AI in charge of Cybernetic Development and Tiberium Evolution. After going insane in Tiberian Sun's expansion, Firestorm, it has become known that CABAL is somehow connected to Nod's leader, Kane. The origin of these connections is unknown. The fate of CABAL after Firestorm is unknown. A damaged state of CABAL can be heard in C&C Renegade's last mission, inside the Temple of Nod.

    * Or, even possibly an entirely new faction. According to PC gamer, and according to pictures, it appears that there could be new units unknown to any of the speculations.

Other known facts

Other known facts about the game include:

    * The return of full motion videos, after being notably absent in Command & Conquer: Renegade and Command & Conquer: Generals.

    * The return of resource harvesting and Mobile Construction Vehicles.

    * The return of Kane, although it cannot be confirmed if Joseph D. Kucan will reprise his role as the Nod leader, as casting for the movies is not yet finished.

    * It seems unlikely that Frank Klepacki, game music composer who did all Command & Conquer games except Generals, will do the music for Command & Conquer 3. Klepacki is currently a full-time employee at Petroglyph, and both himself and the EA Community Manager have stated that he is not on the game's development team nor has he been asked to join. EA's community manager has also said that the team is aware of fan's concern, and that EA's audio team has been studying Klepacki's music for the past ten years, and fans will not be disappointed.

    * Command & Conquer 3 will use the pre-Generals right sidebar interface, as revealed in an interview on IGN at this link: "It's also worth mentioning the return of the side-bar interface: Our in-game UI for C&C3 is a side-bar that will feel familiar to C&C players but it has some added features that make it more useful - and make it feel interesting and new. We are combining the centralized production queues in the classic C&C side-bar with contextual space for selected units and structures. The new UI lets you quickly build units and structures, easily control grouped units, and access your build queues anywhere on the map - even in the middle of a battle. But you can still get lots of information about your selected units and activate their special abilities - which is pretty much expected in the latest generation RTS games. We think our interface for C&C3 is the best of both worlds."

    * The development team, with help from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has devised information to see how Tiberium would work in real-world science.

    * AI will be improved and campaigns will be more immersive.

    * A brand new version of the SAGE (Strategy Action Game Engine) engine will be used.

    * Multiplayer will feature VoIP support.

    * EA is planning several fan summits for previews, feedback and discussions.

Here's the trailer:

http://ghost.adktrails.com/CC3.avi

Shots from the trailer:

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail1.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail2.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail3.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail4.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail5.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail6.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail7.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail8.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail9.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail10.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail11.jpg

http://www.cnc3forums.com/cnctrail12.jpg

And some screenshots:

GDI Harvester in Tiberium field

GDI Tank convoy and defence structures

GDI Tank

GDI Light vehicles

GDI Base

GDI in the city

GDI forces moving into a ghost town

GDI forces (note:Naval units and stunning water effects!)

Concept art:

GDI Zone troopers

The Mac version of Warcraft: Orcs & Humans also got a graphics upgrade, as is evident from these reviews (preserved by the Wayback Machine):

http://www.macledge.com/Reviews/warcraft/warcraft.html

http://www.game-revolution.com/games/mac/warcraft.htm

http://www.macweek.com/mw_12-04-95/rev19.html

However, apparently it is almost impossible to find any good quality screenshots of the Mac version on the net these days. And even though a Mac demo was released by Blizzard, running it without a Mac is not possible.

There exist a number of free, open source Macintosh emulators (a good overview can be found at this site), however nearly all of them require a ROM image obtained from an actual Mac and a copy of MacOS to run. But recently I learned about an emulator (or rather, a compatibility layer) called Executor which does not have these requirements.

Originally a commercial product, Executor was released as freeware and open-sourced by the authors in 2008-2009. It can run Mac software for 68k machines and has versions for Windows, Linux and DOS.

I have tried several versions of this programme, and they are all capable of running Mac Warcraft. The latest DOS release runs the demo without any noticeable issues, except one: nearly all palettes are not displayed properly, as the game uses the Mac system palette instead.

This was a really serious issue, but thankfully Hallfiry wrote a Warcraft data extractor which supports the Mac demo (found here). With it, I was able to get the original palettes, and after some experimentation convert them into a usable JASC format (attached to this post). That way, screenshots taken with the DOS version of Executor in DOSBox can be fixed to display the proper colours.

Here's a small screenshot gallery of the Mac demo (a DOS version screenshot is included for comparison):

http://imgur.com/a/SR4Yu#0

JASC.zip