Incline EA just open sourced Command & Conquer, Red Alert, Renegade and Generals

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EA just open sourced Command & Conquer, Red Alert, Renegade and Generals​

By Liam Dawe - 27 Feb 2025 at 7:02 pm UTC


I can't quite believe it either. Command & Conquer, Red Alert, Command & Conquer Renegade and Command & Conquer Generals (inc. Zero Hour) have their code officially open sourced.
This is how it should be done. When a game is old enough, open source it so the community can keep it alive and learn from and perhaps even improve them. Looking over them they're all under the GLP3 license. However, there are some additional terms added like EA not granting any "trademark or publicity rights", you don't get the right to use "Command & Conquer" or any other trademark for example.
EA did more than just open sourcing their older titles though. They've also enabled Steam Workshop support for:

• C&C Renegade
• C&C Generals & Zero Hour
• C&C 3 Tiberium Wars and Kane’s Wrath
• C&C Red Alert 3 & Uprising
• C&C 4 Tiberian Twilight

They also launched a new video going over some rare gameplay footage from the early development of C&C Renegade and C&C Generals:


All of them are now on GitHub:

• https://github.com/electronicarts/CnC_Tiberian_Dawn
• https://github.com/electronicarts/CnC_Red_Alert
• https://github.com/electronicarts/CnC_Renegade
• https://github.com/electronicarts/CnC_Generals_Zero_Hour

To do this EA worked with Luke "CCHyper" Feenan, who they said was "part of our Community Council for the C&C Remastered Collection, and was involved in bringing the C&C Ultimate Collection to Steam back in March 2024". You can see the full message from EA and Feenan in a post on Steam.

 

[Storyfag]

Westwood LIVES!

 

[Luka-boy]

Peace through modding!

 

[Sergio]

Incline. From EA. What the fuck.

 

[Ryzer]

Professional code looks like code I could have made. Lot of code under quotes there and there without info as to why it's there lmao.

 

[Storyfag]

Incline. From EA. What the fuck.

They have been handling Command and Conquer well ever since the remaster. The guy in charge of these IPs, Jimtern, is a fan, and a pious Brother.

 

[grimace]

The real time strategy game is believed to be dead by EA Executives.

 

[MASLV]

https://github.com/electronicarts/CnC_Red_Alert/blob/main/IPX/IPX16A.ASM

;*************************************************************************************************
;* _IPX_Get_Outstanding_Buffer95 -- return contents of the next unread buffer in the buffer list *
;* *
;* *
;* INPUT: copy_receive_buffer -- ptr to buffer that data will be copied to *
;* *
;* OUTPUT: number of buffers returned (0 or 1) *
;* *
;* 32bit PROTO: extern BOOL __stdcall IPX_Get_Outstanding_Buffer95(unsigned char *buffer); *
;* *
;* HISTORY: *
;* 01/29/96 ST: Created. *
;*===============================================================================================*

wanna fuzz dos era ipx interfaces written in assembly? and smash the stack for fun and profit?

 

[MoistCloister]

The monkey's paw curls...

 

[Modron]

They have been handling Command and Conquer well ever since the remaster. The guy in charge of these IPs, Jimtern, is a fan, and a pious Brother.

That aged like milk:

 

[luj1]

Renegade was a unique concept and a ton of fun in LAN.

 

[Hammer Of The Heretics]

Wait, EA did something sensible? Have I fallen into some bizarre parallel universe? Who's the President of the United States?

 

[Inec0rn]

A lot of these games suffered from 30 FPS lock, really hoping modders quickly sort that shit out and make the games playable.

 

[Storyfag]

They have been handling Command and Conquer well ever since the remaster. The guy in charge of these IPs, Jimtern, is a fan, and a pious Brother.

That aged like milk:

Erm. This was released in 2012, and the Remaster in 2020? Obviously BEFORE the glorious General Slavik executed the traitor Hassan Jimtern took over GDI EA was trying its best to destroy the legacy of the Messiah.

 

[vota DC]

I wonder if they can cross features among those games.
For example Gla tunnel mechanic in other games (would fit well in Dune)

Red alert 2 Is destroyed and licensed games like Dune and bfme are still close source.

 

[ArchAngel]

This is awesome news. Zero Hour community is already gathering C++ devs to fix all the networking and crashing issues that plague Zero Hour and prevent it from being one of the best MP RTS ever.
Also they plan to finally balance it and implement some QoL.

 

[Lucumo]

Renegade was a unique concept and a ton of fun in LAN.

Absolutely. It was fun online as well.

 

[SilentSeeker]

Incline. From EA. What the fuck.

They released the expansion for the last Wing Commander game for free, as an apology for abandoning the franchise and deciding to go all-in on multiplayer, but that was the EA of 1999, not the EA of today- and at any rate, I don't see why they'd do this now.

Still, a step forward is a step forward, and I'll give credit where it's due. Thanks, EA. This makes the idea of seeing you torn apart by ravenous badgers less appealing.

 

[ArchAngel]

Incline. From EA. What the fuck.

They released the expansion for the last Wing Commander game for free, as an apology for abandoning the franchise and deciding to go all-in on multiplayer, but that was the EA of 1999, not the EA of today- and at any rate, I don't see why they'd do this now.

Still, a step forward is a step forward, and I'll give credit where it's due. Thanks, EA. This makes the idea of seeing you torn apart by ravenous badgers less appealing.

Either they are making a new real C&C game set to release in next 1-2 years and want to garner some good publicity in RTS circles or they are abandoning RTS completely forever

 

[Catacombs]

It's always fun to read through professional-level (even if it's ugly) C++ code from the 90s.

 

[ds]

https://github.com/electronicarts/C...Engine/Source/Common/Recorder.cpp#L1003-L1007

			// Since we don't seem to have any *visible* desyncs when replaying games, but get this warning
			// virtually every replay, the assumption is our CRC checking is faulty.  Since we're at the
			// tail end of patch season, let's just disable the message, and hope the users believe the
			// problem is fixed. -MDC 3/20/2003
			//TheInGameUI->message("GUI:CRCMismatch");

Yup, sounds like Generals alright.

 

[anvi]

Beyond All Reason is my new favourite RTS. But I did like Generals with Zero Hour. I play it sometimes but I had to install a mod to raise the camera or it get claustrophobic and weirdly close to the ground.

 

[Caim]

Nothing on RA2 and Tiberian Sun. Either the source code for those games is truly gone... or they got something else in the works.

 

[anvi]

We at least have a version of Tiberian Sun you can play online and it includes Firestorm and I think some tweaks to run on modern systems or whatever. I was glad to get that. It's my top 3 RTS ever. Tiberian Sun, Generals (with zero hour), and SupCom/FA/BAR. Some mixture of those 3 games would be incredible.

 

[Caim]

TibSun went freeware a few years ago, which is great but I do not believe that this required an awful lot of work on the coding side of things. Maybe remove the registration of the game (I own a box copy and I'm 80% certain it had a code on the back to install the game), but that's it.