The huge free Command & Conquer - Combined Arms RTS just got upgraded

Powered by the always impressive OpenRA game engine, the standalone and entirely free Command & Conquer - Combined Arms RTS has a brand new release out.

For those of you who continue to love your classic RTS game, this is probably one of the best. It combines together Command & Conquer, Red Alert and expands upon it further. It includes Allies, Soviets, GDI, Nod and the Scrin each with their own sub-factions with their own units, powers and upgrades.

The latest update brings in all these upgrades to the overall game:

• Campaign progress tracking. Mission browser records which missions have been completed as well as the date, time taken, difficulty, version, and game speed.
• New music track "Malevolence".
• Co-op version of the mission "Reckoning".
• Increased the size of the final campaign mission.
• Added 10x RAGL 16 maps along with 7x more 1v1 maps, 1x 3v3 map, 1x 4v4 and 1x FFA Europe map.
• Condition applying abilities no longer delayed until next full cell of movement, increasing the responsiveness of Gyro Stabilizers, Defense Matrix, Mind Blast, Mind Spark, Hypercharge, Advanced Optics, Decoy Projectors, Chaos Drone, Mobile EMP.
• Bounties are now taken from a pool that first has to be accumulated by a player getting kills. Bounty increased from 10% to 15% of unit value. Added bounty column to economy stats panel.
• Most previously uncrushable infantry (SEALs, Tesla Troopers, Desolators, Zone Troopers/Raiders/Defenders, Cryo Troopers, Chem Warriors, Templar) can now be crushed by any vehicles that can crush walls (e.g. Mammoth Tanks, Tripods etc.). Commando units, Brutes and Enforcers are now the only fully uncrushable infantry.
• All superweapons do increased damage vs buildings (so they can now kill an undamaged Construction Yard / War Factory).
• Added "Harvester under attack" announcement.
• Reduced mine damage, increased splash radius, added TankBuster modifier (+33% damage vs tanks).
• Oil Refinery no longer affects cost of buildings/defenses.
• In competitive multi-queue, Service Depot & equivalents grant reduced cost of additional production structures (equivalent to radar).
• Added 1.33x speed option in replays.
• Added produced unit values tab to observer info panel.
• Show times in build order tab in observer info panel.
• Added & improved unit compositions for campaign AI.
• Allow 10 hotkeys for support powers (up from 6).
• Targets are validated when activating support powers that apply conditions (e.g. Iron Curtain) so the power isn't used up if targets are destroyed before the condition can be applied.

Plus, there's a whole lot of faction-specific balancing changes and upgrades as well. There's some new voice lines, new artwork, new units to try out and so much more. Command & Conquer - Combined Arms is a truly impressive project and one I really love jumping back into.

OpenRA itself also has a new version coming since that had a first test build released back in November 2024, and had a small follow-up test release in December 2024.

We have a lot to thank EA for since they released Command & Conquer 1, Red Alert 1 and Tiberian Sun as freeware many years ago.

You can follow it via Mod DB and see the full changelog on GitHub. It runs on Linux, macOS and Windows.