EA’s Lead Producer, Jim Vesella might be hinting at another Command & Conquer Remastered Collection.
A collection of 17 titles from the storied real-time strategy game series, Command & Conquer Ultimate Edition, was recently released on Steam. The bundle includes a ton of community improvements and optimizations like level editors which have been anticipated for a long time, and is landing at a discounted price. The good news doesn’t end there, though, as a potential teaser about another Command & Conquer remastered collection was also dropped with the games that were added to Steam.
Jim Vesella, a prominent figure within the Command & Conquer community and a Lead Producer at EA, was the individual who initially unveiled the Command & Conquer Remastered collection. He recently posted a letter to the community on Steam, which, while containing generic community engagement content, slipped in an interesting line in the second paragraph: “After the launch of the first C&C Remastered Collection.”
Did you catch that hint? The use of “first C&C Remastered Collection,” not simply “C&C Remastered Collection,” raises eyebrows and fuels speculation.
Now there are a few things that add nuance to this discovery as pointed out by a Reddit user.
- If you check Vesella’s Reddit profile, his last comment before the above-mentioned one, was 4 years ago, and the fact that EA released a unique statement on this even speaks something.
- Also, the comment’s mention of “Until next time” raises questions about future plans beyond the Command & Conquer Ultimate Collection’s release.
- Then, the announcement of map editors FinalSun and FinalAlert 2 for Tiberian Sun and Red Alert 2, released under the GPL version 3.0 license, prompts curiosity about why only these two games received editors.
With the approaching 30th Anniversary of Command & Conquer next year, it’s reasonable to speculate that EA might be testing the audience on Steam and potentially preparing for remasters of Tiberium Sun and Red Alert 2, given their significance in the franchise.
Of course, this could be nothing more than a simple oversight or a whimsical desire for the project to materialize. However, given Vesella’s integral role as the face of the project and his previous contributions to the C&C community, there’s a possibility that this subtle hint could be intentional.
Since its first PC release in 1995, the Command & Conquer game has received numerous expansions and sequels that its fans continue to cherish. And this week, Command & Conquer fans received some welcome news after a lengthy wait. Here is what Jim Vesella said on Steam:
Dear C&C Community,
It’s been a few years since I had the opportunity to reach out and engage with you directly. I’ve truly missed that. I hope you have all stayed safe, healthy, and positive since my last post in September of 2020.
I realize many of you have been wondering about the status of Command & Conquer over the past several years. After the launch of the first C&C Remastered Collection, I told our Community Council I would continue to try and find opportunities to support the C&C community and franchise wherever possible. With that in mind, I do have an announcement we think the entire C&C Community can get excited about. The C&C Ultimate Collection is now live on Steam!
How did this come to happen? Well, a while back I heard some team members at EA had the desire to launch some of our classic titles on Steam. After hearing about this initiative, several of us proposed we include the C&C Ultimate Collection. We knew this has been a request of the C&C community for over a decade, and has been an equal goal of us passionate C&C folks around the company. As such, a dedicated strike team here at EA has been pushing to make this a reality - but we knew we couldn't do it alone. So in the spirit of our community collaboration from the Remastered Collection, we reached out to a small group of the C&C Community to understand how we could best deliver the Ultimate Collection on Steam.
The feedback and collaboration has once again been invaluable. With improvements like better compatibility for modern operating systems and additional supported languages for both the Steam and EA App versions, we believe this is the best release of the Ultimate Collection to date.
Alongside the launch of the Ultimate Collection on Steam, we are also excited to announce the release of the beloved map editors FinalSun and FinalAlert 2 under the GPL version 3.0 license, which can also be launched directly from the Steam version of Tiberian Sun and Red Alert 2. Now over 20 years since their initial release, original creator Matthias Wagner has generously repackaged these classic editors into a more compatible version for 2024. This was achievable thanks to the technical collaboration with Luke "CCHyper" Feenan, and the kindness of Olaf van der Spek, who has graciously released his XCC Library under the GPL 3.0 license as part of this effort. We cannot thank Matthias, Luke, and Olaf enough for making this a reality for the C&C community, and are eager to see where the tools and content creation go from here.
A huge thank you to the community playtesters who helped provide feedback on this version of the Ultimate Collection, and the organizations of CnCNet, W3DHub, and C&C Online for continuing to support these classic titles. We hope you all enjoy these improvements to the C&C Ultimate Collection - available today on Steam.
Until next time.
Cheers,
Jim Vessella
Although it’s wonderful to see the entire set available on Steam at last, there may be a very subtle clue that another Command & Conquer Remastered Collection is actually being planned.
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