C&C Labs News Wire

What about the poor war story writers? From the stories I've seen, they aren't worth a kindergartner's applaud. "Man jumps. Man shoots gun. Man fall down... dies. Super powerful laser gun kills man who made other man fall down and... die." Yes, I really enjoy reading a war story that seems more like 'Run, Spot, Run!' (On another note, Paradox from CNCG believes this: "Spot the dog is the pinnacle of English literature.") than a Tom Clancy novel.

Many “State of the Community” articles have been written. Articles on the “State of the Community” articles were written. And now articles on the articles on the “State of the Community” articles are being written. Many are just rants and many more offer no solutions and simply serve as either “flamers” or an “I’m pissed and here’s why:” article. Mark at C&C Universe has been the “Bill O’Reilly” of many of the current issues. And then there are the “President Bush”-type people who do not take a firm position either way, not wishing to rock the boat. But these are, in this journalist’s viewpoint, the main problems of “The Community.” Clearly, concisely, and bluntly.

The fact is, people, that some of us are worrying too much about the 'state of the community'. Really, is what we are doing here, creating and populating fansites that important? They aren't all going to dissapear overnight, and if they do, no one's whole life will be destroyed, and nothing big is going to really change. We can be concerned about what is going to happen to our favourite sites, but really, it's the webmaster and site owner's choice about whatever happens to their site. There WILL be CnC sites around for a while yet, with another game on the horizon, and continual interest in the previous CnC games.

Affiliates. What does that word bring to mind? A list jam-packed with links in the right sidebar of your favorite site? No, that's not quite it, I was sure it was on the left. Regardless, affiliates have degraded into nothing more than a huge solid block of links to every other relevant site in the community. In my mind, the idea of 'affiliates' needs to be redefined.

Now, let’s go on with the real issue. To write an article about some community, one should first define a community. People, who are used to complaining about things, often tend to forget the initial purpose of those things they complain about. The Command & Conquer community exists, like any collective, to offer the individual what he cannot obtain himself. One cannot create, all by himself, all the maps, war-stories, discussions, wallpapers, articles and news posts, which the community creates for him. That’s why, quite naturally, what we are used to calling “the community” was formed.

Many articles I have read seem to indicate that the community is 'falling to pieces' or that the loss of a few influential members is causing a community meltdown of sorts. This quite frankly isn't the case and I will explain why. For every member that 'leaves' the community another two join. There will always be Westwood/EA Pacific fansites as long as there are games to support and there will always be fans to run them as long as the games are worth supporting. With Generals on the horizon and many other 'unannounced' games lurking in the background I can't see the community falling to pieces or going to hell quite yet.