Post by N_Monsterer on Jan 4, 2005 14:47:26 GMT -5
Welcome!!! to this Total Annihilation website.
I have decided to make this thread to help the new players become familiar with Total Annihilation after all these years. The new people seeking online gaming have to understand that TA has evolved a lot since it was released. Cavedog created TA but due to a great success it also released Core Contingency and Battle Tactics add-on packs with more missions, units and maps.
The game is just great, playing missions is challenging at the beginning but it also has those lovely skirmish mode games in which you battle to death vs the artificial intelligence. BUT, BUT !!!!!, the greatest thing about this game is Online Gaming, its just so fun, people spend hours playing this game, some do not have a life , hehehe.
Anyways, Online game is my priority, there are several ways to play: Online or over a network connection (modem connection dialing to your buddies house, serial connection between computers or simple get online and look for a place where TA is still Alive). Online is fantastic, it is the best way to know most of the Total Annihilation community which is about 70-100 at this moment, being active about 50-60 all the time.
Online stared all at Boneyards. Boneyards was a type of program intended only for TA only to play online, and have a ranking system of all the players. I didn’t get to play there it was before my time but I heard it was great. There were others called Heat, MPlayer, Phoenix Works, GBL, Gamespy and Zone to mention the most active ones. Of all the above mentioned; only Gamespy and Zone are supporting TA as a classic MONSTER game. I believe Phoenix works and GBL are down , too bad.
So what are you waiting for?? GET ON ZONE !!!!!,, how? Well, here we go….
Make sure you have at least Total Annihilation. You don’t really need the add-on packs. You can get them latter from several sites this web page is linked to.
Install the game on your system and make sure you install multiplayer spawn.
Go to the Internet with Internet Explorer. (Netscape or any other browser will not work or have a lot of errors). I strongly suggest getting latest Internet Explorer version.
Ok, now you have to go to the Zone domain, use this zone.msn.com and the main page of zone shows up. OK now we have to go to TA right, click on CD ROM and all the available cd-rom games to play online show up. Click on Total Annihilation, at the very bottom so scroll down. The click gets you to a sponsor page, simply click GO or wait a few seconds to be taken to the desired page.
Sign In Page.
Click on Sign In or Register Now.
If you do not have one of these two services and you do have an email account from any other place, please fill up the lower information on the same web page to be given a sign in passport
If you have a hotmail or msn account click on Sign In.
Either way you should come back to the zone.com sign in web page. Now you have a .NET password, use your email address and the password and hit sign in. A small rectangular window appears, click YES.
Create a Nickname
Ok, now you will have to create a nickname, click Yes again to the rectangular window and type a nickname there. A nickname is a name that you will have on the Total Annihilation lobby; you will be seen with this name. You can change the nickname later on, for now type something weird like: charlie98356599 or Jhon8743e4. If you use a common nickname like RICK, you will be taken back to Choose another nickname, The nickname is already taken. Try to avoid this by making one of the above examples.
If you have bad luck and run into a nickname like I did just now, I tried richi764393 and was taken, simply chose one of the five options zone offers as a nickname and hit continue. Click on YES. YES again. Click CONTINUE followed by YES.
Zone Newsletter, I clicked on NO, and I was taken to the following page
ZONE ….PAGE NOT FOUND, don’t worry this is a problem very few people have, actually I am the only one that runs to it. On the same page click on CD-ROM again.
Look for Total annihilation and click on it.
Zone is now downlaoding some files, so please wait…… a rectangular window appears asking for a directory to install the zone files, choose C:\Program Files and hit Install.
A square window appears and an agreement shows up, read it if you like and click YES I AGREE. Downloading and installing starts, after that it will ask if you want a shortcut on your desktop, I suggest you to click YES.
Ok, by now a Zone Friends window should be on your computer, this is the way you chat in private messages with your buddies. As for now you have zero buddies because you haven’t met any.
So go back to the MSN Games by zone.com and look for Total Annihilation and click on it. A Download starts automatically, let it finish.
As soon as it is finished you are taken to ZONE lobby. Congratulations !!!!!!!!
I have decided to make this thread to help the new players become familiar with Total Annihilation after all these years. The new people seeking online gaming have to understand that TA has evolved a lot since it was released. Cavedog created TA but due to a great success it also released Core Contingency and Battle Tactics add-on packs with more missions, units and maps.
The game is just great, playing missions is challenging at the beginning but it also has those lovely skirmish mode games in which you battle to death vs the artificial intelligence. BUT, BUT !!!!!, the greatest thing about this game is Online Gaming, its just so fun, people spend hours playing this game, some do not have a life , hehehe.
Anyways, Online game is my priority, there are several ways to play: Online or over a network connection (modem connection dialing to your buddies house, serial connection between computers or simple get online and look for a place where TA is still Alive). Online is fantastic, it is the best way to know most of the Total Annihilation community which is about 70-100 at this moment, being active about 50-60 all the time.
Online stared all at Boneyards. Boneyards was a type of program intended only for TA only to play online, and have a ranking system of all the players. I didn’t get to play there it was before my time but I heard it was great. There were others called Heat, MPlayer, Phoenix Works, GBL, Gamespy and Zone to mention the most active ones. Of all the above mentioned; only Gamespy and Zone are supporting TA as a classic MONSTER game. I believe Phoenix works and GBL are down , too bad.
So what are you waiting for?? GET ON ZONE !!!!!,, how? Well, here we go….
Make sure you have at least Total Annihilation. You don’t really need the add-on packs. You can get them latter from several sites this web page is linked to.
Install the game on your system and make sure you install multiplayer spawn.
Go to the Internet with Internet Explorer. (Netscape or any other browser will not work or have a lot of errors). I strongly suggest getting latest Internet Explorer version.
Ok, now you have to go to the Zone domain, use this zone.msn.com and the main page of zone shows up. OK now we have to go to TA right, click on CD ROM and all the available cd-rom games to play online show up. Click on Total Annihilation, at the very bottom so scroll down. The click gets you to a sponsor page, simply click GO or wait a few seconds to be taken to the desired page.
Sign In Page.
Click on Sign In or Register Now.
If you do not have one of these two services and you do have an email account from any other place, please fill up the lower information on the same web page to be given a sign in passport
If you have a hotmail or msn account click on Sign In.
Either way you should come back to the zone.com sign in web page. Now you have a .NET password, use your email address and the password and hit sign in. A small rectangular window appears, click YES.
Create a Nickname
Ok, now you will have to create a nickname, click Yes again to the rectangular window and type a nickname there. A nickname is a name that you will have on the Total Annihilation lobby; you will be seen with this name. You can change the nickname later on, for now type something weird like: charlie98356599 or Jhon8743e4. If you use a common nickname like RICK, you will be taken back to Choose another nickname, The nickname is already taken. Try to avoid this by making one of the above examples.
If you have bad luck and run into a nickname like I did just now, I tried richi764393 and was taken, simply chose one of the five options zone offers as a nickname and hit continue. Click on YES. YES again. Click CONTINUE followed by YES.
Zone Newsletter, I clicked on NO, and I was taken to the following page
ZONE ….PAGE NOT FOUND, don’t worry this is a problem very few people have, actually I am the only one that runs to it. On the same page click on CD-ROM again.
Look for Total annihilation and click on it.
Zone is now downlaoding some files, so please wait…… a rectangular window appears asking for a directory to install the zone files, choose C:\Program Files and hit Install.
A square window appears and an agreement shows up, read it if you like and click YES I AGREE. Downloading and installing starts, after that it will ask if you want a shortcut on your desktop, I suggest you to click YES.
Ok, by now a Zone Friends window should be on your computer, this is the way you chat in private messages with your buddies. As for now you have zero buddies because you haven’t met any.
So go back to the MSN Games by zone.com and look for Total Annihilation and click on it. A Download starts automatically, let it finish.
As soon as it is finished you are taken to ZONE lobby. Congratulations !!!!!!!!