There's usually games available to play online on Game Ranger it's a neat program.
People make their own matches using whatever unitpacks they please (though I don't recall the current most used unitpacks, it's been a month or two since I played).
I also own the disks but I ended up rebuying the games from GoG as they fixed they fixed the issues I had with running the discs on Windows 7.
Thanks for this! Quick question about ESC and multiplayer. The official ESC installation guide (found here: http://taesc.tauniverse.com/?p=faq) has the following instructions:
>To install TA:ESC please follow these simple instructions:
>To start, ensure that you have a clean install of TA. This can be done by installing the GOG TA Commander Pack >Download and run TAESC_BETA_6_8_1.exe from the downloads Page >Download TAESC_BETA_7_5_1.rar from the downloads page and then extract it into your GOG Games\Total Annihilation\TA Escalation folder, overwriting TotalA.exe. >Download the Zeal Maps Complete Pack and extract to your GOG Games\Total Annihilation\TA Escalation folder >Download and install GameRanger for Multiplayer - http://www.gameranger.com
But the newest version found in Downloads is TAESC_BETA_8_1_2.rar. Does this auto-update? Are there difficulties coordinating versions in multiplayer or is everyone always pretty much up to date? I've never played ESC (or any multiplayer at all... PM me if you want to help change that and destroy me) so any insight is appreciated.
On GameRanger you can find some buddies to play with, just make sure you have either original TA patch 3.1 or escalation 7.5.1 all clean installed! Besides that gameranger does most of the hard work.
I think it's a feature, not a glitch. I know there was a place where you could get different A.I. mods but I can't seem to find it. Might have been on TA Universe. I've always played online or over LAN. Try Gameranger if you don't know anyone to play with you, there are usually a few TA:E games open.
Give TA a try with GameRanger instead. It's designed to solve these problems (and specifically tames DirectPlay). Windows 7 will be fine.
It will solve your LAN problem as well (from your other thread).
Help me do shameless plugs of /r/TotalAnnihilation in Reddit!
Here are some links I use to find out if people have mentioned 'Total Annihilation' in Reddit:
This webpage lists comments and submissions which mention Total Annihilation (some posts/comments might not be related to TA - the game, but literal 'total annihilation'):
http://metareddit.com/monitor/fQM9N/total_annihilation
You can also use Google Alerts. I set it to email me of 'All results', 'as-it-happens' of this search query: "total annihilation" site:reddit.com
I find that Metareddit.com presents more updated and more search results than Google Alerts or searching Google.
Just check if someone else has already mentioned /r/TotalAnnihilation in the comments, to avoid doing double shameless plugs.
Zero-K is probably the best mod available for this engine. Not enough players though, everyone plays Balanced Annihilation instead. Zero-K has the best graphics and most interesting evolution of gameplay in my opinion =)
It even has Chicken Defense, which is Tower Defence, but with TA units!
Steam Link or Shadow PC (https://shadow.tech) would probably do it although older titles can be tricky to get working. In both cases the game actually runs on a PC (either yours or Shadows) but you play on the iPad.
Hi and thank you for the feedback!! The latest version is indeed TAESC_BETA_8_1_2.rar. Unfortunately it does not auto-update. To install and play online do this:
Hope to see you online soon!!
If you're hosting a game with a mod, link to the mod somewhere so people can download it if they need.
All too often I pop into a game room and can't get the mod downloaded, which wastes time and pisses people off.
Also, which service are we using to organize games? I highly recommend GameRanger. I've been using it to play TA since ~1999, and it works great.
DAE play TA on GameRanger?
I used to use GR in like 1997 when it was Mac only. About a year ago I picked up a copy of TA from GOG and was very surprised to find that GR had gone to Windows as well.