25 Years Online
Anniversaries have a tendency to creep up on one. It’s a big one this time – this very site is 25 years online, maintaining its position as oldest English-speaking (and second-oldest in general, behind only the French CnCSaga) Command & Conquer fansite still up.
Times have definitely changed for the franchise in these 25 years. Not just from the perspective of the games themselves, but the dynamics in the community as well. Since the games have been out from the zeitgeist of gaming culture for a good while, there’s not a lot going on anymore – it’s basically just running through the motions of several mods still being developed and community multiplayer servers still maintaining life support, but that’s about it. Only a few content creators still give it the time of day, like Sybert‘s frequent commentaries or Direct & Dominate episodes and shorts. Sadly, gone are the days of frequent discussions on the gameplay, lore, balancing, new ideas for the series, or just general fan enthusiasm and buzz. Even as discussions have moved from forums to services like Discord and Guilded, actual C&C discussion is getting more scarce compared to what it used to be, and most of us “older” people in the community have gradually but surely moved on to other, more rewarding projects online and AFK, with few new members to pick up where we left off. Every time someone tries to wipe the dust off our projects and mutual connections, all momentum very quickly disappears as other things get in the way and they eventually realize the effort outweighs the outcome (but bless you for trying, you know who you are if you’re reading this).
While this site will stay online, I would really, for once, like to hear some thoughts and feedback from the few of you who are still around – is there a future at all for C&C fansites that are not focused on a single project/purpose like the community servers, is there a point to adding anything to it, and do you still browse it from time to time? On a more lighter note, how have these 25 years been for you regarding CNCNZ.com and Command & Conquer in general, are there some particular memories you’d like to share? Let us know in the forums and our Discord.