Project Phantom - A Yuri's Revenge Total Conversion Mod

 
Development is still under way for next version of Project Phantom, numbered 1.1, following the initial release from last September. It was initially scheduled to be released during last year but several factors have unfortunately contributed to it being delayed significantly beyond the initial planned release window. Below is some more info on the changes and additions that will be introduced in this version.
 
Artwork Updates
 




Some units and buildings, including Subjugator, Coalition Laser Cannon and Phantom Research Lab have received a facelift.

In addition those with keen eyes can notice some adjustments to offensive support powers in the preview for Research Lab, they now all have same warning animation (with some color differences) and sound.

There has also been some updated animations, particularly for muzzle effects on gun and cannon weapons of all types.

Experimental Unit Improvements

There have been balance changes to almost all experimental units as well as their associated support powers. Below is a sneak peek at some of the changes.



Experimental tech unlock options also no longer benefit from multiple factory build time bonus and can only be placed within fixed distance from a friendly Construction Yard.

Other Gameplay Additions & Changes

Jet Changes


Jet aircraft are now allowed to use waypoint and guard mode. Not all jets will be able to automatically pick targets in waypoint or guard mode, but those that do will scan nearby area automatically for them when in either. Unlike other types of units, guard mode is not persistent on aircraft, meaning that once assigned, the unit will return to idle mode upon returning to airfield or if there was no suitable target found when assigned to guard mode - this may change in future.

Jets also no longer self-repair while in air but repair at rate corresponding to rookie-level self-repairing on vehicles for free when docked.

Some may also notice there have been some additions to the factions' airforce.

Tank Drop and Usurper Shock Tank


Tank Drop no longer drops Oppressor Tanks but a new Usurper Shock Tank with electricity-based weapon much like Shock Troopers or Shock Pylon. Usurper is more effective against infantry than Oppressor but performs considerably worse against buildings and base defenses - making Tank Drop less effective as a surprise base killing tool but potentially more effective for anti-unit harassment. Additionally all Dominion tier 1 vehicles - that is Oppressor, Tyrant and Usurper now share the destruction horde firepower bonus that was previously exclusive to Oppressor and the effect duration now replenishes for all stacks when new stacks are added to the effect. Usurper also gains a weapon range bonus near friendly Shock Pylons.

Usurper is not buildable except if reverse-engineered in Scavenger mode.

Mercenary Faction Additions & Improvements


Fist of Titans arsenal has had bit of a cleanup and facelift. Mercenary Motor Squad and Deliver Crocodile Tank/Vulture Copter have now been merged into one support called Mercenary Strike Force and Mercenary Troops now delivers some of the Fist of Titans infantry periodically at the Outpost free of charge. Savage is no longer trainable at the outpost due to being a mostly redundant pick over the main factions' basic infantry, but in exchange some of the vehicles have acquired new abilities.

Crimson Crown now uses similar Experimental Unit system as the main factions, offering two choices - the existing Blackout Signal Jammer that has been improved and the new Desecrator MLRS crowd control weapon. Both of these choices also unlock a new support power to use alongside the unit.

In addition, Crimson Contract has been split into two support powers with fixed unit loadouts, with the second one requiring a T3 laboratory and some Crimson Crown units have received tweaks to make them bit more interesting to use.

 

Excelsus Research Lab will now unlock a new buildable unit in form of Sentinel Utility Truck if a T3 laboratory is also owned. Sentinel can repair damaged vehicles & structures as well as boost armour strength of nearby base defenses and detect cloaked enemies.

In addition, Excelsus Research Lab itself can now be found on more maps.

Some general misc. improvements & balance changes

• Transports can now load in units without them having to queue up first - they will however still need to exit one by one.
• Credits generation rate for T4 structures and Oil Derricks has been reduced from 100 to 75 credits per 10 in-game seconds.
• Scout infantry attacks have been normalized and will now deal damage on same frame of their attack animations.
• Map reveal support powers now temporarily fully decloak enemies that are in the area of their activation.

Game Options Additions


There are now several new game options that can control availability of certain features in battle such as garrisons, tech defenses and support powers / superweapons.



Merc Alliance is a new 'fun'-type game option that enables players to pick a mercenary faction to choose at game start that permanently unlocks their technology for player's use for duration of the game - this choice cannot be changed later. Any support powers that would deliver units at the mercenary HQ building will instead deliver them at coordinates considered the player's base center.

New Maps


Mortarmouth Challenge pits players against Dominion commanders fielding large amount of artillery weapons, ranging from tech defenses that cannot be recaptured by players (including the brand new Artillery Bastion) to Marauders and Brimstones and even the fearsome Ironblight.

In addition, there are new skirmish/multiplayer maps.



Final Words

There is currently no set release date for the update, however it will be revealed once it is more certain that the planned release can be delivered in that time window. Currently, this is a rough outline of what you can expect.

• A large number of balance tweaks and bugfixes
• Changes to experimental units, to balance out more outstanding ones and make the less interesting ones more desirable choices
• Some new units and/or support powers across the factions, including new jet aircraft for all factions
• QoL improvements like improved jet aircraft behaviour, faster transport loading etc.
• Overhaul of mercenary faction arsenals & bonuses
• New and overhauled game lobby options
• 1 new Challenge map
• 12 new Standard skirmish maps.
• Updated version of World Altering Editor included, with bugfixes and new features
• Support for multiplayer save / loading (currently only one multiplayer game session is preserved at a time, may change in future)
• Built-in custom mission support in game client

Yes, you read that last one right.



Expect to hear and read more about the upcoming update in the near future.

 
As of today, after a very long wait, initial release of Project Phantom is out.
 
Download at: https://projectphantom.net/download
 
If you're looking to discuss the mod, leave feedback, report a bug or a crash or looking for players to play with, join the Project Phantom Discord Server as well.
 

Features:

• 3 playable factions with full-fledged arsenals.
  • Western Coalition: A well-rounded army with access to reinforcements and upgrades. Special technologies: EMP, Non-Absorbing Shield Generators
  • Eurasian Dominion: Focus on heavily armoured vehicles and large area weapons. Special technologies: Radiation, Chaos, Mind Control
  • Phantom Imperative: Mobile units with light armour, high firepower and expensive prices. Special technologies: Teleportation, Stealth, Absorbing Personal Shields
• 3 experimental tech unlocks per faction, that player is locked in for rest of the match after making a choice allowing them access to an experimental unit and a complementary support power.
• Capturable tech buildings and mercenary faction buildings that unlock additional, themed units & structures.
• Over 200 skirmish & multiplayer maps.
• Three players (human or AI) vs. AI challenge maps.
• One cooperative mission.

 

What's Next

For a while the focus will likely be on fixing any bugs found, possible balance tweaks etc. There will eventually be content expansions replacing the placeholder buildings currently used, add additional maps like challenges and also the long-awaited singleplayer missions.

It has been a while since I've last posted a formal update for this mod. Regardless, work on this project has continued even during silence and keeps going relatively strong, and I do have few things to share.

Website
Project Phantom website has been updated with a new layout. Many of the pages are still under construction, and I'll be sure to keep everyone updated when they go live.

Discord
For those who may have missed it, Project Phantom does have an official Discord server that can be used for discussing the modification, receiving updates regarding it first in the line and eventually it would hopefully serve as a multiplayer hub as well.

Showcases
A while back I posted an article about various UI / UX improvements in Project Phantom, be sure to check it out if you already have not.
There's also a new showcase video, showing off some units & buildings in Project Phantom. It can also be viewed on ModDB.

As mentioned prior, development has been going on relatively strong, regardless of occassional pauses and challenges. With that in mind, I have the following announcement to make.

Early access version of Project Phantom will be released during Summer 2024
Exact release date will be made known closer to launch

So what will be in this first release?
Good question. Right now, we are looking at the following set of features.

• Three new factions - Western Coalition, Eurasian Dominion and Phantom Imperative, with complete arsenals full of new units, buildings and support powers (albeit many buildings will use graphics that can be deemed as 'placeholders').
• Three 'mercenary factions' - Fist of Titans, Crimson Crown and Excelsus Group, that have capturable buildings that provide various support powers and units to players who capture them, alongside the classic set of neutral tech buildings including capturable base defences.
• A large number of new map props and other miscellaneous buildings.
• Three reworked terrain tile theaters, Temperate, Tundra & Desert, with significantly expanded tilesets from the original game, including fully integrated urban tilesets and a basic interior tileset.
• Around 160 standard skirmish/multiplayer maps, some old and some new.
• Island Combat game mode, which is constrained to maps with water-locked islands.
• Scavengers game mode, where you start with a Mobile War Factory and are required to collect powerup crates for units and funds - your factory can reverse-engineer any vehicles found (including technology trucks for aerial vehicles) to unlock them as buyable units.
• One scenario for Hold the Line game mode, where up to 4 players (human or AI) are pitted against waves of AI-controlled enemies that scale based on number players in game, with objective to protect a critical structure from the said enemies.

A preview of Crimson Crisis scenario, where players are tasked protecting an Energy Research Lab against waves of Crimson Crown units.

• Challenges game mode, where 2 players (human or AI) are pitted against three AI-controlled enemies in specific scenarios that have unique modifiers in play and odds stacked against the players. Initially Challenges mode is going to come with three scenarios, one against each of the factions.

A preview of one of the Challenges, called Thunderhill Challenge where players are challenged by the nigh-impenetrable defenses of a W.A.R.D research base.

• A single Cooperative mission, testing the waters out, where two Coalition commanders are tasked with eliminating a Dominion mining outpost.

Preview of co-op mission Motherlode, where a small squad of Coalition forces is sent on an infiltration and elimination mission to a Dominion mining base.

• Various quality of life, bugfix and other engine improvements, courtesy of Ares Expansion DLL and Phobos Engine Extension.
• Full integration with the CnCNet client, allowing easy access to multiplayer games and easy download of mod updates.
• Bundled installation of two map editors, a version of the legacy FinalAlert 2 map editor as well as Rampastring's modern World Altering Editor.
• Installer software with compatibility with all releases of Yuri's Revenge.

I hope to have some more news to share about Project Phantom's development and the upcoming early access release in near future, but for now, I'm out.

Since the mod has been in (sort of) a testing phase for a while now there hasn't been a lot of significant content updates and that kind of shows in these newsposts. Not a lot of new stuff, more wrapping up things shown over past few months in one nice package.
 
UNIT SHOWCASE VIDEOS
 
For those who have not yet seen them, the conclusion of both the Hero Spotlight and Experimental Weapons Test showcase series are available for viewing at Youtube.

Hero Spotlight #3

 
Experimental Weapons Test #3

 
There's also a picture with all of the Experimental Units shown on it, combined with a chart that displays under what conditions you get each of them. Stolen technology involves infiltrating both a tier 3 laboratory structure and a vehicle factory, as a reminder.

 
 
OTHER PROGRESS
 
A little while ago the fourth terrain theater to be included in Project Phantom besides Temperate, Tundra and Desert was revealed. The so-called Gloomy theater combines certain elements from both Temperate and Tundra, featuring withered landscapes combined with urban environments consisting primarily of darker pavement and unique cliff-face tiles.


When initially announcing the mercenary factions, it was stated that capturing Crimson Crown's Technology Vault grants access to one of three unique units, depending on your chosen faction. However, in testing most of these unique units were deemed redundant, not unique enough or simply not worth it at all. As a result, capturing the Vault will now instead grant players who have any tier 3 laboratory building and vehicle factory an access to Blackout Signal Inhibitor, a mobile unit limited to one per player that generates a jamming signal with significant radius that blocks use of enemy support powers and superweapons, as well as jams radars and captured Satellite Centers. In addition to this, Blackout can also detect cloaked units at ranges higher than any other unit capable of doing so and use an electromagnetic interference weapon to stop a single, EM-susceptible unit from working at all.
 
Technology Vault also grants Prototype Disruptor Towers, that use a similar but slightly different type of jamming signal to generate blank spots in enemy radar views to shroud the area in their vicinity. They are deployed via a support power, and will eventually, due to being unstable prototypes, explode upon itself regardless of if they are being fired upon (this is displayed via a timer bar under the structure itself to all players).
 

 
Lastly, to round out the capturable base defenses roster, there is an addition of a heavy-duty anti-air defense in form of Missile Bunkers, which work more effectively against slower-moving, heavily armored aircraft than fast ones such as fighter jets.
 

 
 
That's all of it for this time. I have something bit bigger planned for the next news post, so keep your eyes out for that.


FOLLOW PROJECT PHANTOM

So what's up with Project Phantom currently? The news-silence has been mostly due to the mod currently being in a beta testing phase, with most focus going on to polishing gameplay and finishing some graphical assets rather than showcasing. Thought I'd rectify that a bit, however.

UNIT SHOWCASE VIDEOS

The second part of Experimental Weapons Test is now available. This one features a bonus clip showing an unit from the previous installment that has been through quite significant changes based on feedback.

Experimental Weapons Test #2


There is also the second part of Hero Spotlight which was uploaded earlier on.

Hero Spotlight #2


This leaves only one part left of both Hero Spotlight and Experimental Weapons Test - which should hopefully appear during coming weeks.


WEBSITE STATUS

I was initially planning on bringing the website up-to-date gradually as time goes by, but as the mod is currently going through a playtesting phase I figured trying to keep the website up-to-date at this point would be colossal waste of time, and therefore it will be brought fully up-to-date at once much closer to the release of first public beta version some time in (hopefully near) future.


PPROGRESS

One of the big recent additons/changes to Project Phantom is adoption of the new game client created by Rampastring of Dawn of the Tiberium Age. This allows Project Phantom to be played over CnCNet and provides several other neat features especially for game setup. Below is a small teaser of how the client currently looks.



Those with keen eyes might have spotted an unit in the bonus clip segment of the new Experimental Weapons Test video that has not appeared anywhere before. This unit is Liberator AMOS, an artillery unit used by the Western Coalition. Armed with dual mortar guns that can unleash a rapid barrage of moderately inaccurate shells on enemy units from a range. In addition, it sports a third gun that occassionally fires an EMP ordnance as well which will incapacitate enemy vehicles and defences without adequate countermeasures installed.



Few structures have also had their placeholder artwork replaced with brand new ones.

Dominion Training Camp


Dominion Battle Lab


Phantom Shadow Conduit

Phantom Shadow Conduit is an important but expensive Phantom structure that cloaks nearby units and grants specific units ability to cloak regardless of their position on the map. However, if you lose all Shadow Conduits or go on low power, those units will lose their cloaked status until another one is constructed or base power is restored. In team games, you can benefit from your allies' Shadow Conduits.

And for those who might have missed it on ModDB, Facebook or Twitter earlier this autumn, there is the following.

Phantom Singularity Catalyst

Phantom Singularity Catalyst is Phantom's superweapon structure that provides access to Singularity Collapse superweapon.
 

Until next time.

FOLLOW PROJECT PHANTOM