Its limited success is largely blamed on the game lacking the background material, storyline and character of its competitors. TA, despite advanced graphics (for the time), massive critical acclaim, unique gameplay and ground-breaking technical brilliance, was never hugely popular (it had the misfortune of being released around the same time as StarCraft I) and is largely forgotten today. Around this time, the central pattern repository of the Core formed itself into a single vast intelligence, known as Central Consciousness, which took control of the benevolent Core government and instituted mandatory patterning for all. They founded the Arm, a significant minority of militaristic hardliners utterly opposed to patterning.

The Core government, acting according to the will of the majority of its citizens, moved towards universal patterning, and backed up copies of all patterned minds into a central database on the world of Paradise.Ī small group of soldiers rebelled against patterning and the rejection of humanity they associated with it. The war between Arm and Core began over the process known as 'patterning', a technology that allowed the transfer of the human mind into machines untouched by disease or pain.

Pioneering game elements such as 3d models for units, terrain with a 3d heightmap, and strategic warfare on a scale simply not seen before, TA won dozens of awards at its release and is still considered by many critics to be one of the finest examples of the RTS genre. Released in 1997, Total Annihilation is a science fiction Real-Time Strategy game created by Chris Taylor and Cavedog Entertainment.

Cavedog total annihilation