Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun – Firestorm

About Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun – Firestorm

Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun – Firestorm is an expansion pack developed by Westwood for Tiberian Sun, and published by Electronic Arts on March 7, 2000. The expansion pack brings a number of gameplay elements missing from the main game, as well as two new campaigns set after the events of the GDI campaign of the main game, a selection of new units, and the inclusion of a third faction for Skirmish mode and multiplayer. One of the more notable elements brought in by the expansion pack was the return to FMV briefings directed towards the player and a linear storyline combining the campaigns. The game's story focuses on a crisis that slowly emerges when both GDI and Nod try to make use of the AI CABAL to help them with their operations, unaware it is using them for its own schemes.

Several months after the Second Tiberium War has concluded, GDI conducts a salvage operation to recover important technology from Kane's former Temple in Cairo, including the alien database known as the Tacitus. Shortly after it is recovered, an ion storm hits the command ship Kodiak carrying it and causes it to crash. Because of a communication blackout with the space station Philadelphia, GDI officer General Paul Cortez assumes temporary command from a ground base, and assigns a commander to recover the database and any survivors at the crash site, whereupon the core is sent to a GDI research team led by Cortez's ex-wife Dr. Gabriella Boudreau, who is working to find the means to counter the spread of Tiberium before the planet becomes too toxic for humans to live on.

Meanwhile, Black Hand leader Anton Slavik faces opposition from several Nod council members to allow him to lead the Brotherhood, and assigns a task force to help him reactivate the Brotherhood's AI CABAL. Once active, CABAL assigns a Nod commander to cause disruptions against GDI settlements, as well as eliminating the mutant leader Tratos, forcing GDI to quell the resultant riot that erupts. Slavik becomes concerned over the assignments his commander received from CABAL and soon orders the AI to be shut down, only for it turn against Nod. GDI, seeking another way to translate the Tacitus with Tratos dead, acquires a core belonging to CABAL in order to use the AI, and soon learn the database is missing a segment. Upon the segment being recovered and connected to the database, CABAL betrays GDI and attacks them with cyborgs, forcing Cortez to order the evacuation of Boudreau's team.

With both GDI and Nod seeking to stop the crisis being caused by CABAL, Cortez orders his forces to prevent the AI from securing humans to be processed into more cyborgs, while Slavik assigns a team to raid a GDI base and secure an EVA unit to replace the rogue AI. Eventually, both sides form a ceasefire in the wake of CABAL's actions, deeming the AI too great a threat to ignore. Both sides launch operations to counter CABAL's forces, and eventually destroy his core, ending the crisis. Boudreau eventually manages to unlock the Tacitus and acquires a vast amount of data, allowing Cortez to provide good news to the rest of GDI command as the communication blackout ends. Meanwhile, Slavik assumes full command of Nod, making certain to continue the Brotherhood in following the visions and prophecies of Kane. Unknown to both sides, CABAL's memory feeds into a hidden cryo-bunker, where Kane resides, recovering from his wounds inflicted towards the end of the Second Tiberium War.

Firestorm follows the events as they unfolded in the GDI ending of Tiberian Sun, with its campaigns no longer structured into two competing storylines but consisting of two different narratives over the same series of events. With Nod fractured into feuding warlords following Kane's death, Anton Slavik is determined to keep Kane's ideology alive through the resurrection of Nod's highly advanced artificial intelligence, CABAL (Computer Assisted Biologically Augmented Lifeform). Meanwhile, the Global Defense Initiative continues its ongoing campaign to stop the spread of Tiberium and its monstrous mutations by retrieving the extraterrestrial Tacitus device, and decides to take control of CABAL to help it decode the device (after Nod, under orders from CABAL, assassinated Tratos, leader of the Forgotten and the only other individual on Earth with the knowledge necessary to translate the Tacitus). Unbeknownst to both GDI and Nod, CABAL has two cores and intentionally allows each faction to take possession of one so that it can simultaneously manipulate both factions to do its bidding. After securing the Tacitus, CABAL goes rogue and attempts to conquer the world through the systematic assimilation of human populations into cyborg armies, forcing GDI and Nod to unite temporarily against it. Upon successfully defeating CABAL, GDI is able to recover the Tacitus and finds a large portion of it having already been translated, bringing new hope to combating Tiberium infestation; in the Nod ending, the defeated CABAL appears to merge with the consciousness of a resurrected/recovering Kane.