Rock, Paper, Shotgun's Brendan Caldwell writes, "Planetary Annihilation is a slick, modernised RTS, engineered from the ground up to appeal to the fast-paced, competitive, hotkey-loving esports crowd." The game was praised for its ambitious concept, but criticized for playability and overall incompleteness. Planetary Annihilation received a mixed reception upon release. Voice actor John Patrick Lowrie, who did all the narrations for Total Annihilation, did the narrations for Planetary Annihilation as well.Īccording to Mavor, while game visualization began in May 2012, three months prior to the game's public announcement, the game concept itself had been in development for approximately three years by that time.Īdditionally, the server and game engine technologies that would underpin the game had been in development for several years prior to the game's public reveal, with some of the server technology having already made its way into PlayFab, Uber Entertainment's back-end server network. The game's art style was designed by Steve Thompson, who previously worked on the art for Total Annihilation and Supreme Commander. He was also the lead programmer on Supreme Commander. Jon Mavor wrote the graphics engine for Total Annihilation. The player(s) lose when their last commander is destroyed. In development updates, Mavor has commented that "a million" in-game units is a design goal of the development team. The game's creators stated that Planetary Annihilation will resemble something of the 1997 real-time strategy Total Annihilation as its focus is more towards 'macro' gameplay as opposed to 'micro' gameplay. These planets are dynamic in that they can be 'annihilated' using other planets or catalysts, a major focus for Uber Entertainment. Players will be able to conquer other planets and even entire systems on maps said to include "hundreds of worlds", through the Galactic War. Planetary Annihilation features a planet-based map system with different types of planets and asteroid like moons. However, at release 40-player matches were not yet available.
In interviews with PC Gamer and Joystiq, lead game developer Jon Mavor commented that the game's complexity and playtime can vary, from half-hour, 2-player battles to lengthy matches with potentially 40-players. Planetary Annihilation and TITANS are now developed and published by a new company, Planetary Annihilation Inc. A standalone expansion pack, Planetary Annihilation: TITANS, was released, which adds powerful Titan-class units. Planetary Annihilation is a real-time strategy PC game originally developed by Uber Entertainment, whose staff included several industry veterans who worked on Total Annihilation and Supreme Commander.