About Total Annihilation
Total Annihilation is a science fiction real-time strategy game from Cavedog Entertainment, released for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS in September 1997: on the 25th in the UK and the 27th in North America. Cavedog published it in North America, and GT Interactive distributed it internationally. Chris Taylor designed it, Ron Gilbert was the producer and Jeremy Soule wrote the score.
Two expansion packs came out in 1998, The Core Contingency on April 29 and Battle Tactics on July 20. A medieval-themed spin-off, Total Annihilation: Kingdoms, followed on June 25, 1999. The game has single-player and multiplayer modes.
DOS.Zone’s description casts you as the Commander in a galaxy at war, where rebels fight a government that is forcing everyone to become robots. You gather resources, build bases and units, collect intelligence and fight the computer through a story campaign. DOS.Zone also points to the game’s reception: a Metacritic score of 86, Game of the Year and Best Strategy Game awards for 1997, and first place in GameSpy’s 2004 list of the top ten real-time strategy games of all time.
How it runs in your browser
Total Annihilation is a Windows game, and DOS.Zone runs the original release in an emulated PC through js-dos, the browser build of DOSBox that the site develops as open source. Press Play and dos.zone opens in a new tab with the game. The files come from the site, so there’s nothing to install, no disc to find and no account to make, and DOS.Zone doesn’t show ads.
The listing is credited to a DOS.Zone user, Carter54, and has a rating of 4.8 from 56 player reviews. It is single-player only, with no multiplayer room, and it doesn’t say whether the expansions or save support are included.
It’s also worth knowing that DOS.Zone has taken games down when rights holders asked: GTA 1 and 2 were removed after a request from Take-Two. A listing like this one can disappear the same way.
Controls and devices
Use a keyboard and mouse. Click into the game once it starts so the emulator receives your input. The host doesn’t list the game’s keys, so look in its own options before your first battle.
On phones, DOS.Zone gives you virtual on-screen controls, but Total Annihilation was made for a keyboard and mouse, and a desktop or laptop is a far better fit. Chromebooks haven’t been confirmed.
Who it’s for
It suits anyone who played Total Annihilation in the late 1990s and wants to start a campaign again without installing the old Windows release, and strategy players who want to try a game that critics rated highly at the time. If you’d like more from the same years, Age of Empires from 1997 and Dune 2000 from 1998 also run on DOS.Zone.
Is Total Annihilation Free, Safe and Official?
Can I play Total Annihilation online for free?
You can play it free in your browser on DOS.Zone, with no download and no account. The listing is single-player, so you play against the computer rather than other people online.
Are The Core Contingency and Battle Tactics included?
DOS.Zone’s listing doesn’t mention either 1998 expansion, so don’t count on them. Check the game’s page on DOS.Zone if you’re looking for that content.
Does Total Annihilation work on a phone?
DOS.Zone offers virtual on-screen controls on phones, but Total Annihilation was built for a keyboard and mouse, so play it on a computer if you can.
