Red Alert<\/em>, Unreal Tournament<\/em> and more.”,”image_url”:”https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/screen1c-500×500.jpg”,” listing_image_url”:”https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/screen1c-768×432.jpg”}”>
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No more port forwarding!
There are fan browser versions Red Alert, Unreal tournamentand much more.
Over the past couple of weeks, friends and colleagues have told me about a variety of ingeniously implemented browser-based ways to play classic MS-DOS and Windows games with other people on virtually any hardware.
The late 1990s and early 2000s were the peak of multiplayer gaming for me. It was the era of real-time strategy games and boomer shooters, and not only did I attend a lot of LAN parties, but I also played online with friends.
This is still possible today with several old school games; there are Discord servers that organize scheduled matches Star Siege TribesFor example. But often running these games on modern Windows isn't that easy, and just like in the old days, you may have some annoying network setup work to do, not to mention the fact that many people who used Windows back in the day now use macOS or Linux instead.
This week several technologies and games websites (starting from PC gamer) began to distribute the link to Chronoseparationfan version of the browser Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2. It was first introduced in its infancy back in 2020, but has continued to receive updates and is now almost fully loaded with features and content as far as the multiplayer portion of this game is concerned. (Single player doesn't exist yet.)
Here's what the site says about it:
Chrono Divide is a fan project that aims to recreate the original Red Alert 2 from the Command & Conquer series using web technology. The result is a game client that runs in your web browser without installing additional plugins or applications.
The project initially began as an experiment and was intended to prove that it was possible to create a fully functional cross-platform real-time strategy game running in a web browser. Now that the game version is already available, the ultimate goal is to achieve feature parity with the original vanilla “Red Alert 2” engine.
It runs on a client-server model (“say goodbye to port forwarding and firewall exceptions”), supports mods, offers both modern and classic mouse control schemes, and runs “on any device and operating system, right from your web browser,” including phones and tablets. However, to play the game you (for obvious reasons) need a copy of the game files.
In addition, there are leaderboards and Discord serveras well as “seasons” in a modern gaming style (without monetization, of course) with special rules and card rotation. So there is a decent community playing Red Alert 2 on a regular basis in 2025, which is pretty wild.
Chrono Divide joins several similar projects by bringing old-school multiplayer PC games with modern bells and whistles to web browsers. One example: DOS zone offers to join online matches in one click Rock, Quake 2 And 3, Unreal tournamentAnd Half-Life: Deathmatch– again, with a Discord server for an extra layer of community.
So if you want to spend your Friday night reliving the TCP/IP and LAN multiplayer party games of the early 2000s, well, here you go. See you there – I'm still thinking Unreal tournament is the best multiplayer first-person shooter ever made.
