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1) Red Alert 2

2) Generals

3) Red Alert

I don't particularly care for RTS games, actually. And my experience with the genre is pretty much limited to C&C and Warcraft, but there you go.

my little brother loves Hearts of Iron 2, and I have not gotten into it yet, as I would probablyhave to beat him senseless in order to get my hands on it... Although he keeps asking me for strategy advice...and the game sounds great...

just for shits and giggles, lets also try and tink of the WORST RTS'es you've ever played. I'm going to list Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds, because it is simply the WORST RTS ever made: think Age of Empires 2, with shite air units, rediculously disproportionate HP (vehicles and infantry,) and a poor interface and graphics to top it all off... all bad.

I also enjoyed Red Alert 2, simply for the cheese factor ( I'm not saying it is a bad game or anything)

Worst?

Can't say worst ever or worst that I ever played, but worst that I own is:
C&C Tiberian Sun (and Firestorm). I don't like graphics much but largest fall is units, they just do not feel powerful. Even Mammoth mk2 feels junk. Still on my list of games that I own and haven't played to the end, I think... Should fix that someday.
Also, it refused to work on my old Finnish WinXP (sp1) system, works fine on my current English XP (sp2) IIRC.

Worst due me being pathetic on it: Warcraft3 & Starcraft -I can't micromanage and act fast enough to stay alive against even computer opponent(s)...

And if someone mentions Star Wars: Rebellion, I actually like that game somewhat...

--Rin

Man, Galactic Battlegrounds sucks so much balls. Just looking at the box gives it all away: Age of Empires with Star Wars pictures. R2 units that fuck trees for 'carbon'. Fucking shit.

Ignoring RTW...

Ground Control, Homeworld, Homeworld 2.


Not enough mention of GC in this thread.

Hmm, I have to say I quite enjoyed, in this order:

1. Empire Earth Expansion
2. Age of Mythology and the Expansion
3. War Craft III

Rise of Legends was great fun.

Homeworld series. both had their good points, I think including some features from both in a third game would be great.

I dunno, I'm a fan of the Generals Zero Hour game, but nothing is satisfying in an RTS than the little germans screaming 'M'hoiven' when their tank catches fire from Codename; Panzers. or turning a terran command center into a factory for exploding infested terrans right in the middle of a base where they forgot to put any layered defenses.
so yea, three way tie for third.

How about a thread about RTS *campaigns*? For instance, HW2 is a great game and engine, but the campaign is stupid lame shit. Other games have very primitive engines (Kohan, etc) but half-decent stories, and a few RTS have standout stories. For instance, there's no point mentioning Warzone in any discussion of story, because it basically doesn't have one, and it's campaign swings between very easy and brain-crunchingly hard, 2-hour limited assaults of pain.

Stark wrote:How about a thread about RTS *campaigns*? For instance, HW2 is a great game and engine, but the campaign is stupid lame shit. Other games have very primitive engines (Kohan, etc) but half-decent stories, and a few RTS have standout stories. For instance, there's no point mentioning Warzone in any discussion of story, because it basically doesn't have one, and it's campaign swings between very easy and brain-crunchingly hard, 2-hour limited assaults of pain.

So once again, Ground Control?

Okay, that's it, I give in. I'm going to move past the bad experience with the demo and finally play Ground Control. It better be superior to GC2, though, because frankly GC2 was average at best.

Another mention of zero-campaign: battle for middle earth 2. It's an okayish game, but the campaigns are utterly uninspired rubbish.

1) Warzone 2100. I'll always have fond memories of this game. It was my first real pc game, and got me into my first online community. Besides, the game was really fun.

2) Homeworld. Yeah, this is second, but it's a really close second. It took me a week to learn to like it, but once I did, I absolutely loved it. I still play it from time to time.

3) Mechcommander. God, I need to find that disk....

Stark wrote:Okay, that's it, I give in. I'm going to move past the bad experience with the demo and finally play Ground Control. It better be superior to GC2, though, because frankly GC2 was average at best.

Another mention of zero-campaign: battle for middle earth 2. It's an okayish game, but the campaigns are utterly uninspired rubbish.

Fuck GC2, it was nice, but it has nothing to GC simple 'zero reinforcement' model, with a very nice story, acceptable characters and decent graphics for its time.

*goes to install it*

Boyish-Tigerlilly wrote:2. Age of Mythology and the Expansion

Holy shit somebody else knows this game.

Temjin wrote:3) Mechwarrior. God, I need to find that disk....

Mechwarrior is a simulation game, not really RTS. Unless you mean Mech Commander?

I generally DETEST real time strategy games for the aforementioned click-fest factor. However, there are two which I have liked very much. The first one is the much-beloved Dune 2 and the second is a game that many here might never have heard of: Ancient Art of War.

AAoW is really ancient by today's standards, from sometime in the mid-80s. If I remember correctly, the thing ran on the old Amstrad PC 1512 model we had back then and was rather primitive, but it worked. And you actually needed to have a good grasp of strategy to beat it. The game had a map editor, terrain affected how quickly your units could move, it had supply lines, effects of starvation, sieges and a lot of other things that I have not seen in many games since, or at least not as elegantly implemented.

There were even several different types of scenarios and winning conditions, including capture flags, capture all forts, attrition and a couple of others. There were three types of units: Barbarian, Knight and Archer and they all had some different advantages.

The one thing that you had to do was make sure that the "Forts supply food" option was turned off, because then you needed to outnumber the enemy 15 to 1 to get inside and you'd lose 10 to 13 out of every 15 you had. As long as only villages supply food, you can starve a fort to submission. I still remember one hilarious battle where an enemy stack ran down a lone knight of mine. A single rested knight against 14 barbarians who had been starving for a long time, he was completely surrounded and when the fight was done, he was standing amid a pile of barbarian corpses. He also managed to make hash out of a second similar stack just a bit later, but sadly, he died in that fight with just two barbarians left standing.

The game also had limited enough parameters that the AI could handle it and was really tough. There was one map that was such murder that I only beat it once and that against the easiest AI, Crazy Ivan. Picking Sun Tzu as the opponent meant almost certain defeat n most of the maps in the game.

Of course, being as old as it is, it was SP only and only had two sides, black and white.

EDIT: Added a bit of text I accidenatlly left out earlier.

Edi

Stofsk wrote:

Temjin wrote:3) Mechwarrior. God, I need to find that disk....

Mechwarrior is a simulation game, not really RTS. Unless you mean Mech Commander?

uh.... long day?

Fixed now.

Edit: What a waste of a 1000th post.

FUCK ME. I forgot Ground Control (grabs wakazashi and kneels).

DrMckay wrote:basically, what the subject says, over the years, what have been your three personal favorite strategy games, and a reason/reasons why you liked them.

1. Dune 2 - the first RTS ever I've played. I've been scared of sandworms ever since.
2. C&C Generals: ZH - all the other RTS-s after Dune 2 were lacking imho.
3. TA - First played it a year ago after C&C Generals:ZH started to repeat the same scenarios (ie. I win in the end ).

Does anyone remember When Two Worlds War? It was really hard to play (80s, not-designed-for-mouse interface) but it was a multi-level battle between two nearby planets in realtime, where you had to manage your huge planet map with economy, production research etc while launching spacebourne assaults on the other planet.

I'm going to put another shout in for Warzone 2100. The campaign mode wasn't great, but the sheer number of things you could build and research was astounding. One of my favourite ways to while away an afternoon was to play a skirmish map that had eight giant hills against the maximum number of CPUs on their hardest setting, and turn mine into a gigantic layered fortress of guns, guns, and more guns and watch the bangage.


Also, though it's not quite on the level of complexity of a PC RTS, the RPG/RTS hybrid Lost Magic on the DS is pretty funky. It's got a good mix of pokemon style capture and training for units, and missions that, because of their sometimes quite punishing time limits, and respawning enemies, can actually put up a reasonable challenge.

Plus, playing an RTS by physically pointing at units is the business.

DrMckay wrote:my little brother loves Hearts of Iron 2, and I have not gotten into it yet, as I would probablyhave to beat him senseless in order to get my hands on it... Although he keeps asking me for strategy advice...and the game sounds great...

HOI2 is not an RTS. It is a grand strategy game. It is good, but not enough to justify prison time Hard to play while in prison.

The Ancient Art of War was a very fun game way, way back. Damn hard.

Another is Nobunga's Ambition (from KOEI.) Possibly the origin of the Shogun game that started the Total War series. Had some definite comparisons. But the game was much earlier, so the battles were all simulated since detailed battles weren't possible. Also fairly hard, although I always had problems since it was a free for all - 50 some odd fiefs all with their own leaders. So attack fief A, and fief B immediately swooped in to attack your weakened forces.

3: Warzone 2100
2: TA
1: Homeworld

Rise of nations coming in very close

Total Annihilation
Red Alert 2
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War

In second Place
Wacraft III(Play it for the capaign)
Homeworld(Lost it before I could really get into it)
Batallion Wars(For the action)

Games I'm looking foward to:
Supreme Commander
BWii(Batallion Wars 2)
Warhammer: Mark of Chaos

The three I was constantly playing was
1. Total Annihilation
2. Starcraft
3. age of Mytholgy

I never really had high-end computers so I couldn't try out the new games, but these old favorites were still fun to play, armies of giants and collossues or waves of tanks.

I'd have to say Total Annihilation, Homeworld, and Age of Mythology, in that order.

Ooh. Hrm. Homeworld: Cataclysm, Rise of Nations and Total Annihilation.