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On The Ascent And Descent Of The RTS
Thanks to GameSpot for their guest 'GameSpotting' editorial discussing the perceived decline of the real-time strategy genre. The author argues: "While there have been unusual bright spots on the RTS gaming scene, the overall look of it is pretty grim. Most games offer very little when it comes to revitalizing the genre, and eventually they even fail in rekindling old interests that faded away when we let go of Command & Conquer and Warcraft." He finishes with a call to arms, citing Command & Conquer: Generals ("[a] dearth of interesting strategies") and Age Of Mythology ("[offering a] rote formula") as examples of this lack of innovation, and urging: "Only you can stop the market from regurgitating the same old titles, and maybe even encourage it to make a few nudges in the right direction."
A few years ago adventure games were in this same 'state'. All you fans out there: be patient. In a few years time the genre will slowly awake from it beauty sleep, just like adventure games are doing at the moment.
-- Cheers!
Warning, parent is a goatse link.
If it's in you sig, it's in your post.
There's definately been a stagnant few years for RTS's. In the ages of Command & Conquer, Total Annihilation and Age Of Empires, I couldn't get enough, but someone milked the same formula far far FAR too much and killed the key original concepts.
As far as I can see, people became desperate to improve on something that wasn't 'broke' and made worse and worse DEvolutions of a genre which once sailed high.
I'll still never forget the endless playing of C&C and TA.... but its gone stale now... im not sure if they'll ever return to quality of the great games of their hayday, but it'd be nice to think so.
Bring back dodgy sprites and top down views!
Name substantial gameplay differences between Red Alert, Warcraft II, KKND, M.A.X, Knights and Merchants [...] they all offer roughly the same gameplay. It may look a bit different, but it boils down to the same formula: Settle down, collect, build up, expand, destroy.
I hate to burst his bubble, but that is what (RT)S is all about. Next, he says that adventures had no substantial progress since "Adventure" because they are still "solve the puzzles and win" and FPS are all about "shoot the enemy dead".
Besides, there are quite a few games that took RTS one step further, the author names three of them. And yet the future looks grim? C'mon, there are bright spots in every genre, and there is the mass of run-of-the-mill games. That hardly counts as a descent of the genre.
Plus, many games cross borders and mix RTS with RPG or RTS with FPS (Battlezone). So there are influences from other generes that bring in fresh ideas.
I just realized my post has many TLAs. Oh well.
My cats ate my karma. They also wrote this comment.
The genre is not descending, it is evolving - though not primarily through the main commercial channels (yet). Just look at the popularity of Natural Selection, a truly innovative approach to real-time strategy: Replacing the dumb computer-controlled units with online gamers.
:-)
This idea seems so good to me that I find it surprising that we haven't seen more games of this type yet. (Or maybe someone have? If so, please shout
Apart from my differing opinion about Generals (which has very good multiplayer, especially with the Zero Hour expansion), I find it hard to trust any article about RTS games that claims that Dune 2 was the first game in the genre.
The author states "But that alone is not the only piece of misinformation regarding the RTS genre" when it is he that is spreading misinformation. Take for example, Hertzog Zwei, a Megadrive (Genesis) RTS that far predates Dune 2.
The entire article seems to be nothing but a badly-constructed collection of ruminations about RTS games. I don't claim this post to be any better constructed than his article, but I can claim that I am not trying to make you think I am important and cool by hinting at things I don't really understand.
Take for example the section marked "The Problem". All he does to establish what he thinks the problem is, is list a group of ancient RTS games, and then complain that they all had a lot in common. Of course they had something in common: they were all members of the same genre. An RTS game without most of the things he lists, "Settle down, collect, build up, expand, destroy" would not be an RTS.
So, there was no real point to that section of the article, unless all he meant to say was "I am bored of the RTS genre." The thing that make this article detestable is the way he then tries to make us think he is clever, and actually has a point. First, he make a parenthetical aside about the old games he lists, hinting that they didn't have all that much of a storyline. Oh, what wit! What intellect! What humour the author commands!
Secondly, he tries to make his idea bigger than they are. For example, the use of the rhetorical question "...need I go on?", when he does, in fact, need to go on, because he has yet to make any point. He instead writes "...need I go on?", hoping that the reader will assume he made an important point.
The rest of this article continues in the same vein. The author comes close to realising the stupidity of what he is writing when he adds, in the section marked 'But still a problem': "but seeing how there are dozens of titles clinging to the same genre".
How is it that the author cannot understand that the non-innovative games that he lists, including Generals and Age of Mythology, are as much members of the RTS genre as the innovative ones he lists, Starcraft and Homeworld?
And again, if one has a flaky and ill-established point, why say there are "dozens" of examples, rather that actually list them?
I, on the other hand, believe that I have made my point, and will forgo listing other examples of the poorness of this article. If you disagree, post a response and I will elaborate.
If it's in you sig, it's in your post.
The RTS world needs a big hitter to put it back in the charts.
But no innovation?
Bullfrog has looked after us well.
How about Dungeon Keeper & Black and White.
Both are as RTS as they come but did an admirable job of putting the raw mechanics of '5x = 1y' behind the theme.
It was a sad day to learn that Dungeon Keeper 3 put on hold indefinately
I don't think that the Total War series really fits into the RTS genre considering the time spent in the turn based portion of the game.
I've been hankering after some RTS action recently but don't feel like revisiting.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Total Annihilation from Cavedog took a fairly cool approach to the whole resources thing--making them inexhaustible. It also nicely let you not just put units on hold, but actually slow down production depending on how many you built at the same time.
It didn't fix the problem with harvest-build-attack being sort of rote-ish, but for those of us who like a quick murderous game, it's a nice approach. Even when I got crushed online (always), it at least took my opponents several minutes of gradually rolling carnage through the solid curtain of fire from my defense guns to get through to my base and wipe me out.
The major problem I have with these games is the impression I have that they put too much emphasis on 1v1 combat. There doesn't seem to be enough incentive for everyone to go after everyone; all the online games I've played have resulted in the two strongest players eliminating everyone else, and then going at it for a few minutes. Call me obsessive, but I rather enjoy having either teams or some way for weaker players to survive. But then again, I enjoy the actual battle rather than the resolution of the game.
To be honest, I also think that a lot of the weaknesses in gameplay in FPS, unlike with many-multiplayer battle games like BF1942, is that they are best played among friends.
Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage
I like the approach of some of these newer mix-ed mode games, where there is a few "planners" and the rest are foot soldiers (usually FPS-like). I always thought that the WarCraft genre would be cool if it was tag-team and one person could only do the resources/build units/research and another person concentrated on unit movements and battle. (Or maybe a smart AI or pre-programmed profile that handled decisions about what to research or when to build new units)
CnC was not the first RTS in the same way that Doom was not the first 3D shooter. They are both the one that many people remember as leading in the genre.
I think he's right about the decline - at least to a certain extent. Here's my quick summary of the Westwood games as I remembered them:
Groundbreaking; excellent story, gameplay and music. Very easy to get into. Liked it lots.
Prequel to CnC, so the story fits in. Gameplay much the same, but different units (including ships and planes) made it interesting. Excellent music. Decent skirmish mode too (which CnC lacked). Liked it lots.
Story continues from CnC, so it fit in (ok, a little stretched, but we'll allow it!). New graphics engine, new units, still interesting. Music didn't kick like the first two. Mild cheesiness, but I still thought it was OK.
Story somewhere between first RA and CnC, but no Kane (some Yuri person instead), so didn't feel quite right. New units, but the cheesiness factor was way up (eg: units all cheer when you complete a mission). Don't remember the music - I was too distracted by all the cheese.
Still annoyed at having been ripped off last time, so didn't bother with this. Smelled like cheese to me anyway.
By now I was into Team Fortress, so I didn't bother. Still annoyed with them too.
Occasionally, I still fire up Red Alert (which runs just fine under wine). It's still fun. It's certainly nostalgic.
The article didn't talk much about Age of Empires, which for me at least, brought some interesting game play - the different types of units and the whole development concept.
I didn't see Total Anihilation mentioned anywhere, which I found odd. That game took the graphics to new hights, and the gameplay too, with much more in the way of ships, subs and planes than Red Alert. Having a commander and nanolathing were interesting. If you were quick, you could have a transport plane pick up the enemy commander at the beginning of a multiplayer game!
OK, so the basic strategies are much the same, but that's the RTS genre. For me, the decline has not been the lack of new stragies. It's been the lack of new story lines and cool music.. and the addition of cheesey units
-- Steve
I haven't bought a RTS since TA (well, I bought Kingdoms, but that was to support the development of TA2, which never happened). I consider the game to be the peak of the genre, with everything else just rehashing paper/rock/scissors. I read in an interview that Chris Taylor was doing an RTS after he finished Dungeon Siege. That was a bit over a year ago, so does anybody know what Gas Powered Games is up to?
While it might be the case that there have been plenty of poor RTS games released in the recent past, there have also been a few gems: Rise of Nations, by BigHuge Games, is one that I haven't seen mentioned, and it is quite amazing. Don't be thrown off if you didn't like the AOE games; it's quite different, and completely enjoyable. The whole city-based development adds alot to the genre.
I loved Starcraft and TA.
I got Warcraft III, played the Single-player campaign until about half-way into the undead campaign, and then stopped playing. Don't know why.
I've never been that great with RTS online anyways. I can't seem to multi-task that well in those, and can never make up my mind when to launch an opening assualt. Not to mention I'm slow at doing things in those games which is bad.
Insert Sig Here
Personally, it peaked with Starcraft for me. I'm just now replaying Brood Wars because I realized I had never finished it, and it's *still* a fun game, albeit a little rote.
My wish for an RTS game is the following: the build, collect, search, destroy algorithm would still hold true, but it could actually be expanded over multiple missions. In other words, when you built that command center in the first mission, it stuck around throughout the game. Resources would be harder to get, so that Carrier would actually MEAN something and you would want to protect it at all cost.
What RTS games come down to is you are playing a very small part in the very big picture, and the author's have a hard time establishing a believable storyline with only showing a single battle. Perhaps entire campaigns, where you zoom in on individual battles, or something would be more interesting.
--trb
When I first found Age of Empires I was told, "this is a true RTS." Then I tried Stronghold and StarCraft and found that resources were used and created very differently. To add to the confusion, Civ, a turn based game is also considered a RTS game. Maybe we're just trying to jam to many games into one genre.
The problem with teamplay is different skill level.
It's relatively easy to build teams of novices since this is where most people fit.
Unfortunately, as you go up in skill level, the number of people available to make a team diminishes almost exponentially.
This is what is happening in Warcraft III on Battle.net. Once you go up in level, you have to wait longer and longer to get a team game or even a 1v1 game. And this is by making teams out of players of different levels so it would be even worse if a team was to be made only of players of the same level.
Another problem that has arisen on Battle.net is that players will *very* often create a new account from scratch in the hopes of getting a better win record. As a consequence, you have many very good players in the low levels and that makes leveling a bit harder.
Anyway, playing online means also the need of a VERY balanced game and even Starcraft / Warcraft, while making a good attempt at it, have still some problems to solve.
Intelligence shared is intelligence squared.
Perhaps you're just not cut out for the pace of Starcraft, and what you call "rush" is just the intended pace. :p
This is my sig. There are many others like it, but this one is mine.
TA is definitely my all-time favorite RTS. It had great depth of gameplay; there was no one killer strategy. TA has tons of possible strategies and counter-strategies. Intelligence-gathering is key -- you need to know what your opponents are up to so you can counter them.
The game itself had a ton of balancing options, too. Prior to starting you could allow or disallow individual unit types. This could handicap a good player or just give the game a little more variation. Turn off the Advanced Aircraft plants, for example, if you want a grunt war.
The control scheme was great. You could queue orders for any unit, including buildings. You could assign buildings to control groups, so any new units produced there were automatically assigned to a group. I always assign my main production buildings to groups, and give them a perimeter patrol path that emerging units will follow. Then queue up a bunch of units and go off to focus on something else, content that the units will be built and not just stand around looking like a big target.
UberHack was a great mod for the game, too. It added a lot of new features to the game. Best. Mod. Ever. TA with Uberhack became a lunch-hour favorite for better than a year where I was working at the time.
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
One of the more unique RTS games I've played in a long time. It's as if the developers couldn't decide between an RTS or an RPG.
Advoid Lords of Everquest. What a load of crap. Sony proved that companies are just regurgitating the same old formulas.
RTS gamers just have to realize that Real Time Strategy doesn't have to only be the same old same old build-base kill-base rinse lather repeat paradigm we've had to deal with since Command and Conquer. There is room for complexity and brilliance in games that are real time, but bear no resemblance to those.
Have you heard of Paradox Entertainment? How about Europa Universalis 2, Hearts of Iron (second thought: forget about that one), or Victoria? They're, technically, real time strategy games, albeit with control over the game speed. No turns in sight. And they're some of the most brilliantly involving strategy games I've seen in a long, long time. (Disclaimer: I beta test some of their games, but I got the volunteer position because I was such a dedicated fan.)
IMO, these two games, both of the RTS genre, were both very innovative:
Rise of Nations - my current favourite and all around amazing RTS.
The Moon Project - sort of old by now, but more innovation than most RTS games.
...give Warlords Battlecry 2 a try. Web site is here: http://www.warlordsbattlecry2.com/ Sure, it's got 12 different races to choose from, lots of units and spells, heros you level and equip from game to game....that's fine, but what really makes this game great is the random map generator. Currently, I have a Human Paladin, a Dwarf Merchant, and a Wood Elf Druid. The Paladin is can heal himself and his armies, the Merchant can produce units for less and exchange resources at a better rate, and the Druid can summon creatures. I highly recommend this game to anyone who loves RTS games.
How can he list Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne in his 'games played' at the top, yet not mention it in his article? Even if he thought war3x had no improvements for the RTS genre, it deserved a passing mention even for its lack of 'innovation'.
I know its a large topic that would take a long time to discuss, but I just want to add that I think arguably there has been innovation in RTS, especially with Blizzard's games. Take war3's 'hero' concept, for better for worse, and I think there is SO much thinking and planning that goes into game balance for RTS that it is an innovation in itself, and may appear to be conservative design when in fact its not.
I agree with some previous posters, it seems like the article was not really thought out well at all, as much as I want to like something written by another avid sc2 fan.
Another poster brought up the fact that the editorial puts forth Dune 2 as the "first RTS", which is obviously wrong.
What was it, though? You might call Warcraft the first "modern RTS", I guess, but reaching back into the dark corners of my youth, I'm coming up with Ancient Art of War as the first RTS. It was, what, 1981 or so on a CGA PC?
Anyone know something before that (or want to argue that AAW was not an RTS)?
And what about the descent of the FPS? I mean every one is the old formula: put the character in a first-person view and make them shoot at things.
TA was a *fantastic* game.
There were a couple of really neat things it did.
It was one of the first games to leave Blizzard-style micromanagement. The interface is designed so that using it isn't one of the challenges of the game (limited group sizes, queues, etc), but to help you as much as possible (flexible AI toggles per group or unit, easy to queue up masses of units and preassign orders, etc).
It was the first I know of to have really neat sea battles. Infantry were cheap -- you could churn out tons -- but each ship was *expensive*, and specialized. The first time I played a sea battle level, I was enthralled.
It had great explosions and fires.
Battles took place over more realistic ranges -- people didn't shoot the equivalent of twenty feet. The biggest guns could lob rounds from seven or more screens away.
There was no limit on resources. A round didn't come to an end because you exhausted your resources -- you used everything possible, just as intelligently as you could.
There were masses of intelligent auto-build and repair abilities.
And a ton of other things.
Cavedog (TA's publisher) could have gone far, but for two factors: Blizzard, it's main competitor, didn't make as good games but had a phenomenal marketing budget that it used well, and TA's sequel, TA:Kingdoms, really sucked compared to TA.
Incidently, the guy that designed the TA system (where you could tell things to follow things that attacked them, or not etc)...I believe his name was "Tim" something...went on to make some medieval game with the same style interface. It wasn't an RTS, though. I can't remember the name. Fantastic to see that one game designer is interested in making a highly usable interface, not one that you have to fight.
May we never see th
RTS games are the most difficult games to make for multiplayer in my opinion. The reason for this is two fold. If you are brand new, and just trying to play the games online, you will lose to everyone. Unlike fps games or mmorpgs, even experienced players cant just pick up the game and expect to do well. The second reason is a balance issue. Even if you become good at the games, there are always serious balance issues which take an incredible amount of time to manage. There are very few companies that have the resources to handle this, and even those that do often have problems for months or years.
I don't know if this counts as an RTS, but I definatly give RTS's credit for spawning this masterpiece of a game. Myth and Myth II were fantastic games. I LOVE tactical combat, I hate managing resouces in rts games. Give me some points, let me buy my units, and get to the fun part, the combat.
Anyway, author's just bored with rts as we all are. RTS's arent dieing, they are getting better, I see nothing but improvments to the formula on most of the bigger games. Basically there hasnt been a new genera to make you go "OMFG THIS IS SO AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!111" for quite some time now. There will be something eventually though, there always is.
From GameSpot Computer game magazine:
http://www.gamespot.com/strategy/chess/review.html
CHESS
By Greg Kasavin
The latest offering in the rapidly overflowing
strategy genre is hard evidence that strategy games
need a real overhaul, and fast. Chess, a
small-scale tactical turn-based strategy game,
attempts to adopt the age-old "easy to learn,
difficult to master" parameter made popular by
Tetris. But the game's cumbersome play mechanics
and superficial depth and detail all add up to a
game that won't keep you busy for long.
Chess casts you as king of a small country at war
with a rival country of equivalent military power. There is little background story to speak o
by
and large the units in the game are utterly lacking
any character whatsoever. The faceless,
nondescript units are dubbed arbitrarily such labels
as "Knight" and "Bishop" while their appearance
reveals nothing to suggest these roles. To make
matters worse, the units on both playable sides are
entirely identical aside from a simple color palette
swap. The setting of the conflict is equally
uninspiring and consists merely of a two-color grid so
as to represent the two warring factions. Adding insult
to injury, there is only one available map- and it's
pathetically small, an 8x8 matrix (Red Alert
maps are up to 128x128 in size). The lack of more
expansive battlefields makes Chess feel like little more
than an over-glorified Minesweeper.
In a definite nod to Tetris, Chess eschews any kind of
personality and styling in order to emphasize its supposedly
addictive gameplay. Unfortunately, that gameplay is severely thin, there are only six units
the game.
Of those six, two are practically worthless while one is an
overpowered "god" unit, the Queen. She's your typical Lara
Croft-esque 1990s "me, too" attempt to attract the fabled gaming
girl audience from out of the woodwork to help solidify a customer
base for a game that simply cannot sell itself on its own merits.
The Queen can attack in any direction and she is balanced solely
by the fact that both sides are equally equipped with only one.
Otherwise, the functions of the six Chess units feel entirely
arbitrary. For instance, Rooks can only move in horizontal lines,
unable to attack enemies at diagonal angles; yet Bishops can
move diagonally, but not horizontally. The result is a frustratingly
unrealistic effort at creating balance and strategy where there
is, in fact, very little of either element to be found.
Inexplicable pathing problems also plague Chess - the irritating
Pawns can only move straight ahead, but for some reason or other
they attack diagonally. Worst of all, your units are always deployed
in exactly the same fashion. While there might have been some
strategic element involved in cleverly deploying one's troops around the undeniably constricted map, the designer
it to enforce a
"rule" about how the game should be set up. In the end, Chess matches
may often go on for a great length of time because your Pawns always
begin in front of your more useful forces, thereby blocking them off.
Only two players can compete simultaneously, thus severely limiting
any play life to be found. There is only one gameplay mode- no
capture the flag or team play - and that involves the two players
taking turns moving their units one by one. The moment a player's
King is threatened, that player is placed in a state of "check."
At this point, the player must defend his King with whatever means
are available. If he cannot defend his King, he is defeated. Yawn.
All units are killed by a single hit, so even a lowly Pawn can be
instrumental in defeating an opponent if you plan accordingly.
While the artificial balance of forcing equivalent deployment for
Simple, they take the strategy out of the game.
Too many units mean too many different actions, and the units in general are dumb as rocks.
WC3 improved this a little bit with the ability to turn on healing spells as such, but still certain units take too much time to hand hold that they become ineffective.
If you have 200 dumb units you just send them all at once, maybe picking out a couple to use their special abilities.
The newer games do better at making units smarter but not good enough.
Liquid War its fun and it is a ...its not exactly eye candy though...Screen shost...
--meh--
Check out Medieval Total War.
This is a great game - you can choose any one of a number of European and Muslim countries, and guide it through the middle ages. When the Muslims send Imams to scout out your country and convert the populace, you can assassinate them. You can also declare crusades, marry off your daughters for political gain, conquer others, and get trade monopolies. A good time.
Also, the original MechCommander is fun. You defeat enemy mechs in combat, and sometimes you can salvage their carcases and rebuild them (get the MadCat!). You can completely customize the weapons on each mech, and can make up your own strike force configurations with no limitations (except weight).
"If you think you have things under control, you're not going fast enough." --Mario Andretti
There have been several RTS games that I have felt improved the genre. Rise of Nations was a good one. I don't think it was very innovative but very well polished. The introduction of a larger tech tree added some fun game play. Also the way cities are founded and captured is pretty good too. The multiplayer mode where 2 people run one nation was pretty fun too. Its biggest drawback for me was that it was such a pain to get to serve up games from behind a NAT firewall.
Homeworld was cool because of the space battles you were able to control. The interface was not for the faint of heart though and most of my friends were put off by it. The sequel by a different company (I forget the name right now but the game is not HW2) refined the interface and made it easier to control. I haven't tried HW2 yet but it looks as good as the original HW.
The RTS game that I like the most which I don't think anyone has mentioned yet is Kohan. Yes the graphics were a bit dated for when it was released but the gameplay was great. The resource management was fairly light with a greater emphasis on tactical combat. It was nice not to have to protect the peasants or go rescue a stupid harvester that wondered into enemy territory. The way units were grouped into squads was really cool too. You didn't have to worry about clicking on 10 magicians to make them send fireballs at the enemy. The squads all fought with whatever they had. I can't wait for the next one to come out. It should have some nice improvements to it.
In Republican America phones tap you.
sounds like another freaking whiner.
Our main beefs with EE and RoN were that while EE had a much longer timeline (you get to play in the future, with future weapons) and this was fun, both it and RoN required micromanaging the individual units quite a lot. The AIs used by both, once you set the difficulty high enough to be challenging, end up cheating so as to make the gameplay more frustrating than challenging.
I enjoyed AoE quite a lot, and ditto for AoE2, but I think that these games seem to have a hard time striking a good balance between unit richness, a lengthy historical timeline for the gameplay, and the quality of the AI. RoN (to me anyway) tried to add a more structured environment with city building limits and all kinds of hierarchies, but I found these things more obstacles than anything else. You still end up micromanaging, but you end up micromanaging other things than the units.
I wish EE would be improved, truthfully.
My .02, fwiw.
-- R
.. pa-ra-bo-la, pa-ra-bo-la, 2 pi R, 2 pi R, where's your latus rectum, where's your latus rectum, 2 pi R
Do you mean Chris Taylor, the lead designer of TA, and Dungeon Siege, Microsoft's dungeon skirmish game?
One of the main complaints about Dungeon Siege was that the interface was so streamlined the game almost played itself.
You're thinking of Chris Taylor. He was the genious behind TA (and TA:CC) before Cavedog folded. Now he's working at Gas Powered Games, creators of Dungeon Siege. :(
Rumor has it, Chris would *love* to create the spiritual successor to TA, but that it just isn't his decision to make.
RIP, TA. Best damn RTS ever.
Actually, it IS his decision to make, and *drumroll please*, [b]hes made that decision.[/b]
Expect the "spiritual succesor to TA in 2005-2006, after DS2 (Dungeon Siege 2) is released.
Apparently its already started, although its really low-key till DS2 is released.. they're mainly making it almost as a hobby for now.. adding bits here and there at their leisure.
how can you be assured i know what im talking about?
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| yay for sigs.
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V
Newsie, Moderator, www.tauniverse.com
It's amazing how well it translates. I do actually have a point after the parodies.
...need I go on? These are games depicting completely different worlds, entirely different plots (if applicable), and yet, they all offer roughly the same gameplay. It may look a bit different, but it boils down to the same formula: Run, shoot, reload, heal, get weapons, shoot some more.
--
Original:
The Problem
Look at RTS titles over the years. It's been almost 12 years now since the genre as we know it was introduced, and how much significant advancement can you say has been achieved in the field? Advancements in graphics hardly count as specific improvements--strategy games may benefit from advances in technological prowess, but they're certainly not the catalyst for such advances. Maybe a few companies honed down the interface along the way, added a few more minor elements to the gameplay, but aside for cosmetic makeovers, the changes have been kept to a bare minimum.
Name substantial gameplay differences between Red Alert, Warcraft II, KKND, M.A.X, Knights and Merchants...need I go on? These are games depicting completely different worlds, entirely different plots (if applicable), and yet, they all offer roughly the same gameplay. It may look a bit different, but it boils down to the same formula: Settle down, collect, build up, expand, destroy.
--
--
FPS version:
The Problem
Look at FPS titles over the years. It's been almost 18 years now since the genre as we know it was introduced, and how much significant advancement can you say has been achieved in the field? Advancements in graphics hardly count as specific improvements--shooting games may benefit from advances in technological prowess, but they're certainly not the catalyst for such advances. Maybe a few companies honed down the interface along the way, added a few more minor elements to the gameplay, but aside for cosmetic makeovers, the changes have been kept to a bare minimum.
Name substantial gameplay differences between Doom, Castle Wolfenstein, Quake, Counterstrike, Halo,
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RPG version:
The Problem
Look at RPG titles over the years. It's been almost 15 years now since the genre as we know it was introduced, and how much significant advancement can you say has been achieved in the field? Advancements in multiplayer connectivity hardly count as specific improvements--role-playing games may benefit from advances in technological prowess, but they're certainly not the catalyst for such advances. Maybe a few companies honed down the interface along the way, added a few more minor elements to the gameplay, but aside for cosmetic makeovers, the changes have been kept to a bare minimum.
Name substantial gameplay differences between Everquest, Star Wars Galaxies, Asheron's Call, Neverwinter Nights, Baldur's Gate...need I go on? These are games depicting completely different worlds, entirely different plots (if applicable), and yet, they all offer roughly the same gameplay. It may look a bit different, but it boils down to the same formula: Pick a character, work for XPs, form a party, get a quest, die and respawn.
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I'll spare you the pain of reading the sections on driving games, sim-whatever games, etc. My point is this...why do you suppose it's fashionable - or even conventional wisdom - to single out the RTS genre as stagnant, yet the other equally-stagnant genres get a pass?
Hey, well thanks for the info. I've been out of touch with the TA universe for quite a while now, so I hadn't heard of Chris actually getting the green light on that project :O :( :)
Perhaps the only dissapointing part is that it probably won't be called TA2. I think Humongous Ent. still owns the rights to that name
But thanks for the heads up. Definitly gonna be keeping an eye peeled in '05.
A good SC game ideally lasts about 15-20 minutes.
Slashdot: Where people pretend to be twice as smart as they really are by behaving like children.
The control method was identical to TA which goes to show you can't improve on perfection.
They added upgrades, not the pathetic level or two that most games have, but what seemed like hundreds. I boxed the computer into a corner one game then spent 4 1/2 hours upgrading to see how far it would go. I never came to the end of the tree. It sounds like it wouldn't work, but it really made the game. Armor, ammo, weapons, sensors, vehicle frames, and propulsion could be improved. It really just depended on your strategy determined which areas you would concentrate on. Vehicles were modular so you could further customize your army to your liking.
Command units were another wonderfull addition. They could be set as rally points for your factories so newly created vehicles would automatically join them in the field. As they gained experience they would be able to pick out targets for it's forces to concentrate on verses the shoot at whatever is closest method of TA
Sensor assignment was another good one, to save on the micro management. Put a airsupport sensor on a tower or on a mobile unit and aircraft assigned to it would auto attack anything in it's range. Other sensors worked for ground units and artilery.
Vehicle pilots could be managed by recycling old outdated vehicles. New vehicles would use those pilots and would deal more damage. If you were semi-careful with your units and pulled back badly damaged ones you could build up a strong force.
Of course they had off the screen ranged artilery so you could send out a scout to pick targets for your 30-40 rocket artilery units sitting back in the back.
They only real downside to the game was the main resource was oil, and it's locations were static. Unlike the build up from nothing anywhere aspect of TA, which on more than one occation allowed me to rise from the dead off in a quiet corner in a multiplayer match.
The name TA2 is owned by Atari. What they're doing it is somewhat of a mystery.
As for the spirtual successor to TA, "RTS 2.0", yes, it's in pre-production. Chris collected a lot of data from the TA Community a while back through a forum I ran.
A *LONG* time TA'er
Sigh...but I can't reasonably expect a Linux version.
:-(
Damn it, I should really sit down and spend a couple weeks trying to figure out what would be involved in some sort of system that would allow binary distribution of (fast) software under Linux that wouldn't break in twenty four months. Stallman may love open source, but the world's always going to have some form of binary-only software...and Linux trails Windows in this arena terribly.
May we never see th
Yeah ok, sorry for the technicality. Humongous got bought out by Infogrames, which also bought out Atari before switching to that brand name. Or whatever. Stupid publisher politics. I just like games. :D
For those of you who haven't given CNC Generals a shot, I really recommend that you do. It is the best RTS in some time and is even better with the Zero Hour expansion. It is one of those few games that I have bought multiple copies of (2) so that I can (legally) play with friends on my LAN and online. I put it up there with my other two RTS favorties, Homeworld and TA (which was probably the best).
The skirmish mode in CNC Generals Zero Hour is excellent, and the computer can at many times put up a decent fight. Depending on the map, when playing 2 vs 3 or 4 (which my friend and I typically do) it can be quite challenging. The only thing that bothers me is that the computer doesn't quite grasp the concept of continued resource gathering (after the supplies are gone, all the different sides can get resources by relying on buildings/units that create resources, but the computer almost never fully takes advantage of this).
It's greatest downfall is that it does require quite a powerful computer to run, and the performance seems to vary quite a bit. Sometimes it runs smoothly, somtimes it choppy.
Casual Games/Downloads
I have to agree with Sparr0. I can't think of one major innovation that Warcraft 3 introduced. I think it is more likely that you just haven't played many other recent pre-WarcraftIII RTS games, which is certainly okay!
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. -- Francis Bacon