I don't get much time to play games anymore but fancy getting back into RTS. Not really interested in competitive online play as I really don't have the time to make that enjoyable. I used to play a lot of Starcraft, total annihilation and Age of Mythology back in the day. I'm sort of torn between picking up TA on Gog or Starcraft 1 or should I just buy Starcraft 2??? or anyone else have recommendations for something else I might have missed over the past 15 years.
Planetary Annihilation! 3D RTS game from Uber Ent. Can be picked up in the steam sale for about $5 quite regularly.
Its VERY basic compared to SupCom and Forged Alliance. Also, the map selection is pretty dire. Good as a jumping off point before you get into the above though.
Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion. Company of Heroes. Star Wars:Empire at War . Warhammer: Dawn of War - I believe DoW2 is more tactical based on a few squads, at least WRT the campaign.
Rise of Nations Extended Edition - if you enjoy games like Age of Empires then this'll probably be an enjoyable one for you. It can be hellishly challenging in comparison though so might take some practice to get used to the aggressive AI. AI War: Fleet Command - one of my all-time favourite strategy games, it might not be appealing to people looking for flashy graphics but in terms of sheer scale and difficulty it's a beast that won't easily be tamed. AI War can quickly drain your entire free-time as I find it's one of those ones where you can find yourself loosing all awareness of time. It's dirt cheap to buy and often on sale for 80% off so can easily be picked up for under £2. Homeworld 1 & 2 Remastered - an old classic that's been fully redone with tons of improvements and advancements, fantastic space themed strategy games with a deep storyline to play through. Something a little bit different: Crusader Kings 2 and Europa Universalis IV - they're a bit more grand strategy where you'll spend months playing a single campaign as a country to diplomatically and aggressively take control of land. It can be a bit daunting for new players as there is a vast amount of content to get your head around but I absolutely love the immense challenge of starting out as a tiny country surrounded by major powers in EU IV. Offworld Trading Company - rather than the usual RTS where you build up forces and defensive structures to conquer your enemies, in this one you compete against the AI or human opponents to claim resources which you'll then rapidly sell off in order to buy out your opponent's company. It's still in early access development stages at the moment but already has a lot of fun and complexity to it. ... and a few others to watch out for that are on their way: Ashes of the Singularity - has a very old-school RTS vibe to it, thoughwith battles on a massive scale. Just went into Alpha this month, so probably a long way for the retail launch. Grand Ages: Medieval - massive scale medieval RTS where you'll build up your cities and conquer pretty much the whole of the European landmass... around 30m square kilometres of land to play in. Hearts of Iron 4 - another grand strategy in the same category as Crusader Kings and Europa Universalis, but focuses on the period of WW2.
+1 still the best RTS imo ( very closely followed by C&C red alert 2 ) Company of Heroes is also a Very good game ( especially once you add mods like Blitzkrieg ) the only thing wrong with Sup com, is there is a memory leak that means when facing the AI, the game will eventually slow down
Sup com even though it's good will eventually break your pc vs ai. Forged alliance is better as you can play no problem. Starcraft 2 is still the best game for balance vs ai games at least. Multiplayer it's super competitive and a lot more about the clicks per second than much way of strategy. Sins is more fun modded than the original game tends to be. Homeworld remaster has 2 great single player campaigns but multiplayer is unplayable 2 of the sides are basically useless and will get stomped if picked. There's a unit 2 sides get called the heavy cruiser and it can take on 3-4 of the other 2 races best ships and still win easily. PA from the battles I've done does suffer some balance issues that they are trying to correct the commander despite been pretty key is super weak. And even in a well protected base can still be blown up by a group of bombers. And most games turn into a rush air bombers to win strat especially when both on same planet. I'd say at the minute there's no perfect rts game. The 2 I play most often sins and PA both have flaws if you can live with them then they are very good games.
Any C&C, with the exception of 4. SupCom, and something not mentioned yet, GreyGoo. Its some of the guys from Westwood, inc Frank Klepacki doing the OST, It isn't too bad, Slow though. Sam
I'll add my votes towards the SupCom games and any Paradox games. Crusader Kings II and Europa Universalis IV are particularly good imo. It's worth noting that these Paradox games go past a traditional RTS in complexity, they're more like Real Time Grand Strategy.
owing to the large Sup Com love in this thread... we should get a banter filled Game going sometime with everyone on the Bit tech Teamspeak
Well if its PVP ( or team V team ) then it shouldnt grind to a halt as the Memory leak affects the AI ( plus it means more banter as we have more players or we could play Vs the AI and have a 20min no rush rule, this prevents players form leaving their spawn for the first 20 mins of gameplay, and once that timer runs out, all hell breaks loose ( especially if people are running Cheating AI's ) so if your interested please stick your Steam ID in and we can start working something out
I've still not actually found any time to play anything.... but I'm always up for a friendly game (especially if we play team based so someone can hold my hand!) I'm dreadalert on steam
I have been addicted to Dawn of War 2 for to long now. Both single player and PvP are great. Also the first Dawn of War series is fantastic too. Not sure if the PvP is still active though as I haven't played it in a long time.
Company Of Heroes with the Blitzkrieg mod. I'll happily sit for an hour playing a custom skirmish against CPU.
Dune 2000 - never gets old. Is a remake of Dune II, the original RTS. C&C: Tiberian Sun - One of the last greats before 3D graphics got in the way of good gameplay.
Ah man, they remade Dune II? How did I not know?! Cut my RTS teeth on that and the original C&C. Awesomeness. Tib Sun is brilliant, although the Firestorm add-on does unbalance it in my opinion...
Firestorm did unbalance the game. But my brother and I would use Tiberium Edit to really screw up the game. The AI wouldn't change its own strategy, though. So you could really help or hurt yourself by making edits. It was fun, and silly, and game breaking.
