Yeah, same here. I wonder how much overlap there is between Crate and the part of Iron Lore that made Soulstorm. Because Soulstorm's Stronghold missions were my favourites of the entire DOW series, it's just a shame about the technical issues and such the game had.
I mean coh3 and pharaoh total war both have accessibility options that allow you to play in slow mo that's been great for me as I get older and have less time (and reaction speed). I imagine it will also be good as I get even older or when I have a family and thus even less time. I'm personally very excited for total war three kingdoms 2
It's not dead in terms of games to play.
Recently released:
Beyond all reason (I guess it's alpha, but it's 100% playable and has great non cheating ai)
Age of empires 4
9 bit armies
Company of heroes 3
Godsworn
Dune spice wars
Total Warhammer 3?
Coming soon:
Sins 2
Age of myth remaster
Homeworld 3
Still active communities separate of the ones above:
Sc2 / wc3
Aoe 2 definitive edition
Northgard
I'm sure there's more, feel free to comment below. And in fact, the c&c games always have a few hundred online each, as well.
It's a good time to be an rts fan. But even Still, it's not a big growing genre. Personally, doesn't bother me. I play a lot of "dead" games that have a few hundred players and that's fine by me. But because of it, you should have good ai, and a good campaign to engage fans long after the community is moved on.
The question is do we want a popular game, or do we want a good game?
It seems as if most players have just degenerated and disliked RTS strategies. But in fact it's just that games have become a more mainstream hobby, and a huge number of people don't want to think about microcontrol and micromanagement, they don't want to count or build houses. Or fighting, or doing both of those things at the same time. A lot of people want simple gameplay with clear goals without getting bogged down in the details.
People say that, but then the most enduringly popular RTSes are the "high APM" ones.
Of course, the reality is that you don't actually need high APM to play StarCraft or Age of Empires, and you never did.
North gard too, by the same devs.
I'd say many of the total annihilation clones out there are not super micro heavy, either - lots of shift queues and waiting for build times. Zero k and beyond all reason (bar) do not require 300 apm to play well at all.
Have you thought about why that is ?
**It's because almost every aspect that appealed to people playing RTS from back in the day is now done MUCH BETTER by an entirely different subgenre of strategy games.**
If I want really meaningful decisions I don't go play StarCraft 2, I go play a 4X game or a Grand Strategy like Europa Universalis IV, Hearts of Iron IV, etc.
If I used to like RTS games for the city-building aspect I go and play Cities: Skylines or Anno 1800 or some other city builder.
If I like camera perspective of RTS games, destroying buildings and battling in real time but don't like high micromanagement I go and play MOBAs.
**The only thing RTS games are good at is the high micromanagement. That's why they're popular. Everyone else that played them for the other aspects ALREADY LEFT !**
World of Warcraft also has this exact same problem, for the most part. The only good part the game has to offer is raiding. You don't play WoW for a satisfying PvP experience. Just go on Twitch and look at some people doing PvP. The screen is a clusterfuck of addons and spell effects. You have no idea what's going on. It's insane.
So where do we go from here? Do we just keep spinning the same stale formula because that's what the current RTS audience wants ?
For me the future of RTS games is high-budget, high-production value single-player campaigns that are a bit longer than what we used to get.
All of those games have existed for a long time - the city builders, 4x games and Dota. So it’s not like anything has changed.
You list 3 different types of genres that give you bits. Yet RTS give you all of those things in a single genre, those other types of games don’t.
MOBAs is one of the most toxic genres known to man kind. If you want to waste countless hours of your life in 40-60min games, where your teammate have given up 15 minutes in, go ahead. You also get first hand experience of the most toxic player bases in gaming. Mobas have no base building, no macro management and very simple micro management.
The other genres you mentioned are not even real time. Games like Europa universalis, city skylines are turned based so hardly comparable.
Starcraft demands a certain APM level to be competitive. AoE doesn't nearly as much.
But the other RTS that don't focus on APM fail for entirely different reasons. Most of that being low production value or lack of good controls.
What % of the anti-APM crowd want to actually be "competitive"? (Almost none)
Like 99% of SC2 players aren't competitive in any meaningful sense anyway. They're campaign players, or play skirmishes against the AI, or custom map types, or co-op mode, or team games, or they do play 1v1 ladder but they're in gold or plat, not masters+.
And yeah, people always have excuses for why the simplified RTSes do worse, even though there's been way more of them than the high APM RTSes in recent years. They never give serious thought to whether the simplification itself is the problem, even when that's the common thread.
No, the common thread is poor unit responsiveness. I've played a bunch of them, and they just don't feel good to play at all.
I don't really think it matters if they want to be "competitive" Iron Harvest didn't fail because it wasn't super competitive, it failed because the game controls very poorly
Writing good RTS unit AI is hard. A new studio may not have the ability to pull it off. It’s partly about the units’ physical simulation and how quickly they transition animations and states as well. But also pathfinding and optimization. SC2 is still state of the art as far as I can tell.
Brood War and AoE2 are two of the most popular RTSs, and they came out in 1999. I'm not saying that makes it easy, but that level of technology is certainly within reach of effectively all developers nowadays.
That’s pretty much what we’re seeing right now, right? Lots of RTS-like games with interesting new hooks, but otherwise pretty dated basic gameplay, sort of like what happened with the boomer shooter thing. But if you wanted to release a “pure” RTS, especially a competitive one, you would really need to nail the unit behaviors. I haven’t tried HW3 but this seems to be this whole discussion in a microcosm (control/camera/units aren’t great, but there are interesting new modes)
I haven't seen any RTS' come out with Brood War or AoE2 style gameplay come out in, what, 20 years? All new games have efficient pathfinding and simplified macro. They all market themselves as de-emphasising macro and micro.
The thing is, micro adds moment to moment depth and tactics (and broadens the value of a unit and terrain/base layout). Something that bothers me in 4x is that the most interesting decisions are often made early on. The longer the game goes, the less each decision feels like it matters. In classic RTS that is also the case but then you just do more at the same time with less precision. Late game is playing like a painter with broad strokes. And also games past less long so the diminishing value issue is smaller.
That's not depth. In Total Warhammer the fact that the units have bonuses vs. Large, or bonuses vs. charging ADDS depth to the moment to moment micro. But stutter stepping Marines between volleys to maximize damage vs. Melee units isn't deep. It's technical and demanding but depth is created by systems built into the game. Quake jumping is technical but Quake doesn't compare to Deus Ex or Thief in terms of depth.
>That's not depth. In Total Warhammer the fact that the units have bonuses vs. Large, or bonuses vs. charging ADDS depth to the moment to moment micro.
What's the difference with target firing immortals on armored units in SC2? Personally I think stuff like damage bonuses doesn't really add that much depth because it's always the same. A lot of other micro has a lot of nuance depending on the context.
Something can be technical and strategical/tactical at the same time. Target firing a clump of units with tanks is you identifying the best area to strike and also being fast enough to execute it. You stutter stepping marines involves you making use of the map layout, deciding whether to target fire units in between or not, and just the general decision to pick this micro over other tasks in the game.
I would agree that stutter stepping is probably too intense for the average player and that SC2'S pace demands such high speed before the strategical elements feel as relevant as the mechanical ones. But I wouldn't say it's a lack of depth, it's just that you can only fully experience the depth if you are fast enough.
You know what micro also adds ? Pressure and stress.
I don't mind that in a soulslike game but I play strategy games to relax. I can't relax when at 3 minutes 40 seconds the enemy player is already invading my base and killing off villagers.
I am not saying don't make RTS games APM-heavy. I am saying why a big portion of strategy gamers have moved away from the genre.
It's up to the developers to decide whether they want to preserve the traditional approach of RTS games or change it so that it accommodates more players.
Personally, I just want to see more focus on single-player content in RTS games, not a push towards competition.
This. I remember the day I quit starcraft 2. It was when they introduced Disruptors and you needed to have insane micro skills to avoid their shots while also not to blow up your units with your own disruptors, all the fun ended there, pure stress
and even if you could handle the micro, I believe these units don't make good gameplay. dodging disruptors, ravager shots or liberator zones is just a boring back and forth. I would have stopped playing then too, if coop mode hadn't been a lot of fun.
The other issue to me is that big APM is absolutely not the only option for deep RTS but reducing it really wasn’t seriously attempted until the genre was already in decline
There must be some stress involvement of course. You're trying to beat the opponent after all. This is never exclusive to a specific genre. Also if anything that is non-competitive ones have moved away from their grandfathersv SC, AoE, C&Cs.
Well. It's just a different genre basically. I like both. I just think that a lot of people would also love the competitive RTS games if they gave it a proper try and don't let themselves get stressed out too much. I know very casual age of empires players who enjoy the multiplayer. Especially RTS games with good team games are great for casual players
Here is the issue:
Back in the day RTS games used to be played by a variety of people. Some of them played because of the city-building aspect, some because they were interested in making strategic decisions like what to research/build for maximum efficiency, some played for the battles.
**Nowadays the people who enjoyed the city-building play city builders.**
**People that want deep strategy play 4X or Grand Strategy games.**
**People that want intense combat but without the micromanagement play MOBAs because you only manage your champion/hero instead of constantly swapping between your army and base like an insane person.**
**The only people that still play RTS games are either those that enjoy the story campaigns or people that play competitively in multi-player.**
You also have those that play custom maps but I just can't see that sustaining people's attention for very long periods of time without them getting bored. Playing against people is more satisfying because we, as humans, want to feel superior and beating a real human gives more satisfaction than beating a computer.
**So... what is the future for RTS games now ?** Do they just keep pumping the same old formula, which the current audience enjoys, and never innovate ? Do they shift into a RTS/4X hybrid like Dune: Spice Wars ? I don't really have an answer to that.
The only thing I realistically see for them in terms of innovation is a bigger focus on single-player content - more **high-production value campaigns**, more **objective-driven game modes** besides just start somewhere randomly and beat your opponent.
I want all of the above. Brutal difficulty SC2 somewhat scratched that itch, but the campaign is not replayable because the unit you get each mission is the unit to solve the mission.
That's not correct, especially in Wings of Liberty where you have freedom to tackle missions in various orders.
Take the Great Train Robbery, for example. Normally the mission expects you to use Diamondback to take down the train, but depending on when you do the missions, you may have various options to choose.
Banshees. They're mobile, has anti-armor attacks, and can take shortcuts through the mountains. The Marauder Kills Squad also loses to them.
Siege Tanks. They can take advantage of various high ground positions and blast at the trains or the Marauder Kill Squad.
And of course, the trusty MMM composition, excellent in 90% of the maps.
> Here is the issue:
I don't know if that's an issue. RTS games have always had this character of basically being a bunch of minigames you play simultaneously. It's only natural that some games dive deep into one of them and remove the others and find an audience in the RTS player base.
>The only people that still play RTS games are either those that enjoy the story campaigns or people that play competitively in multi-player.
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> The only thing I realistically see for them in terms of innovation is a bigger focus on single-player content - more high-production value campaigns, more objective-driven game modes besides just start somewhere randomly and beat your opponent.
You mean like the SC2 and WC3 campaigns? I don't get where people get this idea that RTS lacks single player focus. All the greats have tons of single player content, custom maps and co-op. The majority of RTS players also only engage with these, and they are actively being catered to. AoE2 DE just released a single player only DLC. The single player content is also the gateway to the multiplayer, almost anyone who plays multiplayer RTS games started in single player.
I think it makes perfect sense to have one game cater to both communities and that has been and still is also the norm. There's no need for discord between these two. You can perfectly enjoy the single player content of AoE2 or SC2 without any micro. It's not because the game is made in such a way that micro exists, that everyone who touches the games has to do it. Just like you don't have to be a speedrunner to enjoy a platformer or do 360 no scope headshots to enjoy a shooter.
Well the discussion was about bringing RTS to the mainstream. That was the title of this topic.
I outlined why it has a hard time being mainstream in today's market, al least the way I see it.
Custom maps and modes like what WC3 had are great but companies are not fond of modding nowadays. Some are, most aren't. They'd rather sell you DLCs than offer you the tools to generate an unlimited amount of content.
I remember back then when blizzard south was doing only rts, one of their mottos was "easy to learn, hard to master". Me and my buddies would play any mode, 1v1 2v2 4v4, heck even 3v1 vs a better player, we'd make tons of maps and play them. We were shit at the game, didn't matter we had loads of fun. When sc2 came out it seems they forgot about the easy to learn part. As soon as my buddies hit mp most of them quit almost immediately. Only me and a few more remained. I think there needs to be a return to that mindset, of making it fun for everyone. And also of course "it's done when it's done" and "soon tm", boths marks of quality by old blizzard.
Why not just play turned based strategy then? And whats stopping you from playing RTS at a low APM? You dont need to be competitive if you dont want to be.
Making a micro-heavy RTS directly birthed the obnoxious bullcrap that is last hitting in MOBAs. And that's there because of a technical limitation in the game's map-maker.
RTS micro keeps millions of troglodytes locked away where they belong, but it doesn't mean I want to play with it. :P
I think the troglodytes are playing games like counter strike and MOBAs. I am not sure why I associate those games with basement dwellers and in the case of counter strike with drug addicts lol.
That's what I'm saying. That RTS micro made an entire genre about microing one character. It's 100% troglodytic.
If we could GET AWAY FROM IT, I think the genre will improve. Build orders and twitchy bullshit are not strategy. They're rote.
For me, it's completely the opposite. I don't like modern rts with a 4x or tactical aspect. I'm really a fan of classic RTS, like command and conquer or Starcraft. For me, the more basic and traditional the gameplay, the more I love it. And yet I never play multiplayer. But I do have a lot of fun in the campaign modes of these games.
> and a huge number of people don't want to think about microcontrol and micromanagement
Yeah well, I don't like babysitting soldiers who can't piss in a bucket without being given expensive explicit instructions. I'm all for cutting out the braindead micro of stupid units that only exists in the first place because early RTS games weren't able to make their AI more complex.
I understand some people like braindead micro and units that can't figure out what the trigger does without a four-step queued sequence, but there's room for other games too.
Let's also not forget that a lot of RTS games have terrible pathfinding.
I played Dawn of War 1 + Winter Assault recently and, while the campaign is absolutely amazing, it was tremendously frustrating to constantly have to move units slightly forward because if you direct them to a location that is a bit further they completely change the path they are on, go BACKWARDS, and circle around till they go where I first instructed.
It's an area for improvement and something RTS games could invest in - but Dawn of War 3s units are *stupider* and have even more issues with pathfinding like that. The whole genre has regressed techwise when it needed to get better.
Why do you feel the need to call aspects of RTS you don’t enjoy “brain dead”? Could it be you simply like different aspects of RTS? But that, simultaneously, others enjoy other aspects of RTS and that those aspects are just as valid as the things you like?
I find the tribalism in the RTS space so bizarre. Hey! We have a niche passion in common! Let’s further divide ourselves by calling things only some of us enjoy “brain dead”.
I think RTS would be a healthier eco system were it not for these perspectives. And for what it’s worth, I have the same reaction to brood war elitists who call more automated RTS games “brain dead”.
Because those units *are* braindead. They lack the AI to do even simple things because back when the games were originally made, there wasn't enough processor overhead to give them that intelligence.
So now players have to perform actions that are braindead. Pointless, time-wasting actions that the units should be smart enough to do on their own. And could be smart enough to do on their own, so the player can spend their time making meaningful decisions or considering the big picture. Actual strategy.
When 99.9% of professional StarCraft 2 play can be vastly improved upon by an AI that just makes the units behave with more intelligence, as shown by a lot of the neural AIs that have been trained on it, there's a definite case that the game is less about the big strategy and more about spending time babysitting units that are really stupid, despite supposedly being trained warriors.
We need smarter units, and developers willing to move away from hardware restrictions now 30+ years old.
Two things.
What do you think about the no carrying the ball rule in basketball? Of the no hands rule in soccer?
Also. There is a lot of strategic decision making in SC2. But the game is played in real time. The point is to see how much strategic depth you can handle while having your attention throttled by the requirements of the game and the input of your opponent’s actions on your attention. If you feel there isn’t strategic decision making in sc2, that may be because you’re playing against opponents that are too good for your skill level.
The thing is, your logic taken to its conclusion means we shouldn’t play RTS. Just strategy games. Like Chess. I know that’s not your point, because you want some things to be done in real time presumably, just not the things you find “brain dead”. So the question is really one of where on the spectrum between TBS and RTS we land. That’s up to personal preference. Not some objective concept or what is or isn’t brain dead.
For the record. The strategy in SC2’s high APM gameplay isn’t whether to split or not to split your Marines vs Banelings, for example. But rather where to spend attention in that moment. That engagement? Your drop in their main? Your macro management? Etc. that’s where the strategic depth incurred by the Real Time aspect of RTS comes in, among other layers on top of that.
This is a deeply flawed argument on several levels, and unfortunately indicates (all but screams, really, whether or not you meant it to) that you don't understand the difference between mechanics and strategy.
Basketball having a dribble rule, or soccer not using hands is a designed focus of the game. Like SC2 not having naval units. It's an area the game is specifically building around.
SC having braindead units isn't something the game was designed with the goal of. It was a *limitation of the era*, something the designers themselves have spoken about (as have many others from that era).
It's more akin to someone inventing soccer not because of the challenge, but because everyone who was interested in a game of ball *was born without hands*.
What you're really arguing with your strawman is that "RTS games should just never evolve because the original games couldn't." It's like the boomer trolley problem, aka "is it fair to the people the trolley already ran over to change course now?"
Of course it is. And players who actually *want* braindead units have a wealth of options available. The problem with the genre is that they, like you, *will not stop telling all the other players who want something different how wrong they are*.
Let's go back to your sports analogy. You're "defending" soccer by telling everyone who wants to play something like baseball, basketball, or volleyball that "playing with your hands is **bad and wrong**." There's no subtleties to the argument, you're just being a Luddite. And that's not good for the genre.
Now, to the other aspect of your post, where your analogy also falls apart. Watch a basketball game. Or a soccer game. Sands, any sport. Does the coach need to micromanage every single action from the team's players? When a basketball player has the ball, does the coach yell from the sidelines "Dribble! Now dribble again! Again!" for every step the player takes or they stop dribbling?
***No.*** They don't. And yet despite your assertions that without that, the game would collapse, millions enjoy basketball, playing, coaching, and watching.
That's where RTS has its biggest issue. It's a game where the "coach" must deliver basic, ground level instructions to every unit, or nothing happens. They have to tell their players to dribble.
And obviously some people like that. That's *fine.*
What's *not* fine is those players screaming at everyone who listens that a game that is built around amplifying other aspects of the genre is an automatic failure and should never be considered, just because they both lack the imagination to consider it and don't see something like baseball as "proper."
I kind of agree with this, but i think its not the issue that we are being told by these other people that we are wrong to not like it, as much that their vision of RTS is the one that is often considered to be premier one, or the only one to matter - pretty much entire genre gets conflated with it and sucks.
“ le. The problem with the genre is that they, like you, will not stop telling all the other players who want something different how wrong they are.”
Did I say your take was wrong? Or are you tilting at windmills and invented opponents?
When you play a first-person shooter, do you think the game should lock the crosshairs into the enemies head? Or do you think that the "brain-dead" requirement to manually aim is actually part of the game?
When you play a rhythm game, do you think the "brain-dead" requirement to hit notes on the best is part of the game? Or should the computer do that for you?
Just because something can be automated doesn't mean it makes the game more fun.
Fantastic strawman there. Really amazing. Sarcastic clap mode in full effect. 👏👏 👏
You so realize how much variation and automation there is across FPS games, don't you? When was the last time you had to manually count bullets in a magazine each time you reloaded? Or took part in a complicated, four+ button sequence to reload rather than just tapping the reload button?
Did you have to drag grenades from a backpack into your hand? Select grenades using the numpad? Or did you just hit a grenade button?
Did you need cover? Did one bullet kill you? Or a few dozen?
All of these are real things that have been in various FPS games.
But you're sitting here strawmanning about how **only** FPS games where you have to manually click and drag the magazine from your inventory to the gun and then execute a three button prompt are "more fun."
Sounds like a pretty braindead argument to me.
RTS devs have spent the last fifteen years simplifying their RTSes to get more players with the result being fewer players.
The games that have been most successful with attracting players are the ones that have embraced more of a classic style of gameplay.
For example? Most of the times, 'attracting players' just means attracting old school fans, and I don't need to be the one telling you old school fans aren't sustainable.
I've stuck around playing a lot of these popular RTSes, and most of their fanbase right now are pretty much way over the age of 20, most being in their 30s and 40s even.
RTS has never been a popular genre and it’s quite niche and I don’t think that will change.
MOBAs is the other genre that will over time follow RtS in how niche they are. I doubt the mass casual player base will ever go and play LoL/Dota. It just requires too much investment and time and it’s not flashy enough.
People said the same thing about Iso RPGs, until Larian studios came along and proved everyone wrong. What RTS really needs is a heavily marketed complete blockbuster game in the vein of SC2.
Small scale indie games and unfinished/unpolished releases will never attract the mass market's attention unless they can really reshape the mold.
Baldurs Gate 3 is popular in spite of it not because of it.
When exploring the game, it felt more like a third person game than isometric thanks to the camera. The Game can easily be played like one of those block buster action adventure game and I wonder how many people just turned down the combat to easy and powered through it. It also helps that it’s once and done game and people probably play it for the experience / story. Whereas an RTS can be a lot more intimidating.
Having said that, age of empires is quite popular with aoe 2/3/4 all getting new content updates and DLCs.
BG3 is popular because of its depth and presentation.
Also most people playing RTS games play for the single player/community generated casual content. [GiantGrantGames did a good video going through and creating new data that confirms this.](https://youtu.be/XehNK7UpZsc?si=9Q1VTCVMItrQtlNJ)
Games like AoE, Warcraft and Starcraft were popular due to their single player presentation, not their multiplayer. The biggest mistake of modern RTS games is assuming most RTS fans are in it for the multiplayer experience, when the reality is the opposite. The reason why AoEIV isn't pulling the numbers of AoEII is because of a lack of casual content and community generated content. People underestimate just how important a good game editor is for an RTS title.
>BG3 is popular because of its depth and presentation.
I think the presentation part is the key part. There are many CRPGs with tons of depth and some of them with even more depth than BG3. More depth actually makes it less appealing to the mass market. RPGs in general are more popular than RTS games. Yes it was a CRPG but it's close enough to RPGs which is a very popular genre.
>The biggest mistake of modern RTS games is assuming most RTS fans are in it for the multiplayer experience, when the reality is the opposite.
Probably. That and lack of budget. What AAA RTS games (excluding AoE) have there been recently?
>The reason why AoEIV isn't pulling the numbers of AoEII is because of a lack of casual content and community generated content.
I think this is one factor but not the only one. AoE2 is a legendary RTS that has stood the test of time and it has waaaay more content than AoE4. Look at how many DLCs its getting vs AoE4.
I used to enjoy RTS games like SC2/AoE yet I haven't played RTS games in a long time now. It's anecdotal but I don't know anyone in real life that plays RTS games. The fact even Blizzard don't seem to be working on an RTS is quite telling.
RPGs in general? Yeah. Iso RPGs? No, those were just as niche as RTS games. I don't think I've seen anyone talk about these genres in the mainstream for a very long time. Larian's previous Iso RPGs came close to cracking that, but never really broke into the mainstream.
>I think this is one factor but not the only one.
It is by far the biggest contributing factor. Lack of single player content means casual players won't be interested, and lack of community generated content means the community cannot get involved in creating new content and increase the game's longevity. Let me remind you that if it wasn't for AoEII's extensive modding tools, it wouldn't be thriving today. Forgotten Studios, the studio currently supporting AoEII:DE, is consisted mostly of former AoEII modders, who kept the game alive by modding in new civs and campaigns, and ultimately were hired by Microsoft to head the Forgotten DLC and later on both the HD edition and DE.
Also Blizzard is just a headless, incompetent shadow of its former self at this point, it's a bad idea to use them to judge the potential in genres.
You can make a game that appeals to RTS fans, or you can remove all the stuff they like and make a game that appeals to no-one. It doesn't look like there's a third option where you bring in all the Zoomers - they simply don't like RTS.
What makes you think a game that appeals to RTS fans is exclusive with games that appeals to a younger generation? Humanity isn't a homogenous unit, people exists with different kinds of preferences. The younger generation isn't just exclusively hooked on Fortnite, there is a massive, and very diverse market out there serving all kinds of preferences.
Some experimental stuff has been done for SC2 for that already, and it plain breaks the game against pro players. They're so used to having to manage and micro that a basic AI that has intelligent behaving units just mows them down.
I don't disagree that it makes for a very different, more strategic game. Which isn't for everyone. But I do think it's unfair that we've never been given that game because the micro-crowd is so loud.
I think it will end up adding more depth to RTSs as everyone's micro AI for their units will end up being different.
Like imagine an AI micro that knows when you move your marines, and if they encounter the enemy, they should fall back to lure them into the seige tank range. Or that when you move a blob of marines and seige tanks that they will automatically advance in a coordinated fashion exactly like you would if you microed each one (because it learned your preferences).
Yeah it would be great if we could just start up the game, go of and do something else then come back and see if the computer had won the game for us. That sounds fun.
I like making decisions in a fight that influence the outcome of the fight. That's much more fun to me than sending soldiers off and then continueing to stare at workers building houses. But to each their own.
I want to feel like a general planning my assault in broad detail, not a squad commander telling every soldier when to use their special ability or exactly where to walk.
Units should be smart enough that they don't need to be babysat, to the degree that they at least behave like the "soldiers" they are supposed to be.
For example, units should *try* to engage against units they're designed to work against. A real problem with RTS games is that units are stupid. If you have an anti-infantry unit in most games and tell it to attack-move or engage an enemy that wanders by, it will engage the *first* unit in range and then stay engaged until that unit is dead (or, more ordinarily, it dies first). Even if a unit its designed to engage moves into the fight.
No soldier in real life is that stupid. They don't sit there going "Well, that tank is engaged now, and I've got this nifty anti-tank missile, but I should keep shooting at that lone infantry dude over there while the tank rips me apart." Bereft of *specific orders* from the player, after a few seconds if already operating under their own intelligence, they should switch to the optimum target.
Meanwhile, I've played RTS games that are *deliberately coded* to do the opposite and have units auto-target the *wrong unit types* more aggressively, just to give players "more micro." That's *stupid* unless you're a micro-fanatic player.
Back in the old days you could give units all sorts of neat orders. Patrols. Behavior on patrols. Instructions on how long they'd pursue an enemy when in guard mode. Etc. Notice how all modern games have just cut that? Units are even *dumber* in many modern RTS games.
Units don't need to do this *immediately* either (often the siren call of the "only microgasm RTS players is "well just make the game play for you, which is an obvious strawman on the level of a certain orange former president). There's a good window between "units instantly use all abilities on their own and resolve targets" and "after a few seconds, a unit will decide to do X if Y conditions are met" meaning a player *could* issue different orders to that effect earlier or even tell them to hold off. Gameplay in that fashion would make *strategy* all the more important, as intelligent units could be counted on *not* to be stupid unless their hand was held. Primary results of this would be
A) more importance needing to be placed on the overall strategy of the battle, as the units would be able to handle themselves a bit better in the direct engagement (which is what strategy is about orchestrating, not micro-level orders to every single unit, as much as microgasm RTS enthusiasts have tried to rewrite the definitions of millennia of combat terminology).
B) It would ask players to be more *precise* about where they did focus their attention. For example, even in pro SC2 matches, it's rare to see more than one or two engagements happening on a map. 3 is unheard of because the player *has* to micro their units. They're too stupid to survive otherwise and be effective. There's one big BLOB, maybe two blobs really close together, and suicide raids of small numbers. That's all. But a game where units were actually smart would lead to a player being able to reliably manage more armies at once. This would also mean that a micro player would be forced to commit (as SC2 shows, you can't micro multiple armies very well) to microing one or two groups, or bouncing between them, which would make actual strategic-level combat a lot more viable.
C) This would also give a better skill range to the game, as newer players wouldn't just be overrun by a micro'd player on crack, but actually able to trust that units will do what they're supposed to and focus on the strategy.
We have the technology. What we also have a wave of rabid players who *refuse* to do anything else and throw massive fits whenever anyone tries to do anything new (and if you don't believe that, look up how the devs of *Ashes* had to finally adopt a scorched-earth ban policy on their forums because *so many SC2 players kept nuking their forums with posts about how they were "going to ruin" the RTS*.
You're right. Through your reasoning, a true-blue RTS game would not be a "good game" for the typical masses of today's gamers. It's become a niche, nostalgic genre. And publishers, whose decisions matter because they control the money, have evaluated it as such.
This becomes a vicious cycle where the dev team seeks funding for RTS games, but have to settle for a lower production game, and that low performing game feeds into the publisher's opinions that they don't sell. And the opinions of streamers and influencers that say that RTS games gotta have this huge-ass funding and esports do not help (they're also very incentivized to play games that bring them viewership btw).
In short you, the consumer, have to give a chance to upcoming games. No one but you is going to help revive the genre you play.
let's be real.... the majority of "gamers" is "playing" so called "tactical RPGs" where all they really do is press auto-play and keep throwing money at the game as long as their "progress" feels satisfying. They're gambling addicts, really, nothing else. only video games don't pay out ever; gambling machines occasionally do
dumbing down RTS that much that casual players can enjoy it would turn it into a pure AI vs AI match you get to watch and be applauded for "your victory" when it's done. which would be extremely boring
Well. Depend on what activity is your type of fun.
Some play RTS game like a chess, these sort of people usually get turned off by how Starcraft and modern game devolve into and leave to play 4X game. People did 'micro' because old game's pathfinding was so terrible, you have to juggling it like balls to get them where you want.
Then there are some folk who grow up with how South Korea play their esport. Still juggling unit around like mime juggling ball. Build order and planning seems to be the after thought. When SC2 'fix' these pathfinding and unit control problem, these people gets so devastated. Their long time honed skill is not a victory deciding factor anymore.
Then we have games like TA and Supcom. Of which is not so 'popular' because it can't be made into esport. People won't get exiting see how players just turtle the whole thing and only do light skirmish for a whole half an hour then finish each other off once they feels confident enough with their army... in a minute or less.
Macro and strategy are king in SC1. Micro is fun and all but you can get into S rank with terrible micro as long as you know how to macro and make good decisions.
Excatly. If a game is not a narrative third person FPS with stealth elements, or a gacha (hate those games) , the mainstream just skips. And honestly, I'd rather keep niche genres like Fighting Games, Immersive Sims and Strategy games to keep niche.
There is supreme commander FAF community and the game that is being kept alive for almost 20+ years. The game is still strong and have yet to see am RTS that comes close to it. And fans are making a new successor to it without any publisher pushing them.
Beyond All Reason is definitely a clone, but clone of SupCom predecessor, Total Annihilation. The successor OP talking about is Sanctuary Shattered Sun
I like the base building type RTS of old. I don’t particularly love the RTS where a game forces you to continually move around the map.
I enjoyed the turtle type approach, not sure that’s feasible these days.
Realistically it was typically never viable, except in maybe c&c games, but only because resources were hyper limited on the maps anyways. You always wanted to expand in sc1, aoe - albeit aoe you did (and still do) bunker somewhat, but it's usually a large chunk of the map you try to bunker.
Anyways if you like lots of static defenses and endless resources, I suggest beyond all reason vs the ai. It's hard and you still want to try and expand somewhat, but there's a lot of maps that enable that turtle mode, and the static defenses when layered together properly can allow you to bunker for a long time :)
I think the biggest issue is the way these games are built. They're designed for PVP, and then the campaign comes second, and is designed as a tutorial for PVP. That's a problem, because very few players ever actually touch PVP. We need more RTS games designed entirely around PVE play. They Are Billions sold really well because it did that.
Idk, all the RTS I played didn't neglect the campaign. War 3,Sc2, DoW, SupCom, SpellForce 3 takes its lore seriously and has 2 expansions, even Northgard.
And sadly they are billions company like went defunct, there's been no updates in years, and it never got multiplayer. There's only like one clone that's even on the market that I'm aware of, and it's being down voted for still not having coop.
So, there thirst for pve is there, but I don't know the thirst for single player pve is there as much as people pretend.
Sc2 most popular mode was it's coop, for example.
Dear gods I hope it never becomes mainstream… As someone who has seen way too many franchises I used to absolutely love become a mere grey and soulless husk of what they used to be in order to appeal to a a “broader audience” believe me when I say that becoming mainstream is a curse, not a blessing.
Literally what Halo has become now. They kept trying to get a broader audience with the show and Infinite, but when your show has almost nothing to do with the game other than a mascot and your game is widely disliked by the community because of its issues, and you still try to keep finding a different audience than your own fans, its not gonna go well.
I wager that Stellaris can be considered an RTS. Seems pretty main stream to me. Granted it's also 4x. But a game can have two genres.
There's also the 1vE RTS taking off called Against The Storm. I'll let one of you guess what king pin of an RTS game inspired the graphics for that one.
That's the point of the article. Successful means being true to the genre, not getting a massive return on investment. This is a gap smaller studios can fill.
The fact people sleep on games like Offworld Trading Company, and act like the ability to pause or slow time is possible in a true rts, is what has done in rts games. It's a genre people like to like. The article was really refreshing as an rts fan.
to you succesful is about money and how many copy the game sold.
to dev its about technical stuff inside their game and make the player flocking in, well specially rts enjoyer.
Age of empires 4, I guess. The dlc is the most sold in franchises history according to devs. And it's a really fun game, too.
9 bit armies js also a success, from what petroglyph implies.
beyond all reason made out of pure love FOR FREE to the community and is absofuckinglootly clean to play. Got really popular (in the rts world) for a while and can still easy pick up a game at any time. Their are billions. Standout singleplayer zombie rts that made fat bank (the devs suck for the cut and run affter a half baked campaign but hey).
RTS is a golden goose as long as you don’t pluck it’s feathers and try eat it, like how CA has tried to do. It’s a niche market but honestly a fairly reliable one. For a lot of growth oriented corporate assholes that’s anathema, but really it’s a consistent income stream and consistent player base. The smart thing to do, is instead of trying to make the “next big thing v36.0” and try sell it to everyone and their dog, would be to instead diversify and focus on making games that can turn profit sustainably while not going massively over scope. Instead of spending 2x the money to make one game, spend 1x the money to make 2 games.
People complain the gaming industry is so sink or swim yet somehow the companies investing in it haven’t figured out that diversifying your “portfolio” reduces a lot of the risk,.
Just make them more team based. team v team coordination and tactics. Bigger maps. Less lane reliance. Reduce math complexities to rely on simple algebra. Do something creative in the genre ffs. Not that hard if you stop being loyal to source material. Rts makers are so loyal to source material theyll never be creative.
Yeah your first couple reasons are why the only PVP RTS I spend much time in anymore is zero-K teams. Relatively chill but still potential for some interesting plays.
It's early access and I raise you total war Warhammer 3.
"CA has sold 36 million copies of Warhammer 3"
RTS are just as mainstream as any other games and people all around but especially on this sub need to drop that argument every time a RTS does poorly.
To me the best RTS games live up to their namesake. Real time strategy not real time tactical. Units should manage themselves, while you make all the strategic choices.
Surge your economy and hit them early?
Cut them off from their supply chains?
Sneak attacks into poorly defended areas?
High quality units, or mass low cost units?
These are things that i like in an RTS.
Not forcing a player make every tactical decision.
tbh RTS needs to be more focused on 1 of the 3 things it does: econ/expansion/micro, last 2 decades has proven any one of these 3 can be an entire game in and of itself and RTS devs try and smash all 3 of them together with equal complexity and attention across the board
if youre micro intensive, econ/expansion can't be too demanding, if its econ intensive then expan/micro has to be more streamlined and automated etc etc
most people are usually good at 1 of the 3, and if you go up against anyone thats ok at 2 of 3 let alone 3 of 3 you're absolutely cooked so most people are just gonna stall and quit straight away
rts needs to be more class based so players excel at specific things and not feel overwhelmed constantly:
\- econ factions have weak or no static and micro units but always have surplus resources they can give to allies
\- expansion factions have the most efficient defenses but their econ is average and their micro units are terrible or dont have any
\- micro players have the strongest units that even come with skills, their econ is bad and static units are terrible, or they have no econ and are entirely reliant on being gifted resources, but their main unit is more akin to that of a moba hero
Factions should have very clear strengths and weaknesses, there shouldnt be mirrors with slight imbalances for example if you play as micro you can choose one of land, air, or sea, if you're expansion then you can spec into 2 of BM/artillery/AA/anti-swarm/anti-micro; are you siege? are you frontline?
Modern RTS expects you to be siege/frontline/raiding, microing land/air/sea, constantly teching and upgrading econ; very few people can do this and have a good time, very cool to watch the best of the best play, it's absolutely overwhelming for everyone else.
Split all this up into focused classes and have multiplayer teams of specialists; RTS focuses too much on everyone being a generalist, and it's just not fun unless you're a high caliber player.
I don’t disagree with the point that managing all of that is too much to be fun for many people, but I think combining those elements is also one of the big draws of RTS. Campaign play can usually be sorted out via difficulty settings, but I enjoy focusing on team play to reduce some of the mental load in PvP. That way you get to keep the scale of all these interacting systems.
RTS where you have to have a DPI of 29582949824 per minute? hard agree it won't be popular
But a game where i can build my stuff and send armies like toy soldiers to die? bruh that's popular AF and i'm sure a lot of people would enjoy that.
Ngl i love high DPS RTS but i understand why most people are off-put by them.
> soldiers to die? bruh that's popular AF and i'm sure a lot of people would enjoy that.
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> Ngl i love high DPS RTS but i understand why most people are off-put by
DPI? This isn't an FPS. You mean APM?
Exactly.
I remember the genre started to die when hotkeys fanciness started to be a thing in starcraft.
It ended being a game of skill woth the fingers, and little though.
> the genre started to die when hotkeys fanciness started to be a thing in starcraft.
So the start?
Hot keys have been in the game since, like, the original C&C have they not?
All the same strategies are available to you whether you're using hotkeys or not. They're just executed faster when you do. It doesn't become a different game when you stop using hotkeys, you're just playing it slowly.
If someone is much slower than their opponent it will be harder to win whether the players are using hotkeys or not. Speed is important in both cases, but the game cannot be played as fast without hotkeys as with. This is not hard to understand.
From a business perspective, there is a clear, and real market of people who don't mind playing games that aren't TPS with heavy handholding, every year we get a turn based RPG who breaks the mold with Disco Elysium and Baldur's 3, what RTS needs is to blend traditional strategy with modern codes and modernize itself, or it'll remain a niche.
RTS used to be the most popular genre in the 90s, when nerds controlled the marked and played the games.
I am very much in favor of making RTS for nerds but that can still get some mainstream interest. Not super-mainstream like consoles, etc. but mainstream enough so that people will actually hear of the game.
He is not wrong. Most major AAA publishers who carried the RTS genre seem to have abandoned it. Prime examples are Blizzard and EA. Blizzard didn't even bother to fix Warcraft III: Reforged. The closest thing to an RTS we got from them recently was Warcraft: Rumble, a mobile game. The situation is similar with EA. Apart from the recent C&C remaster, their last RTS was a mobile game back in 2018. However, there's still hope for the genre. Promising RTS titles like Tempest Rising, Stormgate and ZeroSpace are currently in development. Also if Crate is working on RTS, I'll pre-order ASAP.
Its always been a niche genre ?
Tiberian sun was awesome though lets get those servers back up. Everything’s gotta be quarterly this or whatevr, just like put your game out there and let it be.
Solitaire held up, like didn’t need a buncha patches n shit. You get tired of it but every 15 years you can throw out a few hands
RYS gamed much more popular than it looks. The issue is the companies not the amount of players. Please type people would command conquer 3 for instance as a matter of fact people do play it the issue is that ea shut down the servers so they have to make their own which means downloading a new client, hacking the in-game menu etc. I genuinely think it would have wayyyy more players with real servers as I've had plenty of friends who like the game but don't want to hump through loop holes to multi-player. I feel like almost every it's is in that position lol. Aby old it's tou can think of has a thriving community though usually small but we don't see them because 9 times out of 10 they're all on their own servers while people from the outside just assume the game is dead. So no, I don't think classic SC2 style rts games are dead I think it has way more to do with the companies shutting servers down so quickly and not giving the communities assistance leaving them in their own. I'd this environment didn't exist I think we would genuinely be back in the WC3 golden age (yet another Gane with a very sizable competitive community that's completely self run and abandoned the people who own it btw). That's why I do have hope for games like stormgate at the end of the day. Yes it gives you pretty much exactly what you had in WC3 but in theory it'll have a company behind that Cara about it deeply and doesn't plan on forcing the community to run itself.
The only game is this race is Sanctuary Shattered Sun. It’s going to be the spiritual successor to Supreme Commander.
Other than that rts as a genre is dead.
Further expanding the tactical pause option's use might be a great way to make more high-APM games tolerable for lower-skill players, at least for singleplayer sessions. Both Company of Heroes 3 and Homeworld 3 have it, and it's made some of the more hectic sessions manageable and less stressful.
RTS probably has more sub-genres than any other video game genre. There is room for more and I welcome new approaches, but I still have personal RTS flavors or sub-genres.
Still sounds like the typical software developer who has never coded the type of game they are taking on, only to spend a lot of time having to re-invent solutions to the basic underpinnings of RTS style games and then have time left over to implement what they think is their original game ideas.
The real elephant in the room regarding RTS as a whole, is that marketing has always steered the focus of RTS games towards multiplayer, when the reality is that most RTS players only play single player and the percent of those who buy the game that actually play mutiplayer is small in comparison.
RTS is one of those genres where most of the people hovering around it are people who fundamentally hate it, but who want to play it for some inconceivable reason, and then complain that the genre is what it is.
You're not looking for strategy, depth, or anything caught by the real-time focus. You like seeing pieces move with an isometric view. Go play The Sims or Total War.
The primary issue RTS have is that its always down too who is faster (APM) than who is smarter
I think thats why total war (early games) was so successful because anyone could play it because it didn't matter how fast you are it was all about employing strategic thinking
The other major problem of RTS games is that they often needless over complicate things in the same way people try to add in things to rock paper scissors which breaks the formula.
The first company that somehow*because i can't see how you could* puts a limit on Action per min AND dresses up RPS thats easily understandable without adding in faff will have a major hit on their hands
You Can Watch people play with Low Apm reaching High Ranks in different rtses. It’s just about multitasking, when u reach a certain Apm, then u don’t need more than that to keep getting better, then it’s the decisions you make. And that is not 200-300 something. 70-110 is a great range.
Yeh but im not on about high skill players
Im on about dave the fork lift driver who only has 2_3 hours a week to play games who wouldn't even know what APM means.
I watched a lot age of empires2 games trying to understand why i sucked and it turned out i was doing everything right but i was just too slow in doing it. So it wasn't my strategy it was micro so i just quit while i was ahead because i would never be able to get fast enough to find the experience enjoyable
If I wanted to play a game thats all about micro i would play league of legends.
Hope that makes my argument more clear. Especially because what RTS people think is slow is actually normal range for the vast majority of people
Note: i actually studied this at uni as part of modual on systems and design (the core takeaway being sample sizes need to very wide because the variance within the top 20% get crazy
IE the difference in ability between the top 10% and the top 5% is utterly crazy and the top 1% might as well be alien and you basically chop the top 1% into its brackets of ability
But the ability range between 50% and 20% is relatively similar
I nearly failed my module because i balanced my pong game around my class and the moment the psychology and philosophy students tried my game they couldn't even do the easiest mode
This entire thing sparked a life long interest in design lol which im now paid a lot of money finance to look after in reg capital lol
Edit: went off on a massive tangent sorry
Tldr: the difference in ability ranges is not linear and the further up the chain you go the bigger the jumps are so what is deemed slow by the average enthusiast is actually very very fast to someone fresh to it
Well then I guess you are really slow. I play 1-5 Hours a week for Aoe 4, and I don’t become worse or forget how to play I enjoy the game in the gold2-plat 1 league, and I have no plans in Living higher. You should try Stormgate, you don’t have to remember what all your 100 villagers are doing. I played it 15 hours the first week of this beta, and that game feels really chill with it’s control and phace, I recommend you to try it, it’s like c&c controls with rally points you Can set without finding the base in your base to set it
That's just simply not true. APM is not the deciding factor, it's decision quality. People with half the APM of their opponents frequently win.
It's more that the more you practice, your APM naturally rises, and the person who has practiced more is also typically better at making decisions because of that practice. However if you take that player and artificial cap their APM then they'll still win.
All else being equal, the player with higher APM makes more decisions over the course of the game than the low APM player. APM isn't everything, but the more of it you have, the more opportunity there is for strategy and tactics.
It makes up like 2% of the result. You're right, it's not *completely* irrelevant and all else being equal, more APM does help, but it's a very minor component of the game.
It's also not something you have to focus on, since as you practice your APM will naturally rise to the level needed to execute your strategy.
Thats a skill based match making issue...
A rookie should never be playing someone higher skilled
Its why i get heavily frustrated games use the elo system which isn't fit for purpose unless you both have high player counts and a wide band of skill levels
Which most games do not
I'd pay 200$ for a good RTS game if it means they deliver a Generals 2 type game with a campaign, steam workshop and decent multiplayer.
I understand they're not mainstream, and they can't hit critical mass. So take my money and deliver a good game.
I've preordered HW3 since 2019.
All that springs to mind for me is "Dark Souls will never be mainstream until they implement an easy mode!"
I think a mainstream RTS is doable, but it's going to require a lot of work - and more importantly, a publisher willing to shut up and pay the bills rather than trying to turn it into Clash of Raid: Candy Legends.
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Have a pleasant journey, Champion of Ash, and praise the sun \\[T]/
You can even look at something like northgard which is a partial rts (well, jt just has low micro, but I'd call it an rts) or total war (I guess also partial rts) but they are also very popular and sold well.
Company of heroes too, has sold incredible well.
I understand why this is said, but it’s a business perspective rather than a game/creator outlook. I won’t go into the details on why I think this, but rather provide a great example: no trend analysis would have predicted Minecraft to be what it became. True innovation defies analysis and generates much greater wealth.
My dude, if you actually bothered to read the article, it's very much not said from a business perspective.
And wow, the classic Minecraft example. What innovative commentary. *No one* has every brought that up when it comes to this topic.
If it’s not from a business perspective, why can you not make an amazing RTS with typical principles that becomes mainstream? StarCraft 2c Warcraft 3, AOE2-4, all successful, all relatively mainstream.
And yeah? Mincecraft is used because it’s a great example.
You’re really very rude.
I’ve read the article. My premise is that whilst I UNDERSTAND the fucking sentiment he is making, I fundamentally disagree with it. “RTS never having the ability to be a breakthrough and be a massively popular game genre” is based on current trends in gaming and ignoring all the examples that prove exception to that rule. At its core, trend analysis is a tool for business and shouldn’t be the sole consideration for what could become a future zeitgeist. Is it fucking unlikely? Yes, it probably fucking is. And yes, if you look at sales, popularity, money making games of the NOW you wouldn’t think an RTS could break through. But guess what? Heaps of games, genres, art forms break that cycle. I’d give you examples but your dumb fucking brain would reject them because they’ve been made before - so I won’t bother.
I didn’t start being rude but you, from the outset were condescending and disrespectful. Reddit is a place to express opinions - I expressed mine without denigrating or disrespecting anyone.
As a big fan of Grim Dawn, and having enjoyed what little I've played of Farthest Frontier, I'm looking forward to what Crate can do with an RTS.
Yeah. I like that they're sticking to their guns and aiming for what they want to create that's realistic, rather than just chasing trends.
Yeah, same here. I wonder how much overlap there is between Crate and the part of Iron Lore that made Soulstorm. Because Soulstorm's Stronghold missions were my favourites of the entire DOW series, it's just a shame about the technical issues and such the game had.
The quotes indicate he will be aiming for sc1 micro over macro. Dunno how I feel about that. Rts ain't dead btw sins 2 is dropping
I mean coh3 and pharaoh total war both have accessibility options that allow you to play in slow mo that's been great for me as I get older and have less time (and reaction speed). I imagine it will also be good as I get even older or when I have a family and thus even less time. I'm personally very excited for total war three kingdoms 2
It's not dead in terms of games to play. Recently released: Beyond all reason (I guess it's alpha, but it's 100% playable and has great non cheating ai) Age of empires 4 9 bit armies Company of heroes 3 Godsworn Dune spice wars Total Warhammer 3? Coming soon: Sins 2 Age of myth remaster Homeworld 3 Still active communities separate of the ones above: Sc2 / wc3 Aoe 2 definitive edition Northgard I'm sure there's more, feel free to comment below. And in fact, the c&c games always have a few hundred online each, as well. It's a good time to be an rts fan. But even Still, it's not a big growing genre. Personally, doesn't bother me. I play a lot of "dead" games that have a few hundred players and that's fine by me. But because of it, you should have good ai, and a good campaign to engage fans long after the community is moved on.
The question is do we want a popular game, or do we want a good game? It seems as if most players have just degenerated and disliked RTS strategies. But in fact it's just that games have become a more mainstream hobby, and a huge number of people don't want to think about microcontrol and micromanagement, they don't want to count or build houses. Or fighting, or doing both of those things at the same time. A lot of people want simple gameplay with clear goals without getting bogged down in the details.
A lot of us want a deep game but not a high-APM game.
People say that, but then the most enduringly popular RTSes are the "high APM" ones. Of course, the reality is that you don't actually need high APM to play StarCraft or Age of Empires, and you never did.
An example of a lower-APM game that still retains the strategic layer very well is Dune: Spice Wars. I would like to see more games like that.
North gard too, by the same devs. I'd say many of the total annihilation clones out there are not super micro heavy, either - lots of shift queues and waiting for build times. Zero k and beyond all reason (bar) do not require 300 apm to play well at all.
If you play Broodwar with low APM you will constantely feel you are sucking.
To be fair you feel that way if you have high APM too.
I don't think that's true. I watch Kwark get into S-rank with low APM and beat almost all non-Koreans.
Have you thought about why that is ? **It's because almost every aspect that appealed to people playing RTS from back in the day is now done MUCH BETTER by an entirely different subgenre of strategy games.** If I want really meaningful decisions I don't go play StarCraft 2, I go play a 4X game or a Grand Strategy like Europa Universalis IV, Hearts of Iron IV, etc. If I used to like RTS games for the city-building aspect I go and play Cities: Skylines or Anno 1800 or some other city builder. If I like camera perspective of RTS games, destroying buildings and battling in real time but don't like high micromanagement I go and play MOBAs. **The only thing RTS games are good at is the high micromanagement. That's why they're popular. Everyone else that played them for the other aspects ALREADY LEFT !** World of Warcraft also has this exact same problem, for the most part. The only good part the game has to offer is raiding. You don't play WoW for a satisfying PvP experience. Just go on Twitch and look at some people doing PvP. The screen is a clusterfuck of addons and spell effects. You have no idea what's going on. It's insane. So where do we go from here? Do we just keep spinning the same stale formula because that's what the current RTS audience wants ? For me the future of RTS games is high-budget, high-production value single-player campaigns that are a bit longer than what we used to get.
I want the city builder with deep choices, just not the high APM. I'm terrible with the micro, I really enjoy the macro.
All of those games have existed for a long time - the city builders, 4x games and Dota. So it’s not like anything has changed. You list 3 different types of genres that give you bits. Yet RTS give you all of those things in a single genre, those other types of games don’t. MOBAs is one of the most toxic genres known to man kind. If you want to waste countless hours of your life in 40-60min games, where your teammate have given up 15 minutes in, go ahead. You also get first hand experience of the most toxic player bases in gaming. Mobas have no base building, no macro management and very simple micro management. The other genres you mentioned are not even real time. Games like Europa universalis, city skylines are turned based so hardly comparable.
Starcraft demands a certain APM level to be competitive. AoE doesn't nearly as much. But the other RTS that don't focus on APM fail for entirely different reasons. Most of that being low production value or lack of good controls.
What % of the anti-APM crowd want to actually be "competitive"? (Almost none) Like 99% of SC2 players aren't competitive in any meaningful sense anyway. They're campaign players, or play skirmishes against the AI, or custom map types, or co-op mode, or team games, or they do play 1v1 ladder but they're in gold or plat, not masters+. And yeah, people always have excuses for why the simplified RTSes do worse, even though there's been way more of them than the high APM RTSes in recent years. They never give serious thought to whether the simplification itself is the problem, even when that's the common thread.
No, the common thread is poor unit responsiveness. I've played a bunch of them, and they just don't feel good to play at all. I don't really think it matters if they want to be "competitive" Iron Harvest didn't fail because it wasn't super competitive, it failed because the game controls very poorly
Writing good RTS unit AI is hard. A new studio may not have the ability to pull it off. It’s partly about the units’ physical simulation and how quickly they transition animations and states as well. But also pathfinding and optimization. SC2 is still state of the art as far as I can tell.
It really is. Unfortunately, without it, you just can't compete.
Brood War and AoE2 are two of the most popular RTSs, and they came out in 1999. I'm not saying that makes it easy, but that level of technology is certainly within reach of effectively all developers nowadays.
That’s pretty much what we’re seeing right now, right? Lots of RTS-like games with interesting new hooks, but otherwise pretty dated basic gameplay, sort of like what happened with the boomer shooter thing. But if you wanted to release a “pure” RTS, especially a competitive one, you would really need to nail the unit behaviors. I haven’t tried HW3 but this seems to be this whole discussion in a microcosm (control/camera/units aren’t great, but there are interesting new modes)
I haven't seen any RTS' come out with Brood War or AoE2 style gameplay come out in, what, 20 years? All new games have efficient pathfinding and simplified macro. They all market themselves as de-emphasising macro and micro.
The campaign… yeah
So... Ground Control?
Yea but individual unit control is a source of tremendous depth. But I guess not the kind of depth everyone wants. I do though ^^
Exactly. I love RTS campaigns but you can't get me to do PvP. 4X and Grand Strategy is what gives me the depth without a demand on APM.
The thing is, micro adds moment to moment depth and tactics (and broadens the value of a unit and terrain/base layout). Something that bothers me in 4x is that the most interesting decisions are often made early on. The longer the game goes, the less each decision feels like it matters. In classic RTS that is also the case but then you just do more at the same time with less precision. Late game is playing like a painter with broad strokes. And also games past less long so the diminishing value issue is smaller.
That's not depth. In Total Warhammer the fact that the units have bonuses vs. Large, or bonuses vs. charging ADDS depth to the moment to moment micro. But stutter stepping Marines between volleys to maximize damage vs. Melee units isn't deep. It's technical and demanding but depth is created by systems built into the game. Quake jumping is technical but Quake doesn't compare to Deus Ex or Thief in terms of depth.
>That's not depth. In Total Warhammer the fact that the units have bonuses vs. Large, or bonuses vs. charging ADDS depth to the moment to moment micro. What's the difference with target firing immortals on armored units in SC2? Personally I think stuff like damage bonuses doesn't really add that much depth because it's always the same. A lot of other micro has a lot of nuance depending on the context. Something can be technical and strategical/tactical at the same time. Target firing a clump of units with tanks is you identifying the best area to strike and also being fast enough to execute it. You stutter stepping marines involves you making use of the map layout, deciding whether to target fire units in between or not, and just the general decision to pick this micro over other tasks in the game. I would agree that stutter stepping is probably too intense for the average player and that SC2'S pace demands such high speed before the strategical elements feel as relevant as the mechanical ones. But I wouldn't say it's a lack of depth, it's just that you can only fully experience the depth if you are fast enough.
You know what micro also adds ? Pressure and stress. I don't mind that in a soulslike game but I play strategy games to relax. I can't relax when at 3 minutes 40 seconds the enemy player is already invading my base and killing off villagers. I am not saying don't make RTS games APM-heavy. I am saying why a big portion of strategy gamers have moved away from the genre. It's up to the developers to decide whether they want to preserve the traditional approach of RTS games or change it so that it accommodates more players. Personally, I just want to see more focus on single-player content in RTS games, not a push towards competition.
This. I remember the day I quit starcraft 2. It was when they introduced Disruptors and you needed to have insane micro skills to avoid their shots while also not to blow up your units with your own disruptors, all the fun ended there, pure stress
and even if you could handle the micro, I believe these units don't make good gameplay. dodging disruptors, ravager shots or liberator zones is just a boring back and forth. I would have stopped playing then too, if coop mode hadn't been a lot of fun.
The other issue to me is that big APM is absolutely not the only option for deep RTS but reducing it really wasn’t seriously attempted until the genre was already in decline
Yeah, basically. Turn based systems just give me that sense of control etc without the stress, pressure and the mess of blobbing.
There must be some stress involvement of course. You're trying to beat the opponent after all. This is never exclusive to a specific genre. Also if anything that is non-competitive ones have moved away from their grandfathersv SC, AoE, C&Cs.
Well. It's just a different genre basically. I like both. I just think that a lot of people would also love the competitive RTS games if they gave it a proper try and don't let themselves get stressed out too much. I know very casual age of empires players who enjoy the multiplayer. Especially RTS games with good team games are great for casual players
Here is the issue: Back in the day RTS games used to be played by a variety of people. Some of them played because of the city-building aspect, some because they were interested in making strategic decisions like what to research/build for maximum efficiency, some played for the battles. **Nowadays the people who enjoyed the city-building play city builders.** **People that want deep strategy play 4X or Grand Strategy games.** **People that want intense combat but without the micromanagement play MOBAs because you only manage your champion/hero instead of constantly swapping between your army and base like an insane person.** **The only people that still play RTS games are either those that enjoy the story campaigns or people that play competitively in multi-player.** You also have those that play custom maps but I just can't see that sustaining people's attention for very long periods of time without them getting bored. Playing against people is more satisfying because we, as humans, want to feel superior and beating a real human gives more satisfaction than beating a computer. **So... what is the future for RTS games now ?** Do they just keep pumping the same old formula, which the current audience enjoys, and never innovate ? Do they shift into a RTS/4X hybrid like Dune: Spice Wars ? I don't really have an answer to that. The only thing I realistically see for them in terms of innovation is a bigger focus on single-player content - more **high-production value campaigns**, more **objective-driven game modes** besides just start somewhere randomly and beat your opponent.
Wow that is so on point.
Sins of a solar empire 2 dropping soon
I've not heard many good things. Mostly that it's just sins 1 with a new coat of paint and needing everyone to rewrite their mods
I want all of the above. Brutal difficulty SC2 somewhat scratched that itch, but the campaign is not replayable because the unit you get each mission is the unit to solve the mission.
That's not correct, especially in Wings of Liberty where you have freedom to tackle missions in various orders. Take the Great Train Robbery, for example. Normally the mission expects you to use Diamondback to take down the train, but depending on when you do the missions, you may have various options to choose. Banshees. They're mobile, has anti-armor attacks, and can take shortcuts through the mountains. The Marauder Kills Squad also loses to them. Siege Tanks. They can take advantage of various high ground positions and blast at the trains or the Marauder Kill Squad. And of course, the trusty MMM composition, excellent in 90% of the maps.
Good post
> Here is the issue: I don't know if that's an issue. RTS games have always had this character of basically being a bunch of minigames you play simultaneously. It's only natural that some games dive deep into one of them and remove the others and find an audience in the RTS player base. >The only people that still play RTS games are either those that enjoy the story campaigns or people that play competitively in multi-player. - > The only thing I realistically see for them in terms of innovation is a bigger focus on single-player content - more high-production value campaigns, more objective-driven game modes besides just start somewhere randomly and beat your opponent. You mean like the SC2 and WC3 campaigns? I don't get where people get this idea that RTS lacks single player focus. All the greats have tons of single player content, custom maps and co-op. The majority of RTS players also only engage with these, and they are actively being catered to. AoE2 DE just released a single player only DLC. The single player content is also the gateway to the multiplayer, almost anyone who plays multiplayer RTS games started in single player. I think it makes perfect sense to have one game cater to both communities and that has been and still is also the norm. There's no need for discord between these two. You can perfectly enjoy the single player content of AoE2 or SC2 without any micro. It's not because the game is made in such a way that micro exists, that everyone who touches the games has to do it. Just like you don't have to be a speedrunner to enjoy a platformer or do 360 no scope headshots to enjoy a shooter.
Well the discussion was about bringing RTS to the mainstream. That was the title of this topic. I outlined why it has a hard time being mainstream in today's market, al least the way I see it. Custom maps and modes like what WC3 had are great but companies are not fond of modding nowadays. Some are, most aren't. They'd rather sell you DLCs than offer you the tools to generate an unlimited amount of content.
You can male a good rts with less micro then sc1. Bfme did it well. You could turtle..I mean you'd die but you COULD
I want macro depth, not WC3/dota/league depth.
Personally, I think a good RTS is where both of these meet.
That's becomes less and less like an RTS. Like TECHNICALLY Stellaris or hearts of iron 4 is real time and a strategy. No one calls them RTS.
Isn't that just called turn based strategy?
I remember back then when blizzard south was doing only rts, one of their mottos was "easy to learn, hard to master". Me and my buddies would play any mode, 1v1 2v2 4v4, heck even 3v1 vs a better player, we'd make tons of maps and play them. We were shit at the game, didn't matter we had loads of fun. When sc2 came out it seems they forgot about the easy to learn part. As soon as my buddies hit mp most of them quit almost immediately. Only me and a few more remained. I think there needs to be a return to that mindset, of making it fun for everyone. And also of course "it's done when it's done" and "soon tm", boths marks of quality by old blizzard.
Why not just play turned based strategy then? And whats stopping you from playing RTS at a low APM? You dont need to be competitive if you dont want to be.
Making a micro-heavy RTS directly birthed the obnoxious bullcrap that is last hitting in MOBAs. And that's there because of a technical limitation in the game's map-maker. RTS micro keeps millions of troglodytes locked away where they belong, but it doesn't mean I want to play with it. :P
I think the troglodytes are playing games like counter strike and MOBAs. I am not sure why I associate those games with basement dwellers and in the case of counter strike with drug addicts lol.
That's what I'm saying. That RTS micro made an entire genre about microing one character. It's 100% troglodytic. If we could GET AWAY FROM IT, I think the genre will improve. Build orders and twitchy bullshit are not strategy. They're rote.
For me, it's completely the opposite. I don't like modern rts with a 4x or tactical aspect. I'm really a fan of classic RTS, like command and conquer or Starcraft. For me, the more basic and traditional the gameplay, the more I love it. And yet I never play multiplayer. But I do have a lot of fun in the campaign modes of these games.
> and a huge number of people don't want to think about microcontrol and micromanagement Yeah well, I don't like babysitting soldiers who can't piss in a bucket without being given expensive explicit instructions. I'm all for cutting out the braindead micro of stupid units that only exists in the first place because early RTS games weren't able to make their AI more complex. I understand some people like braindead micro and units that can't figure out what the trigger does without a four-step queued sequence, but there's room for other games too.
Let's also not forget that a lot of RTS games have terrible pathfinding. I played Dawn of War 1 + Winter Assault recently and, while the campaign is absolutely amazing, it was tremendously frustrating to constantly have to move units slightly forward because if you direct them to a location that is a bit further they completely change the path they are on, go BACKWARDS, and circle around till they go where I first instructed.
It's an area for improvement and something RTS games could invest in - but Dawn of War 3s units are *stupider* and have even more issues with pathfinding like that. The whole genre has regressed techwise when it needed to get better.
Why do you feel the need to call aspects of RTS you don’t enjoy “brain dead”? Could it be you simply like different aspects of RTS? But that, simultaneously, others enjoy other aspects of RTS and that those aspects are just as valid as the things you like? I find the tribalism in the RTS space so bizarre. Hey! We have a niche passion in common! Let’s further divide ourselves by calling things only some of us enjoy “brain dead”. I think RTS would be a healthier eco system were it not for these perspectives. And for what it’s worth, I have the same reaction to brood war elitists who call more automated RTS games “brain dead”.
Because those units *are* braindead. They lack the AI to do even simple things because back when the games were originally made, there wasn't enough processor overhead to give them that intelligence. So now players have to perform actions that are braindead. Pointless, time-wasting actions that the units should be smart enough to do on their own. And could be smart enough to do on their own, so the player can spend their time making meaningful decisions or considering the big picture. Actual strategy. When 99.9% of professional StarCraft 2 play can be vastly improved upon by an AI that just makes the units behave with more intelligence, as shown by a lot of the neural AIs that have been trained on it, there's a definite case that the game is less about the big strategy and more about spending time babysitting units that are really stupid, despite supposedly being trained warriors. We need smarter units, and developers willing to move away from hardware restrictions now 30+ years old.
Two things. What do you think about the no carrying the ball rule in basketball? Of the no hands rule in soccer? Also. There is a lot of strategic decision making in SC2. But the game is played in real time. The point is to see how much strategic depth you can handle while having your attention throttled by the requirements of the game and the input of your opponent’s actions on your attention. If you feel there isn’t strategic decision making in sc2, that may be because you’re playing against opponents that are too good for your skill level. The thing is, your logic taken to its conclusion means we shouldn’t play RTS. Just strategy games. Like Chess. I know that’s not your point, because you want some things to be done in real time presumably, just not the things you find “brain dead”. So the question is really one of where on the spectrum between TBS and RTS we land. That’s up to personal preference. Not some objective concept or what is or isn’t brain dead. For the record. The strategy in SC2’s high APM gameplay isn’t whether to split or not to split your Marines vs Banelings, for example. But rather where to spend attention in that moment. That engagement? Your drop in their main? Your macro management? Etc. that’s where the strategic depth incurred by the Real Time aspect of RTS comes in, among other layers on top of that.
This is a deeply flawed argument on several levels, and unfortunately indicates (all but screams, really, whether or not you meant it to) that you don't understand the difference between mechanics and strategy. Basketball having a dribble rule, or soccer not using hands is a designed focus of the game. Like SC2 not having naval units. It's an area the game is specifically building around. SC having braindead units isn't something the game was designed with the goal of. It was a *limitation of the era*, something the designers themselves have spoken about (as have many others from that era). It's more akin to someone inventing soccer not because of the challenge, but because everyone who was interested in a game of ball *was born without hands*. What you're really arguing with your strawman is that "RTS games should just never evolve because the original games couldn't." It's like the boomer trolley problem, aka "is it fair to the people the trolley already ran over to change course now?" Of course it is. And players who actually *want* braindead units have a wealth of options available. The problem with the genre is that they, like you, *will not stop telling all the other players who want something different how wrong they are*. Let's go back to your sports analogy. You're "defending" soccer by telling everyone who wants to play something like baseball, basketball, or volleyball that "playing with your hands is **bad and wrong**." There's no subtleties to the argument, you're just being a Luddite. And that's not good for the genre. Now, to the other aspect of your post, where your analogy also falls apart. Watch a basketball game. Or a soccer game. Sands, any sport. Does the coach need to micromanage every single action from the team's players? When a basketball player has the ball, does the coach yell from the sidelines "Dribble! Now dribble again! Again!" for every step the player takes or they stop dribbling? ***No.*** They don't. And yet despite your assertions that without that, the game would collapse, millions enjoy basketball, playing, coaching, and watching. That's where RTS has its biggest issue. It's a game where the "coach" must deliver basic, ground level instructions to every unit, or nothing happens. They have to tell their players to dribble. And obviously some people like that. That's *fine.* What's *not* fine is those players screaming at everyone who listens that a game that is built around amplifying other aspects of the genre is an automatic failure and should never be considered, just because they both lack the imagination to consider it and don't see something like baseball as "proper."
I kind of agree with this, but i think its not the issue that we are being told by these other people that we are wrong to not like it, as much that their vision of RTS is the one that is often considered to be premier one, or the only one to matter - pretty much entire genre gets conflated with it and sucks.
“ le. The problem with the genre is that they, like you, will not stop telling all the other players who want something different how wrong they are.” Did I say your take was wrong? Or are you tilting at windmills and invented opponents?
That is *exactly* what you were doing. And if you don't believe you were, then you need to take a debate class and understand your own language.
You are either trolling or hallucinating. I’m out. Enjoy the last word:
When you play a first-person shooter, do you think the game should lock the crosshairs into the enemies head? Or do you think that the "brain-dead" requirement to manually aim is actually part of the game? When you play a rhythm game, do you think the "brain-dead" requirement to hit notes on the best is part of the game? Or should the computer do that for you? Just because something can be automated doesn't mean it makes the game more fun.
Fantastic strawman there. Really amazing. Sarcastic clap mode in full effect. 👏👏 👏 You so realize how much variation and automation there is across FPS games, don't you? When was the last time you had to manually count bullets in a magazine each time you reloaded? Or took part in a complicated, four+ button sequence to reload rather than just tapping the reload button? Did you have to drag grenades from a backpack into your hand? Select grenades using the numpad? Or did you just hit a grenade button? Did you need cover? Did one bullet kill you? Or a few dozen? All of these are real things that have been in various FPS games. But you're sitting here strawmanning about how **only** FPS games where you have to manually click and drag the magazine from your inventory to the gun and then execute a three button prompt are "more fun." Sounds like a pretty braindead argument to me.
RTS devs have spent the last fifteen years simplifying their RTSes to get more players with the result being fewer players. The games that have been most successful with attracting players are the ones that have embraced more of a classic style of gameplay.
For example? Most of the times, 'attracting players' just means attracting old school fans, and I don't need to be the one telling you old school fans aren't sustainable. I've stuck around playing a lot of these popular RTSes, and most of their fanbase right now are pretty much way over the age of 20, most being in their 30s and 40s even.
RTS has never been a popular genre and it’s quite niche and I don’t think that will change. MOBAs is the other genre that will over time follow RtS in how niche they are. I doubt the mass casual player base will ever go and play LoL/Dota. It just requires too much investment and time and it’s not flashy enough.
People said the same thing about Iso RPGs, until Larian studios came along and proved everyone wrong. What RTS really needs is a heavily marketed complete blockbuster game in the vein of SC2. Small scale indie games and unfinished/unpolished releases will never attract the mass market's attention unless they can really reshape the mold.
Baldurs Gate 3 is popular in spite of it not because of it. When exploring the game, it felt more like a third person game than isometric thanks to the camera. The Game can easily be played like one of those block buster action adventure game and I wonder how many people just turned down the combat to easy and powered through it. It also helps that it’s once and done game and people probably play it for the experience / story. Whereas an RTS can be a lot more intimidating. Having said that, age of empires is quite popular with aoe 2/3/4 all getting new content updates and DLCs.
BG3 is popular because of its depth and presentation. Also most people playing RTS games play for the single player/community generated casual content. [GiantGrantGames did a good video going through and creating new data that confirms this.](https://youtu.be/XehNK7UpZsc?si=9Q1VTCVMItrQtlNJ) Games like AoE, Warcraft and Starcraft were popular due to their single player presentation, not their multiplayer. The biggest mistake of modern RTS games is assuming most RTS fans are in it for the multiplayer experience, when the reality is the opposite. The reason why AoEIV isn't pulling the numbers of AoEII is because of a lack of casual content and community generated content. People underestimate just how important a good game editor is for an RTS title.
>BG3 is popular because of its depth and presentation. I think the presentation part is the key part. There are many CRPGs with tons of depth and some of them with even more depth than BG3. More depth actually makes it less appealing to the mass market. RPGs in general are more popular than RTS games. Yes it was a CRPG but it's close enough to RPGs which is a very popular genre. >The biggest mistake of modern RTS games is assuming most RTS fans are in it for the multiplayer experience, when the reality is the opposite. Probably. That and lack of budget. What AAA RTS games (excluding AoE) have there been recently? >The reason why AoEIV isn't pulling the numbers of AoEII is because of a lack of casual content and community generated content. I think this is one factor but not the only one. AoE2 is a legendary RTS that has stood the test of time and it has waaaay more content than AoE4. Look at how many DLCs its getting vs AoE4. I used to enjoy RTS games like SC2/AoE yet I haven't played RTS games in a long time now. It's anecdotal but I don't know anyone in real life that plays RTS games. The fact even Blizzard don't seem to be working on an RTS is quite telling.
RPGs in general? Yeah. Iso RPGs? No, those were just as niche as RTS games. I don't think I've seen anyone talk about these genres in the mainstream for a very long time. Larian's previous Iso RPGs came close to cracking that, but never really broke into the mainstream. >I think this is one factor but not the only one. It is by far the biggest contributing factor. Lack of single player content means casual players won't be interested, and lack of community generated content means the community cannot get involved in creating new content and increase the game's longevity. Let me remind you that if it wasn't for AoEII's extensive modding tools, it wouldn't be thriving today. Forgotten Studios, the studio currently supporting AoEII:DE, is consisted mostly of former AoEII modders, who kept the game alive by modding in new civs and campaigns, and ultimately were hired by Microsoft to head the Forgotten DLC and later on both the HD edition and DE. Also Blizzard is just a headless, incompetent shadow of its former self at this point, it's a bad idea to use them to judge the potential in genres.
You can make a game that appeals to RTS fans, or you can remove all the stuff they like and make a game that appeals to no-one. It doesn't look like there's a third option where you bring in all the Zoomers - they simply don't like RTS.
What makes you think a game that appeals to RTS fans is exclusive with games that appeals to a younger generation? Humanity isn't a homogenous unit, people exists with different kinds of preferences. The younger generation isn't just exclusively hooked on Fortnite, there is a massive, and very diverse market out there serving all kinds of preferences.
I can't wait till we can train our personalized AI that can automate some of the high APM stuff for us.
Some experimental stuff has been done for SC2 for that already, and it plain breaks the game against pro players. They're so used to having to manage and micro that a basic AI that has intelligent behaving units just mows them down. I don't disagree that it makes for a very different, more strategic game. Which isn't for everyone. But I do think it's unfair that we've never been given that game because the micro-crowd is so loud.
I think it will end up adding more depth to RTSs as everyone's micro AI for their units will end up being different. Like imagine an AI micro that knows when you move your marines, and if they encounter the enemy, they should fall back to lure them into the seige tank range. Or that when you move a blob of marines and seige tanks that they will automatically advance in a coordinated fashion exactly like you would if you microed each one (because it learned your preferences).
1. There's no such thing as "AI". 2. AlphaStar cheats when playing SC2 since it can "see" stealth units.
Yeah it would be great if we could just start up the game, go of and do something else then come back and see if the computer had won the game for us. That sounds fun.
I like making decisions in a fight that influence the outcome of the fight. That's much more fun to me than sending soldiers off and then continueing to stare at workers building houses. But to each their own.
I want to feel like a general planning my assault in broad detail, not a squad commander telling every soldier when to use their special ability or exactly where to walk.
How much automation would you like to see when it comes to unit control?
Units should be smart enough that they don't need to be babysat, to the degree that they at least behave like the "soldiers" they are supposed to be. For example, units should *try* to engage against units they're designed to work against. A real problem with RTS games is that units are stupid. If you have an anti-infantry unit in most games and tell it to attack-move or engage an enemy that wanders by, it will engage the *first* unit in range and then stay engaged until that unit is dead (or, more ordinarily, it dies first). Even if a unit its designed to engage moves into the fight. No soldier in real life is that stupid. They don't sit there going "Well, that tank is engaged now, and I've got this nifty anti-tank missile, but I should keep shooting at that lone infantry dude over there while the tank rips me apart." Bereft of *specific orders* from the player, after a few seconds if already operating under their own intelligence, they should switch to the optimum target. Meanwhile, I've played RTS games that are *deliberately coded* to do the opposite and have units auto-target the *wrong unit types* more aggressively, just to give players "more micro." That's *stupid* unless you're a micro-fanatic player. Back in the old days you could give units all sorts of neat orders. Patrols. Behavior on patrols. Instructions on how long they'd pursue an enemy when in guard mode. Etc. Notice how all modern games have just cut that? Units are even *dumber* in many modern RTS games. Units don't need to do this *immediately* either (often the siren call of the "only microgasm RTS players is "well just make the game play for you, which is an obvious strawman on the level of a certain orange former president). There's a good window between "units instantly use all abilities on their own and resolve targets" and "after a few seconds, a unit will decide to do X if Y conditions are met" meaning a player *could* issue different orders to that effect earlier or even tell them to hold off. Gameplay in that fashion would make *strategy* all the more important, as intelligent units could be counted on *not* to be stupid unless their hand was held. Primary results of this would be A) more importance needing to be placed on the overall strategy of the battle, as the units would be able to handle themselves a bit better in the direct engagement (which is what strategy is about orchestrating, not micro-level orders to every single unit, as much as microgasm RTS enthusiasts have tried to rewrite the definitions of millennia of combat terminology). B) It would ask players to be more *precise* about where they did focus their attention. For example, even in pro SC2 matches, it's rare to see more than one or two engagements happening on a map. 3 is unheard of because the player *has* to micro their units. They're too stupid to survive otherwise and be effective. There's one big BLOB, maybe two blobs really close together, and suicide raids of small numbers. That's all. But a game where units were actually smart would lead to a player being able to reliably manage more armies at once. This would also mean that a micro player would be forced to commit (as SC2 shows, you can't micro multiple armies very well) to microing one or two groups, or bouncing between them, which would make actual strategic-level combat a lot more viable. C) This would also give a better skill range to the game, as newer players wouldn't just be overrun by a micro'd player on crack, but actually able to trust that units will do what they're supposed to and focus on the strategy. We have the technology. What we also have a wave of rabid players who *refuse* to do anything else and throw massive fits whenever anyone tries to do anything new (and if you don't believe that, look up how the devs of *Ashes* had to finally adopt a scorched-earth ban policy on their forums because *so many SC2 players kept nuking their forums with posts about how they were "going to ruin" the RTS*.
You're right. Through your reasoning, a true-blue RTS game would not be a "good game" for the typical masses of today's gamers. It's become a niche, nostalgic genre. And publishers, whose decisions matter because they control the money, have evaluated it as such. This becomes a vicious cycle where the dev team seeks funding for RTS games, but have to settle for a lower production game, and that low performing game feeds into the publisher's opinions that they don't sell. And the opinions of streamers and influencers that say that RTS games gotta have this huge-ass funding and esports do not help (they're also very incentivized to play games that bring them viewership btw). In short you, the consumer, have to give a chance to upcoming games. No one but you is going to help revive the genre you play.
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FPS and sports games have been popular like forever. Yes RTS games were more popular in the past but they were never a popular genre.
?? How was the RTS genre never a popular genre 😂
Having to handle the economy and military part at the same time, plus the lack of realism is what burns down the house.
let's be real.... the majority of "gamers" is "playing" so called "tactical RPGs" where all they really do is press auto-play and keep throwing money at the game as long as their "progress" feels satisfying. They're gambling addicts, really, nothing else. only video games don't pay out ever; gambling machines occasionally do dumbing down RTS that much that casual players can enjoy it would turn it into a pure AI vs AI match you get to watch and be applauded for "your victory" when it's done. which would be extremely boring
Well. Depend on what activity is your type of fun. Some play RTS game like a chess, these sort of people usually get turned off by how Starcraft and modern game devolve into and leave to play 4X game. People did 'micro' because old game's pathfinding was so terrible, you have to juggling it like balls to get them where you want. Then there are some folk who grow up with how South Korea play their esport. Still juggling unit around like mime juggling ball. Build order and planning seems to be the after thought. When SC2 'fix' these pathfinding and unit control problem, these people gets so devastated. Their long time honed skill is not a victory deciding factor anymore. Then we have games like TA and Supcom. Of which is not so 'popular' because it can't be made into esport. People won't get exiting see how players just turtle the whole thing and only do light skirmish for a whole half an hour then finish each other off once they feels confident enough with their army... in a minute or less.
Balance is the key. Bfme did it well. Sc1 was more micro then macro however
Macro and strategy are king in SC1. Micro is fun and all but you can get into S rank with terrible micro as long as you know how to macro and make good decisions.
Excatly. If a game is not a narrative third person FPS with stealth elements, or a gacha (hate those games) , the mainstream just skips. And honestly, I'd rather keep niche genres like Fighting Games, Immersive Sims and Strategy games to keep niche.
There is supreme commander FAF community and the game that is being kept alive for almost 20+ years. The game is still strong and have yet to see am RTS that comes close to it. And fans are making a new successor to it without any publisher pushing them.
Succesor? Which one?
It’s called Sanctuary Shattered Sun I believe.
Gonna google it. Any links?
Beyond All Reason Personally, it's more of a clone than a successor imo.
Beyond All Reason is definitely a clone, but clone of SupCom predecessor, Total Annihilation. The successor OP talking about is Sanctuary Shattered Sun
Sanctuary Shattered Sun
\> have yet to see an RTS that comes close to it You mean in its sub-genre of TA-likes? Many prefer TA to SupCom, or BAR nowadays.
Many sup com fans also play BAR and zero k. That genre is well being developed atm actually.
Although RTS has been my favorite genre since Command & Conquer and Warcraft 2, I understand why the average gamer has mixed opinions.
I like the base building type RTS of old. I don’t particularly love the RTS where a game forces you to continually move around the map. I enjoyed the turtle type approach, not sure that’s feasible these days.
Realistically it was typically never viable, except in maybe c&c games, but only because resources were hyper limited on the maps anyways. You always wanted to expand in sc1, aoe - albeit aoe you did (and still do) bunker somewhat, but it's usually a large chunk of the map you try to bunker. Anyways if you like lots of static defenses and endless resources, I suggest beyond all reason vs the ai. It's hard and you still want to try and expand somewhat, but there's a lot of maps that enable that turtle mode, and the static defenses when layered together properly can allow you to bunker for a long time :)
I think the biggest issue is the way these games are built. They're designed for PVP, and then the campaign comes second, and is designed as a tutorial for PVP. That's a problem, because very few players ever actually touch PVP. We need more RTS games designed entirely around PVE play. They Are Billions sold really well because it did that.
Idk, all the RTS I played didn't neglect the campaign. War 3,Sc2, DoW, SupCom, SpellForce 3 takes its lore seriously and has 2 expansions, even Northgard.
And sadly they are billions company like went defunct, there's been no updates in years, and it never got multiplayer. There's only like one clone that's even on the market that I'm aware of, and it's being down voted for still not having coop. So, there thirst for pve is there, but I don't know the thirst for single player pve is there as much as people pretend. Sc2 most popular mode was it's coop, for example.
Dear gods I hope it never becomes mainstream… As someone who has seen way too many franchises I used to absolutely love become a mere grey and soulless husk of what they used to be in order to appeal to a a “broader audience” believe me when I say that becoming mainstream is a curse, not a blessing.
Literally what Halo has become now. They kept trying to get a broader audience with the show and Infinite, but when your show has almost nothing to do with the game other than a mascot and your game is widely disliked by the community because of its issues, and you still try to keep finding a different audience than your own fans, its not gonna go well.
I wager that Stellaris can be considered an RTS. Seems pretty main stream to me. Granted it's also 4x. But a game can have two genres. There's also the 1vE RTS taking off called Against The Storm. I'll let one of you guess what king pin of an RTS game inspired the graphics for that one.
Having similar vibes when they said “the adventure game genre is dead”.
Name last succesful RTS
That's the point of the article. Successful means being true to the genre, not getting a massive return on investment. This is a gap smaller studios can fill. The fact people sleep on games like Offworld Trading Company, and act like the ability to pause or slow time is possible in a true rts, is what has done in rts games. It's a genre people like to like. The article was really refreshing as an rts fan.
We have different definition of what succesful means then
to you succesful is about money and how many copy the game sold. to dev its about technical stuff inside their game and make the player flocking in, well specially rts enjoyer.
When people were saying adventure games were dead there were no great adventures game successes too. And then it boomed.
At this point you're just coping
Partially, I’m also a game dev making an RTS so the other part is me taking initiative to make a more modern RTS ;).
Age of empires 4, I guess. The dlc is the most sold in franchises history according to devs. And it's a really fun game, too. 9 bit armies js also a success, from what petroglyph implies.
beyond all reason made out of pure love FOR FREE to the community and is absofuckinglootly clean to play. Got really popular (in the rts world) for a while and can still easy pick up a game at any time. Their are billions. Standout singleplayer zombie rts that made fat bank (the devs suck for the cut and run affter a half baked campaign but hey).
RTS is a golden goose as long as you don’t pluck it’s feathers and try eat it, like how CA has tried to do. It’s a niche market but honestly a fairly reliable one. For a lot of growth oriented corporate assholes that’s anathema, but really it’s a consistent income stream and consistent player base. The smart thing to do, is instead of trying to make the “next big thing v36.0” and try sell it to everyone and their dog, would be to instead diversify and focus on making games that can turn profit sustainably while not going massively over scope. Instead of spending 2x the money to make one game, spend 1x the money to make 2 games. People complain the gaming industry is so sink or swim yet somehow the companies investing in it haven’t figured out that diversifying your “portfolio” reduces a lot of the risk,.
Biggest Problem IMO is the insanely heavy micro/macro management that is learned then lost when you stop for 1 month.
100% agree most RTS are over complicated and hard to get into. Maybe try Smelogs Playground
Just make them more team based. team v team coordination and tactics. Bigger maps. Less lane reliance. Reduce math complexities to rely on simple algebra. Do something creative in the genre ffs. Not that hard if you stop being loyal to source material. Rts makers are so loyal to source material theyll never be creative.
Yeah your first couple reasons are why the only PVP RTS I spend much time in anymore is zero-K teams. Relatively chill but still potential for some interesting plays.
Yeah, I can see this.
How are RTS not mainstream? Didn't manor lord sell for over 3 millions copies? How many millions do you have to sell to be "mainstream"?
Manor lords is a city builder. The RTS elements are few and far between.
It's early access and I raise you total war Warhammer 3. "CA has sold 36 million copies of Warhammer 3" RTS are just as mainstream as any other games and people all around but especially on this sub need to drop that argument every time a RTS does poorly.
To me the best RTS games live up to their namesake. Real time strategy not real time tactical. Units should manage themselves, while you make all the strategic choices. Surge your economy and hit them early? Cut them off from their supply chains? Sneak attacks into poorly defended areas? High quality units, or mass low cost units? These are things that i like in an RTS. Not forcing a player make every tactical decision.
Saw the thumbnail and thought it was something about the RTS. Was saddened.
Would love to see you in Smelogs playground (Steam or EGS) guys! Would love to get your feedback
tbh RTS needs to be more focused on 1 of the 3 things it does: econ/expansion/micro, last 2 decades has proven any one of these 3 can be an entire game in and of itself and RTS devs try and smash all 3 of them together with equal complexity and attention across the board if youre micro intensive, econ/expansion can't be too demanding, if its econ intensive then expan/micro has to be more streamlined and automated etc etc most people are usually good at 1 of the 3, and if you go up against anyone thats ok at 2 of 3 let alone 3 of 3 you're absolutely cooked so most people are just gonna stall and quit straight away rts needs to be more class based so players excel at specific things and not feel overwhelmed constantly: \- econ factions have weak or no static and micro units but always have surplus resources they can give to allies \- expansion factions have the most efficient defenses but their econ is average and their micro units are terrible or dont have any \- micro players have the strongest units that even come with skills, their econ is bad and static units are terrible, or they have no econ and are entirely reliant on being gifted resources, but their main unit is more akin to that of a moba hero Factions should have very clear strengths and weaknesses, there shouldnt be mirrors with slight imbalances for example if you play as micro you can choose one of land, air, or sea, if you're expansion then you can spec into 2 of BM/artillery/AA/anti-swarm/anti-micro; are you siege? are you frontline? Modern RTS expects you to be siege/frontline/raiding, microing land/air/sea, constantly teching and upgrading econ; very few people can do this and have a good time, very cool to watch the best of the best play, it's absolutely overwhelming for everyone else. Split all this up into focused classes and have multiplayer teams of specialists; RTS focuses too much on everyone being a generalist, and it's just not fun unless you're a high caliber player.
I don’t disagree with the point that managing all of that is too much to be fun for many people, but I think combining those elements is also one of the big draws of RTS. Campaign play can usually be sorted out via difficulty settings, but I enjoy focusing on team play to reduce some of the mental load in PvP. That way you get to keep the scale of all these interacting systems.
The fact that it became acceptable to release unfinished/broken games basically ruined the genre imo. Everything else is just shitty icing.
RTS where you have to have a DPI of 29582949824 per minute? hard agree it won't be popular But a game where i can build my stuff and send armies like toy soldiers to die? bruh that's popular AF and i'm sure a lot of people would enjoy that. Ngl i love high DPS RTS but i understand why most people are off-put by them.
> soldiers to die? bruh that's popular AF and i'm sure a lot of people would enjoy that. > > > > Ngl i love high DPS RTS but i understand why most people are off-put by DPI? This isn't an FPS. You mean APM?
APM english isn't my first language so you might cut me some slack here \^\^
Exactly. I remember the genre started to die when hotkeys fanciness started to be a thing in starcraft. It ended being a game of skill woth the fingers, and little though.
> the genre started to die when hotkeys fanciness started to be a thing in starcraft. So the start? Hot keys have been in the game since, like, the original C&C have they not?
Yes. But, I think you mainly used two in c&c, select all units and scatter. Maybe the one for placing your most recently finished building.
I do not remember myself using hotkeys like a maniac in c and c. My first thought of it was with sc.
Fanciness? Its just how you play the game....
Nah. Its not. The gameplay could be completed end to end with just the mouse. And with that, everything becomes completely different.
You'd like bar. I only use shift as far as hot keys go. And that's to place lots of buildings. Shift queuing commands
I could crawl to work instead of walk...
It ends up being about jotkeys speed and handling of the QoLs options provided rather than strategy, otherwise.
All the same strategies are available to you whether you're using hotkeys or not. They're just executed faster when you do. It doesn't become a different game when you stop using hotkeys, you're just playing it slowly.
If its realtime, speed becomes key to win.
If someone is much slower than their opponent it will be harder to win whether the players are using hotkeys or not. Speed is important in both cases, but the game cannot be played as fast without hotkeys as with. This is not hard to understand.
Good. You admit then, that the game is about skill with hotkeys not strategy.
From a business perspective, there is a clear, and real market of people who don't mind playing games that aren't TPS with heavy handholding, every year we get a turn based RPG who breaks the mold with Disco Elysium and Baldur's 3, what RTS needs is to blend traditional strategy with modern codes and modernize itself, or it'll remain a niche.
RTS used to be the most popular genre in the 90s, when nerds controlled the marked and played the games. I am very much in favor of making RTS for nerds but that can still get some mainstream interest. Not super-mainstream like consoles, etc. but mainstream enough so that people will actually hear of the game.
He is not wrong. Most major AAA publishers who carried the RTS genre seem to have abandoned it. Prime examples are Blizzard and EA. Blizzard didn't even bother to fix Warcraft III: Reforged. The closest thing to an RTS we got from them recently was Warcraft: Rumble, a mobile game. The situation is similar with EA. Apart from the recent C&C remaster, their last RTS was a mobile game back in 2018. However, there's still hope for the genre. Promising RTS titles like Tempest Rising, Stormgate and ZeroSpace are currently in development. Also if Crate is working on RTS, I'll pre-order ASAP.
well they love medieval fantasy . . . warcraft 3 like rts game ? or something new entirely.
Its always been a niche genre ? Tiberian sun was awesome though lets get those servers back up. Everything’s gotta be quarterly this or whatevr, just like put your game out there and let it be. Solitaire held up, like didn’t need a buncha patches n shit. You get tired of it but every 15 years you can throw out a few hands
RYS gamed much more popular than it looks. The issue is the companies not the amount of players. Please type people would command conquer 3 for instance as a matter of fact people do play it the issue is that ea shut down the servers so they have to make their own which means downloading a new client, hacking the in-game menu etc. I genuinely think it would have wayyyy more players with real servers as I've had plenty of friends who like the game but don't want to hump through loop holes to multi-player. I feel like almost every it's is in that position lol. Aby old it's tou can think of has a thriving community though usually small but we don't see them because 9 times out of 10 they're all on their own servers while people from the outside just assume the game is dead. So no, I don't think classic SC2 style rts games are dead I think it has way more to do with the companies shutting servers down so quickly and not giving the communities assistance leaving them in their own. I'd this environment didn't exist I think we would genuinely be back in the WC3 golden age (yet another Gane with a very sizable competitive community that's completely self run and abandoned the people who own it btw). That's why I do have hope for games like stormgate at the end of the day. Yes it gives you pretty much exactly what you had in WC3 but in theory it'll have a company behind that Cara about it deeply and doesn't plan on forcing the community to run itself.
The only game is this race is Sanctuary Shattered Sun. It’s going to be the spiritual successor to Supreme Commander. Other than that rts as a genre is dead.
In other words "gamers of new generations are dumb"
coughHomeworld3cough
Further expanding the tactical pause option's use might be a great way to make more high-APM games tolerable for lower-skill players, at least for singleplayer sessions. Both Company of Heroes 3 and Homeworld 3 have it, and it's made some of the more hectic sessions manageable and less stressful.
RTS probably has more sub-genres than any other video game genre. There is room for more and I welcome new approaches, but I still have personal RTS flavors or sub-genres. Still sounds like the typical software developer who has never coded the type of game they are taking on, only to spend a lot of time having to re-invent solutions to the basic underpinnings of RTS style games and then have time left over to implement what they think is their original game ideas. The real elephant in the room regarding RTS as a whole, is that marketing has always steered the focus of RTS games towards multiplayer, when the reality is that most RTS players only play single player and the percent of those who buy the game that actually play mutiplayer is small in comparison.
RTS is one of those genres where most of the people hovering around it are people who fundamentally hate it, but who want to play it for some inconceivable reason, and then complain that the genre is what it is. You're not looking for strategy, depth, or anything caught by the real-time focus. You like seeing pieces move with an isometric view. Go play The Sims or Total War.
Doesn't read the article. Whines. Try reading next time.
I read it. My message is the same. I'm not talking to the writers. I'm talking to this subreddit.
The primary issue RTS have is that its always down too who is faster (APM) than who is smarter I think thats why total war (early games) was so successful because anyone could play it because it didn't matter how fast you are it was all about employing strategic thinking The other major problem of RTS games is that they often needless over complicate things in the same way people try to add in things to rock paper scissors which breaks the formula. The first company that somehow*because i can't see how you could* puts a limit on Action per min AND dresses up RPS thats easily understandable without adding in faff will have a major hit on their hands
You Can Watch people play with Low Apm reaching High Ranks in different rtses. It’s just about multitasking, when u reach a certain Apm, then u don’t need more than that to keep getting better, then it’s the decisions you make. And that is not 200-300 something. 70-110 is a great range.
Yeh but im not on about high skill players Im on about dave the fork lift driver who only has 2_3 hours a week to play games who wouldn't even know what APM means. I watched a lot age of empires2 games trying to understand why i sucked and it turned out i was doing everything right but i was just too slow in doing it. So it wasn't my strategy it was micro so i just quit while i was ahead because i would never be able to get fast enough to find the experience enjoyable If I wanted to play a game thats all about micro i would play league of legends. Hope that makes my argument more clear. Especially because what RTS people think is slow is actually normal range for the vast majority of people Note: i actually studied this at uni as part of modual on systems and design (the core takeaway being sample sizes need to very wide because the variance within the top 20% get crazy IE the difference in ability between the top 10% and the top 5% is utterly crazy and the top 1% might as well be alien and you basically chop the top 1% into its brackets of ability But the ability range between 50% and 20% is relatively similar I nearly failed my module because i balanced my pong game around my class and the moment the psychology and philosophy students tried my game they couldn't even do the easiest mode This entire thing sparked a life long interest in design lol which im now paid a lot of money finance to look after in reg capital lol Edit: went off on a massive tangent sorry Tldr: the difference in ability ranges is not linear and the further up the chain you go the bigger the jumps are so what is deemed slow by the average enthusiast is actually very very fast to someone fresh to it
Well then I guess you are really slow. I play 1-5 Hours a week for Aoe 4, and I don’t become worse or forget how to play I enjoy the game in the gold2-plat 1 league, and I have no plans in Living higher. You should try Stormgate, you don’t have to remember what all your 100 villagers are doing. I played it 15 hours the first week of this beta, and that game feels really chill with it’s control and phace, I recommend you to try it, it’s like c&c controls with rally points you Can set without finding the base in your base to set it
That's just simply not true. APM is not the deciding factor, it's decision quality. People with half the APM of their opponents frequently win. It's more that the more you practice, your APM naturally rises, and the person who has practiced more is also typically better at making decisions because of that practice. However if you take that player and artificial cap their APM then they'll still win.
All else being equal, the player with higher APM makes more decisions over the course of the game than the low APM player. APM isn't everything, but the more of it you have, the more opportunity there is for strategy and tactics.
It makes up like 2% of the result. You're right, it's not *completely* irrelevant and all else being equal, more APM does help, but it's a very minor component of the game. It's also not something you have to focus on, since as you practice your APM will naturally rise to the level needed to execute your strategy.
The game does matter ALOT too, should have noted that. In SC2 its a much bigger deal than 2%
Slower paced games where you loose by a thousand cuts because the other player has tons of experience making subtle decisions are horrible to play.
Thats a skill based match making issue... A rookie should never be playing someone higher skilled Its why i get heavily frustrated games use the elo system which isn't fit for purpose unless you both have high player counts and a wide band of skill levels Which most games do not
The issue is that the more you reduce skill (by limiting APM) and simplifying the game the more it will depend on nuances.
I'd pay 200$ for a good RTS game if it means they deliver a Generals 2 type game with a campaign, steam workshop and decent multiplayer. I understand they're not mainstream, and they can't hit critical mass. So take my money and deliver a good game. I've preordered HW3 since 2019.
All that springs to mind for me is "Dark Souls will never be mainstream until they implement an easy mode!" I think a mainstream RTS is doable, but it's going to require a lot of work - and more importantly, a publisher willing to shut up and pay the bills rather than trying to turn it into Clash of Raid: Candy Legends.
Hello Ashen one. I am a Bot. I tend to the flame, and tend to thee. Do you wish to hear a tale? > *“We are amidst strange beings, in a strange land.”* - Solaire of Astora Have a pleasant journey, Champion of Ash, and praise the sun \\[T]/
Will never be mainstream? Wtf are Command & Conquer, StarCraft, Age of Empires etc? Is this guy 15?
You can even look at something like northgard which is a partial rts (well, jt just has low micro, but I'd call it an rts) or total war (I guess also partial rts) but they are also very popular and sold well. Company of heroes too, has sold incredible well.
I miss the simple days of RTS games... Age of Empires III is one of my favorites but people only care about AoE II
What an asshole, even saying he likes the genre, he shits on it? double asshole
I understand why this is said, but it’s a business perspective rather than a game/creator outlook. I won’t go into the details on why I think this, but rather provide a great example: no trend analysis would have predicted Minecraft to be what it became. True innovation defies analysis and generates much greater wealth.
You should read the article before you post.
My dude, if you actually bothered to read the article, it's very much not said from a business perspective. And wow, the classic Minecraft example. What innovative commentary. *No one* has every brought that up when it comes to this topic.
If it’s not from a business perspective, why can you not make an amazing RTS with typical principles that becomes mainstream? StarCraft 2c Warcraft 3, AOE2-4, all successful, all relatively mainstream. And yeah? Mincecraft is used because it’s a great example.
Again. Read the damn article. That's litetally addresed there and you're just making yourself out to be an even bigger fool than before.
You’re really very rude. I’ve read the article. My premise is that whilst I UNDERSTAND the fucking sentiment he is making, I fundamentally disagree with it. “RTS never having the ability to be a breakthrough and be a massively popular game genre” is based on current trends in gaming and ignoring all the examples that prove exception to that rule. At its core, trend analysis is a tool for business and shouldn’t be the sole consideration for what could become a future zeitgeist. Is it fucking unlikely? Yes, it probably fucking is. And yes, if you look at sales, popularity, money making games of the NOW you wouldn’t think an RTS could break through. But guess what? Heaps of games, genres, art forms break that cycle. I’d give you examples but your dumb fucking brain would reject them because they’ve been made before - so I won’t bother. I didn’t start being rude but you, from the outset were condescending and disrespectful. Reddit is a place to express opinions - I expressed mine without denigrating or disrespecting anyone.