Top Real-Time Strategy Games of All Time?

Decaffeinated Jedi writes "GameSpy is running a feature looking at the editors' picks for the top real-time strategy games of all time. Included on the list are such classics as StarCraft, Command and Conquer: Red Alert, and Age of Empires. The article looks at each game's significance to the genre as a whole, as well as offering some reader feedback on the editors' choices. Why not grunt rush their server, have a look at their picks, and share some of your own RTS favorites here?"

C&C

[mwheeler01]

I was always a big fan of the original Command and Conquer. The units had a nice variety without bogging you down with too many options and the whole concept of RTS was new and exciting to me. I don't think any C&C quite lived up to the original except Red Alert.

Age of Empires II

[kneecarrot]

I am not a person prone to obsessive behaviour, but when I fired up AOEII, I would often play all night until the sun rose the next day. This is during the week and with a 9 to 5 job.

There is nothing like building an impenetrable fortress and a huge assault force and then unleashing your army on a neighbour.

I love love love that game. I love it. Love love love. Am I gushing? Sorry. :)

playing dune 2

[gl4ss]

should work quite well on dosbox [slashdot.org].

It was just great when it came :)

too bad I never liked the rts games that came after it as much, imho most of them were lacking in atmosphere.

though, I'd count populous 1 as rts anyways :)

Rise of the Nations

[Utopia]

Strategy games & adventure games are the only games I ever play.
My current favorite is Rise of the Nations [microsoft.com].
Before that Stronghold [stronghold-game.com] used to take a big chunk of my time.

Kohan

[buddy53711]

I picked up Kohan: Ahriman's Gift on a whim and can honestly say it is one of the most interesting of all the RTS's I own. It has depth of play that other RTS's really don't even approach and allows you to actually use strategy and tactics, a concept that is slowly becoming foreign to the so called RTS genre. This is a rant for another day though. If you are interested in trying out this little known wonder, I believe there is a demo out for it. I think you can find it at Timegate Studios. Its an Oldie but a Goodie.

The choice is obvious:

[TwistedGreen]

Warcraft II. It's still a fantastic game today, and it's going on what, 9 years now?

I can't say I developed much of a taste for Warcraft III, though. Adding that whole 'hero' aspect just wasn't my style.

No Myth?

[Xzzy]

I know the game was always sort of a "sleeper" that never broke it big like heavy hitters such as Starcraft did, but Myth was still incredibly well done, and I've never come across a person who flat out didn't like it.

It's strongest quality was mostly the fact that it cut out all the annoying resource gathering and just let you work on the strategy part of killing your enemies.

I was hoping the ideas it brought to the genre would catch on (I think maybe Sacrifice is the only game I've played since that comes close) but it never caught on.

Doesn't change that it was an awesome game though.. I would have replaced that stinker 'Age of Empires' with Myth on that list any day. ;)

Re:Starcraft?

[GreyWolf3000]

I totally disagree. Once you got good at Starcraft, you could defend any rush, and folks that tried it got screwed in the end because of their overdedication to early units. Rushing only worked on newbies.

The missions were pointless. That's what Battle.net was for. That's where the strategy was.

Starcraft balanced recourse gathering, unit and building production, expansion, technological progression, and battle tactics in a clear and elegant way.

In my opinion the only problem with Starcraft was people's tendency to play games with lots of resources (think Big Game Hunters) and sit behind defenses and build carriers. It made it hard to find a game with decent players :)

What's with the honorable mention crap?

[lake2112]

Dune II only getting a honorable mention?? Without Dune II where would the RTS genre be? I remember playing this game and being in complete awe over its originality. It only left me wanting more. This game belongs in the top ten with its fellow RTS games. Screw honorable mentions give it the respect it deserves as one of the top ten RTS of all time.

Re:yay!

[ParadoxicalPostulate]

I actually didn't finish the single player campaign in Homeworld (I had borrowed the game and had to give it back) but I can say I was dazzled by the 3-D dimension. I mean, the did it perfectly. Once used to the system, you could send small sories on intercept routes varying at angles, and catch the enemy from three different directions, all the while maintaining an escape route.

The one thing that bothered me was the lack of sufficient variety in units. More units, different spaceships, maybe a history to the units...that would have made it much cooler when you actually saw them in action.

Its really unfortunate that none of the big names in RTS picked up on this idea, because I think it has amazing potential.

Imagine rendering hundreds of ships in a raging 3-D battle in an asteroid field just outside a binary system. Wow.

Only two contenders...

[Ceyan]

Rise of Nations and Homeworld.

Any other RTS I've ever played I've been able to consistently use overwhelming numbers to beat the other players, be it online or off. Problem is that, yes, there is some strategy involved, and in an evenly matched battle the one who can effectively micromanage special abilities or troops will win. But in all the games I've played (sans the two mentioned, and I've played just about every game called an RTS out there, and some that weren't but still qualified) if you have at least 1.5 times more troops than your enemy, nothing will save you. (I'm talking equally skilled players here, an idiot will lose no matter how many troops he gathers)

Rise of Nations really took the idea of borders to the next level, which made it incredibly hard to effectively attack enemy territory because you could never affect the economy directly (before an assault) of any player with decent skill.

Homeworld because the concept of specific units being effective against other specific units actually mattered. Yes in other games it's been done, and using that to your advantage could mean a win, but it wasn't a critical factor. In Homeworld even basic fighters never really lost their effectiveness against more advanced ships (Fighters ate Ion Frigates for lunch), and combine that with future releases like the Beast infection beam or the cannon you could add to the mining ship, you really had to stop and consider how to make an attack.

I'll throw in two honorable mentions:

#1: Total Annihlation. Although not revolutionary in terms of the engine, the modability and the diverse units (Land, Sea, and Air in a Sci-fi setting) really made this game shine.

#2: Dune 2 and Warcraft 2. These I only mention because they were the games that sparked the RTS industry. Yes others came before them, but these two became so popular that they made the difference. (Just like Half-Life/Couter Strike for FPS, Diablo for dungeon crawls, Falcon series for Flight Combat Sims, etc...)