I love defending too personally. If it's done well, and it's my choice.
For example, in Stronghold I love it, building up a nice, huge, labyrinthine castle, putting down towers, siege engines, archers, and everything in just the right places.
In some fps games I also love it, battlefield, battlefront, etc.
However the defending sequences in Half-life must have been the worst gameplay design decision I have ever encountered. I almost quit the game there, and in a number of other places admittedly, because it was just such an awful design, much like mostly everything else in the games, admittedly. It just felt so much like they desperately tried to make the game take longer. If it had been a choice, a lot of enemies are coming your way, here are a few turrets, you can put them up here and try to hold out if you like, then sure, I would have loved it. Now instead it was a chore, run back and fourth between two points, because they're always coming from two directions, use an awful control scheme to try to put turrets where you want them, and wait until the enemy is done. Just awful.
Even Starcraft did that better, in the Terran mission where you had to wait for transportation out. You could just turtle up, or you could run out, and try to fix the situation, or take out a few of the threats, so that fewer can attack you, you were given a choice. Which is damned important.
In command and conquer: Generals I had some real fun turtling up with the American superweapons general. Her turrets are just awesome, and then sending in the alpha bombers to clean up... Feels so right.
I must admit that breaking through such a defence is almost even more fun, in a game that does it well, something like Commandos, Silent Storm, Fallout tactics or the like. To set up a nice coordinated strike, and simultaneously take out three places, fake an attack on a fourth place and sneak inside and take out the leader, or main base, or attack them from behind. In short I guess I love making the most of my resources, using just a few well-placed turrets to defend against a much larger force, a sniper in a strategic location taking out many times it's worth, etc. That's why I like games that require a bit of thinking, with limited resources instead of the regular rts where you can just build up 10 000 000 turrets and have 15 nukes on standby.
For example, in Stronghold I love it, building up a nice, huge, labyrinthine castle, putting down towers, siege engines, archers, and everything in just the right places.
In some fps games I also love it, battlefield, battlefront, etc.
However the defending sequences in Half-life must have been the worst gameplay design decision I have ever encountered. I almost quit the game there, and in a number of other places admittedly, because it was just such an awful design, much like mostly everything else in the games, admittedly. It just felt so much like they desperately tried to make the game take longer. If it had been a choice, a lot of enemies are coming your way, here are a few turrets, you can put them up here and try to hold out if you like, then sure, I would have loved it. Now instead it was a chore, run back and fourth between two points, because they're always coming from two directions, use an awful control scheme to try to put turrets where you want them, and wait until the enemy is done. Just awful.
Even Starcraft did that better, in the Terran mission where you had to wait for transportation out. You could just turtle up, or you could run out, and try to fix the situation, or take out a few of the threats, so that fewer can attack you, you were given a choice. Which is damned important.
In command and conquer: Generals I had some real fun turtling up with the American superweapons general. Her turrets are just awesome, and then sending in the alpha bombers to clean up... Feels so right.
I must admit that breaking through such a defence is almost even more fun, in a game that does it well, something like Commandos, Silent Storm, Fallout tactics or the like. To set up a nice coordinated strike, and simultaneously take out three places, fake an attack on a fourth place and sneak inside and take out the leader, or main base, or attack them from behind. In short I guess I love making the most of my resources, using just a few well-placed turrets to defend against a much larger force, a sniper in a strategic location taking out many times it's worth, etc. That's why I like games that require a bit of thinking, with limited resources instead of the regular rts where you can just build up 10 000 000 turrets and have 15 nukes on standby.