Ok you called me out. Now I?m calling you out. Name me some RTS.

[Azhrarn-101]

Holy Shi... I wasn't planning on commenting in this topic because frankly I'm lazy and mostly just enjoy blabbing in a semi-poetic and overly verbose manner towards topics where I can inflame peoples tempers (ie feed the flames... don't judge me!).

But I gotta say, you are the first person EVER that I have seen read or even 'thought' about that's ever heard of this game other than me. Hell, at one point I was considering the possibility I might have imagined the whole games existence and that the box on my shelf was little more than a manifestation of my own insanity... but you sir... you have proven me wrong.

Nexus: The Jupiter Incident is a *real* game. (It's even pretty fun!)

Shock and Awe!

Happy to prove there's some method to your madness then. ^_^
Nexus is quite something, and for its time probably had the best graphics around, while still having very modest requirements. (the benefits of space, most of what you see can be a static background texture) Especially the shield-effects are second to none, although I recommend keeping some sunglasses handy when you start throwing artillery missiles around. =D
Nothing says "hello sunshine" like nuclear or EMP-blast artillery, the lensflare...

The point-of-reference navigation is intuitive enough, but the free-space movement... takes a while to wrap your head around. Thankfully you'll rarely need to use that mode of movement. Also the ability to let the AI handle most of a ships abilities is great, but the manual control option is quite awesome too.

 

[Mackinator]

'Command and Conquer Red Alert 2'. With the 'Yuris Revenge' Expansion Pack.

A more cartoony style but the same style of game play. The units are less believable but the missions are just as good.

By far my favourite C + C and one of my favourite RTS of all time.

Age of Empires II + The Conquerers exapansion - this played online is an amazing fun RTS.

 

[New Troll]

If you can find them, Total Annahilation and TA: Kingdoms are both good RTS games with tons of mods (though a ton of them really unbalance the game.)

StarCraft BattleChest can be picked up at Wal-Mart for $20. WarCraft III BattleChest for around $40.

The Total War games are fairly cheap also, but I was never a big fan of them. Still popular though.

Dawn of War is also nice but not so friendly to non-gaming rigs.

 

[veloper]

Well since all the ones I was going to say have been said...
Warhammer: Dark Omen. It is fucking old but still one of the best RTS I have ever played. You have set units that you select before battle, can only take in soo many, no in game reinforcments and if a squad gets wiped out then it is gone forever. God I love that game. Not even many modern RTS can compare.

I have that game, but it will nolonger run on my computer.

I tried with both ati and nvidia cards, but all I get is garbled display. The problem is probably that Dark omen was written to take advantage of quirks in a really old version of directx. Last card I could get it to run on was an nvidia TNT2.

How do you manage to run it?

 

[FlameOfArnor]

Age of Mythology is a good one.

 

[TaborMallory]

Halo Wars was an insult to the RTS genre. That said, here are my suggestions.
-Age of Empires 1 and 2: Like chess in the medieval ages. Light micro and heavy macro.
-Age of Mythology: Other than the mythological theme, it's like a modernized version of Empires; Less serious and more pretty and easy.
-Starcraft: Futuristic chess. Very heavy micro and macro. Still fun after 10+ years. Requires relatively high skill.

 

[cheesecake123]

i would have to recomend soldiers heroes of ww2 it makes you think about tactics,the missions are challenging and hard and it shouldnt be to demmanding on your pc.

 

[DanDanikov]

Homeworld gets a second vote from me, but also Cataclysm and Homeworld 2 are worth a play. In a similar vein, Ground Control is another good RTS, and I'm also going to tip my hat towards the people who mentioned Nexus:The Jupiter Incident. The Battlestar Galactica mod for that game rocked.

For a little variety, there's Earth 2160 or Universe at War:Earth Assault. Oh, and Impossible Creatures was fantastic fun. I also have a bit of a soft spot for the MechCommander games.

 

[Mirroga]

The latest, most balanced, most challenging AI and most variety I've had in an RTS is Age of Mythology.

 

[aakibar]

Rise of Nations by microsoft

really straight forward game that moves you through the ages, sorta like age of empires only with a lot of nukes. There mods a plenty and the people who do the scenarios do them really well. The scenario editing tool is well done and since was made a while back it should work with your computer. Make sure you get the expansion too. Wish they were making a third

Gold is 30 and includes the original game and expansion
System requirements Microsoft® Windows® 98/Me/XP/2000
PC with 500 MHz equivalent or higher processor
128 MB of system RAM
750 MB available hard disk space
8x speed or faster CD-ROM drive
16 MB video card required
Sound card, speakers or headphones required for audio
Microsoft Mouse or compatible pointing device
56 Kbps modem or LAN for online/multiplayer

 

[MrLS]

Didin't read everything but did someone post Company of Heroes yet?

If not. I will.
It's easily my favourite RTS game right now (not including Warcraft 3) It's pretty well made, It runs on the Dawn of War engine and works alot better then dawn of war. Even tough i hate WW2 games Company of Heroes is a must-have for any RTS lover.

There im done.

 

[garfoldsomeoneelse]

I'll vouch for Company of Heroes like many of these other gentlemen have.
It can be downright chaotic, but it never, ever stops being fun.

Pretty heavy system requirements, though.

 

[Valiance]

Supreme Commander is the greatest single-player skirmish based RTS I ever played. (FA, of course.)

This includes a wide variety of RTS, such as AoE 1, 2, and 3, All of the -craft series, every single command and conquer game (minus one RA expansion and RA2's expansion), and many others.

But does not include SoaSE (yet).

For you, I highly recommend AoE 2 since it runs on pretty much any machine, has a lot to work with - multiple resources, multiple unit roles, lots of teching, lots of macro but still has some micro in it too.

etc, etc.

 

[j0z]

An RTS thread and not one person has mentioned the Civilization series?[/quote="Aethren" post= "9.120216.2353256"]
Well, this is an RTS thread. Civ is not an RTS, it is turn based.
I do not recommend SupCom, I found it rather lacking and it has an absolutely horrendous UI.
I recommend Age of Empires 2. Good strategy game.
Homeworld. Great space based strategy game with graphics on par with the PS1. And it runs smooth on even extremely old computers. (Win98)
C+C:RA. Good light hearted RTS. With fun gameplay.
Sins of a Solar Empire. Great new RTS, should be able to get it to work on older computers, but it does have a bit of a learning curve to it.

 

[systhicsfg]

The RTS genre begins and ends with Blizzard games.

Starcraft (+ Brood War)
Warcraft III (+ TFT)

/thread

nononono... nono... no..


no.

The -craft games are good, I'll grant you, and immensely popular, but they are far from the alpha and omega of the RTS genre. The games are all macro-management; knowing how to farm crystals/gold/whatever better than the enemy, with little emphasis on actual tactical combat beyond the rock, paper, scissors armor/attack strengths.

Here are a couple games I would recommend outside of the -craft series.

Company of Heroes - The emphasis on unit placement and squad interplay to create an actual strategic flow to gameplay. Resources come passively by taking territories, so you aren't focusing so much on managing your peons, and more on setting up gun emplacements, moving grenadiers into position to root out the entrenched enemies, and finding the best place to drop in back-lines troops. The combat is exciting, but doesn't move so fast that a micro-second misclick will ruin everything. Co-op multiplayer really makes the game shine, with each player taking a certain role in the combat through specialization and really maximizing the possibilities in teamwork and coordination.

Supreme Commander - While not as good, in my opinion, as its predecessor (Total Annihilation), the game is still quite solid, and really creates some epic conflicts. The first modern RTS to really bring emphasis to multi theatre (land, sea, air) combat and the importance of each in relation to the others, Supreme Commander pretty much requires you to be able to see a bigger picture on combat than just the skirmish-style engagements you're usually put into in the RTS scene. The drawback to this is that by the end of the game, you're spending more time in your global view and unable to see the combat unfold, which is really quite beautiful. I still have to recommend Total Annihilation higher, however. While the combat isn't as large as it is in Supreme Commander, the gameplay itself is more solid. And for a title of its time, it was utterly mind blowing. It's just a shame that Starcraft became more popular.

Company of Heroes is the best you can possibly do as RTS's go. A totally amazing, strategic game, my favourite game EVER. The awesomeness cannot be expressed in words, and plus, it runs of low end PC's and still looks great.

 

[EMFCRACKSHOT]

Anything from the total war series
Warcraft 2
Warcraft 3 and expansion

 

[Disaster Button]

YAY! A RTS dedicated thread!
Warhammer40,000 Dawn Of War Dark Crusade usually called DC. But it should be called DLC for its thousands of mods.

Oh ho. Snap.

I'd say all the Dawn of Wars and Dawn of War 2.

And on the other side of things. Rise of Nations. It's just freaking awesome.

 

[Da_Schwartz]

Starcraft and warcraft 3. Its pretty unanyomous.
Oh and Dark Wizard for sega cd. If you can find a port anywhere get that game immediatley. There are others , but these three are a pretty safe place to start. If your going to get into rts's this is where you should start.

 

[The Hairminator]

Starcraft without a doubt. Try it, play it, eventually (or maybe not) master it. Be amazed. You can thank me later.