I Need a New RTS

[Sonicron]

Dawn of War: Soulstorm. Excellent game. And you can get it with only 6,99? from steam.

If only there were a version of that game without horrible balancing, shitty gameplay mechanics and a trillion bugs.

Oh, wait. There is. It's called Dawn of War: Dark Crusade.

@OP:
Dawn of War 1 and its expansions are straightforward RTS mayhem, and Dawn of War 2 and its expansions are more CoH-like tactics. Aside from the aforementioned expansion 'Soulstorm', I can recommend all entries of the series so far.

 

[starslasher]

I'm surprised no-one mentioned Zero Hour [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Command_%26_Conquer:_Generals] really adds a lot to the game).

Well, i have not heard of that title until i looked up the C&C franchise, I have heard of the other titles, like 1,2,3, Red Alert 1 & 2 and tiberium Wars. So I guess you can't blame most poeple for not having bringing it up earlier.

Here are some old titles as well that may interest you.

- Sid meier's Alpha Centauri: it's pretty much Civilization set in the future, where you are one of 7 factions, trying to colonist another planet. But if you're not into a game like Civ, then this may not be for you.

- Battle Realms: Think of it as Warcraft 3, set in a fantasy Oriental setting. Check out Tital Biscuit's take on it: <youtube=6brEpJuBqXQ>

- Majesty: This was less conventional, in that you can't really command every unit, only give out orders and incentives, and let everyone else do their thing. I actually had fun with it, maybe you will as well.

 

[matt87_50]

lol, yer.. where the fuck is Command and Conquer!? is she your cousin or something!?

 

[RA92]

OP

I would like to reinforce the Homeworld suggestion. Here's a bit of gameplay, see if you're convinced.
<youtube=W4w50Gs5jZ0>

 

[ShakyFiend]

I love RTS games. I've been married to Starcraft II for a while now, but it's an open relationship and she's giving me the green light to seek other pleasures. Previous relationships include:

Age of Empires II (We still hook up sometimes.)
Age of Empires III (That was a dark patch.)
Empire Earth (A different experience every time. Sexy as hell.)
Empire Earth III (Then puberty hit her like a truck made of trains.)
Starcraft (Something about being fucked in the ass by a Korean just feels right.)
Warcraft II (My first love. Fuck, she was ugly in retrospect.)
Warcraft III (Her "models" got "3D" if you know what I mean.)
Rise of Nations (Forgettable.)
Company of Heroes (Well. That was...interesting.)

And a number of one-night stands. I'll remember them if you mention them.

Try Frozen Synapse, awesome music and really unusual, not an RTS in the traditional sense, only game iv ever played like it, theres a write up on penny arcade about it +its real cheap and fast, give it a try.

 

[Casimir_Effect]

Homeworld games are always good although:
1 is a bit too hard
2 is all over the place thanks to a stupid AI system
But 1.5 (Cataclysm) is juuust right (for me at least).

You could also try Rome: Total War - although this has the whole campaign map element to it as well, and King Arthur: The Roleplaying Wargame, which has a far less prominent campaign map than Rome but adds in a load of RPG features.

I'm also a massive fan of Spellforce 2 (and 1, to a lesser extent) so can recommend picking that up if you don't mind RTS and RPG smashed together into something wonderful.

 

[siygen]

i would say dawn of war but i find it myself a bit low in number of solders tho i prefer supreme commander as i like to have lots and lots of units not 4-6 units

 

[andrew201292]

world in conflict.

 

[Jacob Haggarty]

Err, command and conquer 3 is pretty good, so is red alert 3...

Also, you COULD try tom clancys Endwar. The mechanics feel a bit laggy, and it can be a tad frustrating to begin with, but you can very quickly pick up the skills, and it then becomes quite fun, especially with the voice command system. I was skeptical of the voice commands system at first, but once you have a little practise with it it's an invaluable tool, and it makes command you troops a lot more engaging and fun. PROTIP, don't enunciate the orders: It somehow works better if you just say it naturally, which is hard to get your head round at first.

But yeah, dawn of war is pretty good too, if you like warhammer. The customisation is pretty cool, but not really that neccessary.

 

[Scorpianhead]

the dawn of war series and if you don't mind a bit of turn based then the total war series

 

[Dizeazedkiller]

Warcraft II (My first love. Fuck, she was ugly in retrospect.)

And a number of one-night stands. I'll remember them if you mention them.

Does how it look matter? Because Stronghold Crusader is an awesomely fun rts, although it was always more of a LAN game for me, probably because by the time i got it there were no online games running. But its cheap and good fun when your playing with people you know against NPCs. I think i should warn you though its less about strategy and more about massing. Probably why i liked it. I never did like any RTSs other than stronghold and starcraft... starcraft even pissed me off because i prefer microing(in proper RTS anyway, not stronghold) rather than macroing.

...I think i went off track... try Stronghold Crusader.

 

[Asehujiko]

Could try the Dawn of War games. If you liked CoH (which I can't tell if you did) you'd enjoy Dawn of War II, it uses a similar mechanic but a lot more refined, and in a much more interesting setting.

CoH was a pretty different experience. There was very little macro focus, which is usually what I excel at, so it was really entertaining to learn how to play. I just didn't feel myself that challenged once I got the hang of it.

What? That was all macro. The entire thing was your overarching strategy and very little thought was needed to be given to the micro, unlike games like SC2.

Dawn of War: Soulstorm. Excellent game. And you can get it with only 6,99? from steam.

Wow. Someone liked Soulstorm? I've always been under the impression that every DOW fan hated that expansion.

Nah, only the ones that thought that it was a bad idea to give one side free infinite resources and a fast moving unit with no accuracy penalty that could marginalize both melee(by running circles around them and never getting hit while shooting back) and ranged(by getting the 75% "can't hit a moving target" damage reduction but not the downsides of not hitting anything in return) that also have jump, are t1.5 and have AV grenades.

And announcing the day after release that there would be no post-launch support.

This especially pissed off the 1 in 3 fans that couldn't run the game at all.

 

[nbamaniac]

Pick up teh Homeworld series. *cringe*

Oh, and if you want huge scale RTS' then Supreme Commander, Sins of the Solar Empire and the Total War series will do. (I preferred Medieval II, Empire and Shogun II)

EDIT: Oh and yes Battle Realms if you dont mind a lil old school RTS with an oriental setting.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

Could try the Dawn of War games. If you liked CoH (which I can't tell if you did) you'd enjoy Dawn of War II, it uses a similar mechanic but a lot more refined, and in a much more interesting setting.

CoH was a pretty different experience. There was very little macro focus, which is usually what I excel at, so it was really entertaining to learn how to play. I just didn't feel myself that challenged once I got the hang of it.

What? That was all macro. The entire thing was your overarching strategy and very little thought was needed to be given to the micro, unlike games like SC2.

Dawn of War: Soulstorm. Excellent game. And you can get it with only 6,99? from steam.

Wow. Someone liked Soulstorm? I've always been under the impression that every DOW fan hated that expansion.

Nah, only the ones that thought that it was a bad idea to give one side free infinite resources and a fast moving unit with no accuracy penalty that could marginalize both melee(by running circles around them and never getting hit while shooting back) and ranged(by getting the 75% "can't hit a moving target" damage reduction but not the downsides of not hitting anything in return) that also have jump, are t1.5 and have AV grenades.

And announcing the day after release that there would be no post-launch support.

This especially pissed off the 1 in 3 fans that couldn't run the game at all.

See, that was what I was thinking.

 

[Jamous]

I love RTS games. I've been married to Starcraft II for a while now, but it's an open relationship and she's giving me the green light to seek other pleasures. Previous relationships include:

Age of Empires II (We still hook up sometimes.)
Age of Empires III (That was a dark patch.)
Empire Earth (A different experience every time. Sexy as hell.)
Empire Earth III (Then puberty hit her like a truck made of trains.)
Starcraft (Something about being fucked in the ass by a Korean just feels right.)
Warcraft II (My first love. Fuck, she was ugly in retrospect.)
Warcraft III (Her "models" got "3D" if you know what I mean.)
Rise of Nations (Forgettable.)
Company of Heroes (Well. That was...interesting.)

And a number of one-night stands. I'll remember them if you mention them.

Have you tried any of the Total War games? They're not quite the same style, but the battles are amazing. You'll probably either absolutely love them or absolutely despise them.

 

[Ninjat_126]

Going to reinforce Dawn of War here for it is truly a a golden RTS.

Khorne is pleased with this statement.

Khorne? There is heresy in this thread. Brothers to me! We must cleanse it of all Chaos!

Death to the False Emperor and his loyalist dogs! KILL! MAIM! BURN! XD

Sorry, I can't hear your religious bickering over the sound of my railgun equipped hovering deathtank.


Supreme Commander's good if you can wait 83 min for your nuclear silo to build and don't mind the fact that the sight range of your Tech 3 Spy Plane is smaller than the icon that shows it on the minimap at maximum zoom.

Also, it's one of the few games where you can spam thousands of tanks to little or no effect, and it's possible to have mobile rapid-fire artillery guns.

Also, there's a flying saucer that fires death rays and doubles as an aircraft carrier.

 

[Cogwheel]

Got a half hour? Watch this video ... then buy Sacrifice.
Although, the multiplayer scene is quite dead, being a 10 year old game and all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7jw6tord7Q

Yes. This. How could I forget?

You need to play this game. All of you.

 

[GrindBass]

Achron-a time travel RTS
See it to believe it.
It's not out yet, but I'm definitely looking out for it.
Take a look at http://www.achrongame.com/

Definitely thinking about getting that myself. Theres some really cool strategies that you could do in that like only just scraping through a battle, then sending the survivors back to help themselves so that you end up with more units. Also I saw a cast of it on youtube where the guy was commentating while he was playing and it was just 'OK um I think I'm being attacked in the past?'

 

[MNRA]

Wow...

I'd first like to thank a couple of posters for rememering the old gems like War of the Worlds, Sacrifice and Battle realms, those three are most certainly worth checking out.

Second of all:

Rise of Legends (Steampunk Rise of nations)
D&D dragonshard (Fantasy strategy with a dungeneering twist)
Evil Genius (The best "play-evil" since dungeon keeper, all set in campy 70's style. A gem)
Heroes of annihillated empires (Solid RTS with a "few" bugs to iron out. But enough to keep one entertained)
Spellforce 1 (Yes they made a second one but it was inferior to the first game and its expansions. Also, be ready to be in for the long haul these are NOT short games)
Kohan - Immortal soverign 1 and 2 (Both good games, look up some gameplay vids)

If you liked Homeworld you can look up any of the following:

The Jupiter incident
Fargate
Project earth
Genesis rising

None of them were "as good" in my opinion, but they are still worth a look.


There, that covers a few things not already mentioned in this thread. If anyone wants more examples of good old RTS games feel free to ask

 

[Dragonborne88]

I throw my vote to Total War. She's a fine lass, with a fine blend of refined and gritty. The recent ones (Empire and beyond) combine what I love about Civ with the city building, along with amazing ground battles when you get to it. Shogun 2 is a real needy lady with the hardware, but she is worth every second and is beautiful to boot.

Civilization is also a great series, but the combat is really grating, at least to me. I don't like the dice-rolls battles, and I hold a secret grudge against it since Knights managed to destroy my tank brigade somehow. The the city building aspect can't be beaten and is amazing.