Recommend me a good RTS.

[Daffy F]

Achron.

www.achrongame.com

An RTS where time itself is a weapon. Plus you're supporting independant, creative game development.

Not sure if it's exactly noob friendly, but if you're a noob, you won't have habits from other games to unlearn.

Hey, that looks pretty cool. Good find!

 

[Raso719]

Star Wars Galactic Battleground is a personal favorite of mine, though you can't access the online matches anymore unless there is some modding out there. You could manage tactics, group formations, marching orders and the different units, counters and tactics were quite awesome. I?d actually rank this as my personal favorite and nomination for best RTS ever on the grounds of unit selection, in depth (yet comprehensive) field orders and fantastic base building (walls, turrets and fortresses!).

Homeworld and its sequel are both fantastic games with epic scale battles. I highly recommend this game.

I?m also quite partial to both the Spell Force series and Dungeons & Dragons: Dragonshard for their fantasy settings and simple, yet elegant combat system.

 

[protogenxl]

Total Annihilation: Commander Pack
You can get it on Good Old Games

 

[Vkmies]

Like so many before me, I cast my vote for Sins of the Solar Empire and Company Of Heroes, but there is another one you might not know about.

The good old Populous-series. Since you are itching for RTS-action,

Populous: The Beginning.

A great RTS with really original and innovative ideas. My favorite thing to do was to put my shaman in a hot air balloon, fly it above the city of the enemy and summon a giant volcano in the middle of his favorite restaurant. If that's not enough to convince you, consider yourself a heartless bastard! ^_^

 

[recurve6]

Rome: Total War is the best out of the Total War series, in my opinion, and is my all-time favorite RTS. You should definitely try it out.

 

[Taddy]

Galactic Civilization 2, really fun game. Basically the game lets you pick one of so many races (Or a custom one), gives you a planet. Then it says, "See that rather large galaxy? Conquer that shit." It can last for a very long time. Also, watch out for those Dread Lords.

 

[Wieke]

The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings:_The_Battle_for_Middle-earth] is quite entertaining and not too complex. The game did some interesting things regarding base building (limited and streamlined but with interesting results). Avoid Battle for Middle Earth 2, all the interesting innovation from the first was left out and replaced with standard fps stuff.

Oh and I second the posters advocating Dawn of War, SoSE and Starcraft 1&2 (though for the last two I'm not so sure on the noob friendliness).

Really ner vod? I always thought BFME2 was more fun, the expansion in general.

Yeah it is a personal preference largely based on the BFME's base building system and campaign mode. I liked the high-level overmap strategy part and the fact that you kept the units in your army. And the base building system, while simplified, did force you to think about what you really needed to build, because of the limited slots available. It also allowed for a harvest-less resource system and made some of your bases look like cool castles. I bareley played it but IIRC BFME2 dropped some of these things.

One of the few examples of streamlining/simplification to yield good results imho.

 

[Sonicron]

I second the recommendations for the Dawn of War series. Warhammer 40k is not everybody's cup of tea, of course, but the games are excellent in and of themselves anyway.

If you're looking for classic RTS with base-building, upgrade research, amassing armies etc, you're best off with "Dawn of War" and the expansions "Winter Assault" and "Dark Crusade"; disregard "Soulstorm", it's a disgrace.
If you're willing to try something of the RTT (Real Time Tactics) variety, "Dawn of War 2" is your game, along with the expansions "Chaos Rising" and "Retribution". (It's worth noting that "Retribution" concludes the story arc begun in the very first "Dawn of War".)

Why does everyone hate soulstorm?
if I may ask
I really like playing the dark eldar in it, but never really got too deep into the balance in it, is that the problem?

The balance was shot to hell, but that's way down on the list of things I want to see it burn for.
- Writing and voice-over work among the worst I've ever seen in video games. Read up on 'metal bawkses' if you want to know more.
- Faction perks were all crap.
- Sisters of Battle were not only completely overpowered, but also mostly a collection of reskins of previously established units. Even building animations were recycled.
- Conquering those webway gates sucked.
- Having to conquer the gates on TWO sides sucked even worse.
- Worst of all: Defense missions were a load of bollocks, because after you'd conquer a province, your entire base would just vanish and you had to start from scratch, while the enemy immediately starts pounding you into the dust. Bull. Shit.
- And lest we forget: BUGS GALORE!
To summarize, I hate Soulstorm with a passion because it's an irredeemable piece of shit, developed by a bunch of lazy, bungling hacks.

 

[Enverex]

Act of War was admittedly the best RTS I've ever played (better than all the C&Cs, etc) in my opinion as it had more communication from the units, a little more realism added, but annoyingly it doesn't work in Vista or Windows 7 (or Wine). If you're on XP, definitely try it.

 

[JaceArveduin]

Yeah it is a personal preference largely based on the BFME's base building system and campaign mode. I liked the high-level overmap strategy part and the fact that you kept the units in your army. And the base building system, while simplified, did force you to think about what you really needed to build, because of the limited slots available. It also allowed for a harvest-less resource system and made some of your bases look like cool castles. I bareley played it but IIRC BFME2 dropped some of these things.

One of the few examples of streamlining/simplification to yield good results imho.

Yeah, it was nice n neat, but I preferred way the bfme2 games played, and you could have some epic battles. you could also build walls with some of the factions, and that made bases look nice, even if they were practically useless

 

[Nymi]

Starcraft 2 is definitely very fun.

Dawn of War, both 1 and 2. Personally I preferred DoW1, but both sets of games and expansions are good.

 

[WOPR]

The balance was shot to hell, but that's way down on the list of things I want to see it burn for.
- Writing and voice-over work among the worst I've ever seen in video games. Read up on 'metal bawkses' if you want to know more.
- Faction perks were all crap.
- Sisters of Battle were not only completely overpowered, but also mostly a collection of reskins of previously established units. Even building animations were recycled.
- Conquering those webway gates sucked.
- Having to conquer the gates on TWO sides sucked even worse.
- Worst of all: Defense missions were a load of bollocks, because after you'd conquer a province, your entire base would just vanish and you had to start from scratch, while the enemy immediately starts pounding you into the dust. Bull. Shit.
- And lest we forget: BUGS GALORE!
To summarize, I hate Soulstorm with a passion because it's an irredeemable piece of shit, developed by a bunch of lazy, bungling hacks.

Ahh... I want to note that I haven't found any bugs... but yeah the voice acting is horrid... I don't play the campaign for it (because I didn't much care for the risk-like campaign style, I better liked the DoW and DoW:WA campaigns)

and I could never manage to play SS online, ONLY gotten to play DoWC online, rather enjoyed it too, although considering I mostly played soulstorm, I could feel the balance differences right off the bat

but again, I mostly play DoW2 now, I enjoy not having that stupid "build base, mass units, attack-move" thing that starcraft had a major problem with

 

[WOPR]

Galactic Civilization 2, really fun game. Basically the game lets you pick one of so many races (Or a custom one), gives you a planet. Then it says, "See that rather large galaxy? Conquer that shit." It can last for a very long time. Also, watch out for those Dread Lords.

GalCiv2 isn't an RTS
it's a simulation/world building/God game that's turn-based
(just saying)

EDIT:

I see a lot of posts repeating one another, so I'll try to be original.

Everyone who hasn't yet should try Total Annihilation, old, but a classic.

Also fun is Warzone 2100. Best thing is: It's free. And I don't mean indie game or semi-demo kind of free. It used to be a paid game in the stores, but the developer released all codes several years later, and now it's a community-run game.
http://wz2100.net

Research also plays a part in this game, giving the strategy more debth and long-term planning.

Holy crap, I remember having Warzone 2100 on my PS1... in fact I still do... it's sitting right here right now!

 

[skim172]

My favorite RTS's of all time are the Homeworld and Ground Control series. However, that I generally dislike RTS's, so be warned that Homeworld and Ground Control are pretty different from your standard RTS fare.

Ground Control is a full 3D environment where you control a small number of units in combat. And there's no real "building" or "resourcing" of any kind. You lose a group, it's gone for the rest of the mission. Every unit is balanced and has a role, and you constantly need to worry about terrain and line of fire and fog of war, since the very next time you roll your tanks heedlessly through a forest, they just might get jumped by a massive ambush of anti-tank infantry.

Homeworld is more standard fare - you gather resources and build ships and research tech. Of course, it takes place in space, in full 3D, where an attack can come from literally any angle. Nothing more glorious than twenty bombers in claw formation diving straight down out of the heavens onto an enemy mothership. Takes a little getting used to, moving units in full three dimensions, but it's awesome.

 

[Brawndo]

I have hundreds of hours with Company of Heroes, it's a great game. The only issue is that the online community has waned in recent years.

 

[cthulhumythos]

warcraft 3 is a good one. i'd recommend that.

 

[Spitfire]

If you're into AoE type of base-building, ignore the Dawn of War suggestions. Also, while I haven't played a lot of Starcraft, I wouldn't exactly call it a noob-friendly game.
Personally, I'd recommend the Command & Conquer series, particularly Tiberian Sun (which is free, by the way) and Red Alert 2. They're campy, ridiculously fun, and on-top of that, they have great soundtracks as well.
Age of Mythology is another really fun game, if you haven't played it. It's basically Age of Empires, with better graphics, and you play as a freaking god.

 

[Taddy]

Galactic Civilization 2, really fun game. Basically the game lets you pick one of so many races (Or a custom one), gives you a planet. Then it says, "See that rather large galaxy? Conquer that shit." It can last for a very long time. Also, watch out for those Dread Lords.

GalCiv2 isn't an RTS
it's a simulation/world building/God game that's turn-based
(just saying)

Good point, completely forgot about that. Thanks for clearing that up.

 

[Axyun]

StarCraft 2
The definition of standard RTS, executed to near-perfection.

Shogun 2: Total War
Best in the Total War series and friendliest for those new to Total War.

Sins of a Solar Empire
Complex RTS bordering on TBS. Games on larger maps can take days to weeks.