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Real-time strategy

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Age of Empires (1997), Invasion of an enemy

Real-time strategy (RTS) is a genre of computer games characterised by being a real-time wargame ("strategic") in which one exerts direct control over individual units, and resource gathering, base building and technology development are integral gameplay aspects. A common mistake is the belief that any strategic games played out in real time is a "real-time strategy" game, which is not the case since RTS is a particular and specific genre.

RTS titles are strategy wargames which does not have "turns" like conventional turn-based strategy video or board games. Rather, game time progresses in "real time": that is, it is continuous rather than turn-by-turn. While the word "strategy" originally referred to higher-level warplanning (armies, campaigns and entire wars) in RTS games individual units or persons are given orders; also integral to the gameplay of RTS games is production-economic aspects (resource gathering, manufacture and positioning of buildings, production of units, etc), and though combat confrontation is a significant part of RTS gameplay this is most often heavily stylised and relatively little emphasis is placed on realism or the detailed aspects of military tactics (compare with real-time tactics).

History

1983 – 1992: the beginning

The genre of games that is today recognised as "RTS" is the result of an extended period of evolution and refinement. Pinning down the "first RTS" is problematic because we tend to judge titles by their similarity to recent games, and trying to pin down the "first" RTS game before the genre was established and recognised as such is attempting to shoehorn something into a later classification when the games that can be considered ancestors to the RTS genre were never marketed under that label nor designed to meet the modern criteria (in short are not "proper" RTS games as recognised today). The genre initially evolved separately in the UK and North America, then gradually created a unified worldwide tradition. As a result of all these tidal forces different interpretations of history can spark heated debate.

In the UK, we can trace the RTS genre's beginning to Stonkers by John Gibson, published in 1983 by Imagine Software for the ZX Spectrum, and Nether Earth published on ZX Spectrum in 1987. In North America, the first game retrospectively classified as RTS by most sources (e.g. [[1]], [[2]]) is The Ancient Art of War (1984), designed by Evryware's Dave Murry and Barry Murry (published by Brøderbund), followed by the sequel The Ancient Art of War at Sea in 1987. Some writers (e.g. [[3]], [[4]]) list Intellivision Utopia by Don Daglow (1982) as the first RTS (altough it was turn based), but what we currently think of as RTS play is a secondary component of the game and it is more properly classified as the first sim game or god game. None of these games would today be recognised as proper RTS titles since they are lacking crucial RTS gameplay components --especially base building and "true" resource gathering-- but they do feature territorial expansion and base conquering for increased troop inflow.

Herzog Zwei for the Sega Genesis in 1989 and Battle Master for the Amiga and Atari ST [5] in 1990 are perhaps the earliest examples of relatively full-featured RTS games. RTS became recognized as a genre with the release of Dune II from Westwood Studios in 1992, a release that can be argued to have initiated "the golden age of RTS games." Its success encouraged the development of such games as Stronghold (1993), Warcraft (1994), Command & Conquer (1995), Total Annihilation (1997), Age of Empires (1997), and StarCraft (1998); a core group or RTS games today more or less recognised as "standard" (see next section).

File:Dune 2 cropped screenshot attack on base.jpg
Dune II (1992) - the game that defined the RTS genre

Though RTS games as showed above have an extensive history, some titles more than others have served to define the popular perception of the RTS genre and expectations of RTS titles, and the games released between 1992 and 1998 by (the now-defunct) Westwood Studios and Blizzard Entertainment have in particular contributed to this. Westwood's Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty (1992) introduced in one sweep all the core concepts of modern RTS games [6] and was thus the first game with what can be considered the today recognised feature set for "full" RTS games that reached popular acclaim and awareness, and as such acted as the first significant prototype for the coming "modern" RTS genre. As a by-note, the designers of Dune 2 traced its spiritual lineage back to the real-time simulation SimCity (1989) and their previous game Battletech: The Crescent Hawk's Revenge (1988), a real-time wargame without base-building elements. Westwood Studios has recently been resurrected as Petroglyph, which recently designed and successfully released Star Wars: Empire at War.

While Westwood laid the foundation and provided the prototype for RTS games with Dune II, Blizzard Entertainment, between 1994 and 1998, can be argued to be singularly responsible for establishing the form and content of the genre as understood today. Their famous Warcraft titles, Warcraft: Orcs & Humans (1994) and its sequel Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness (1995), refined the concepts introduced in Dune II and arguably ushered in the era of contemporary RTS by its treatment of the burgeoning genre elements and groundbreaking popularity. With Command & Conquer (1995) and C&C: Red Alert (1996), while Westwood provided the original blueprint and prototype, Blizzard cemented the form of what was by now recognised as "proper" RTS games, and finally with StarCraft (1998) provided the de facto standard measure against which all new RTS games are still measured.

1998 - present: transition to 3d

It is interesting to note that the genre has remained content- and feature-wise principally stable since 1995: the additions to the concept in newer games tend to be quantitative (more units, larger maps, 3D terrain etc) rather than qualitative (innovations to the game concept), and new games generally focuses on refining aspects of successful predecessors. In 1997, Microsoft tried to combine elements of Civilization with the RTS concept in Age of Empires by introducing ages of technologies, a combination refined further by Stainless Steel Studios' Empire Earth in 2001. GSC Gameworld's Cossacks: European Wars series' search for novelty took the genre in a different direction, bringing population caps into the tens of thousands. Cavedog Entertainment's acclaimed Total Annihilation from 1997 distils the selling positions of Command & Conquer into sleeker gameplay and more intense action, and introduced the first 3D units in RTS games. Fully 3D-graphical RTS games were attempted several times but due to persistent issues with camera control and too-short viewing distances, until recently never did become the norm. Homeworld was perhaps the first successful fully 3d game. RTS was one of the genres most resistant to being taken over by 3D, with Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos, in 2003, being one of the first successful 3D RTS titles.

Also, relatively few genres have emerged from or in competition with RTS. Real-time tactical games, a superficially similar genre (also see below), emerged around 1995 but probably arising more from hardware affordances than as a reaction to RTS. In 1998 Activision tried to combine the RTS and first-person shooter genres in Battlezone, which was critically acclaimed but beyond a sequel and the Hostile Waters (Rage Games Limited, 2002) games, spawned few followers.

Gameplay

Because of the generally faster-paced nature (and in some cases a smaller learning curve), RTS games have surpassed the popularity of conventional turn-based strategy computer games. In the past some traditional strategy gamers regarded RTS games as "cheap imitations" of turn-based games, arguing that RTS games had a tendency to devolve into "clickfests", in which the player who was faster with the mouse generally won, because they could give orders to their units at a faster rate. Real-time strategy enthusiasts counter that micromanagement involves not just fast clicking but also the ability to make sound tactical decisions under time pressure. It is noteworthy, however, that due to the games being shorter because of the faster pace of the game and absence of turn switching pauses, RTS games are far more suitable for Internet play than turn-based games; this is undoubtedly an important reason for their popularity. Furthermore, turn-based games are often more taxing on the attention of casual gamers, as each game generally takes much longer to play. Correspondingly, though late in emerging, massively multiplayer online real-time strategy (MMORTS) games combine aspects of massively multiplayer with real-time strategy. However, MMORTS's have not become popular and many people claim that it is virtually impossible to create an MMORTS without giving up traditional RTS gameplay.

Total Annihilation (1997), Core base.

The more recent generations of RTS games usually have features which reduce the importance of fast mousework, enabling the player to focus more on overall strategy. For example, queuing allows the player to put in an order for multiple units at a single building instead of requiring the player to return to that building to order the next unit built whenever a unit ordered earlier is completed. The ability to set waypoints allows the player to give multiple movement commands to a unit at once. Most games also give each unit strengths and weaknesses, discouraging players from easily defeating an opponent with simple "rush" tactics or "swarm" tactics in favour of more balanced armies.

As a principle all RTS games follow the same pattern:

  1. Build up your base and forces (your economy).
  2. Acquire more resources.
  3. Attack the enemy, attempting to deprive him of resources and destroy his infrastructure.

However, some games do not allow the player to create new units, or build bases. Some of these games include Myth and Ground Control. These games are purely tactical, forcing the player to play only with the units he or she is given. Due to their fundamentally different gameplay these are defined as "real-time tactical" (RTT) games". Note real time tactical games are NOT real time strategy games, though these are often confused and RTT titles are frequently called RTS games.

File:Warcraft 3 Humans fight Orcs cropped screenshot.jpg
Warcraft III (2002), Humans fighting orcs

Most RTS games also feature single-player campaigns -- a series of missions where a human player plays against the computer with a defined scenario and objectives, usually within the context of a background story. Often each mission has a different style of play, sometimes dramatically so. It has become something like to a tradition for single-player campaigns to include at least one mission with no base construction or resource-gathering; typically at the start of these missions the player is given a number of combat units, occasionally with a "hero" unit. These units must be used to complete the mission in a level which is usually mazelike; often additional units can be gained as reinforcements or rescued as the mission progresses. These missions eliminate the resource-gathering, or "macromanagement", as it's called, and focus solely on micromanagement. Also, different titles place different emphasis on the macro- and micro aspects and, thus, RTS gameplay orientation seems to be diverging into at least two main camps: micro-management and macro-management games.

Micro-management games

Micro-management games allow an army and base to be built, but they limit the size of the army (sometimes, rather severely). The purpose of this is to create more of a tactical atmosphere, and to prevent one side from simply cranking out units and throwing them at the enemy until he collapses.

By limiting the size of the army, the game requires the player to intelligently utilize his "partially" limited troops. This is more similar to the purely tactical Myth-style games. Good examples of this type of game are Warcraft III, where further units require more upkeep, and Battle Realms, allows only a maximum of 40 units. To simplify the control, however, the player can combine individual units into groups. This is even more found in the game ArenaWars, where every player only has 1000 credits to build units. If the unit dies the credits are refunded.

Macro-management games

File:HW2 Screenshot 13.jpg
Homeworld 2 (2003), Hiigaran Carrier

On the other end are the macro-management games. These games have more of a focus on economic production and large-scale strategic maneuvering, and include games such as , Age of Empires II, Empire Earth, Total Annihilation, Supreme Commander, and Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen. A prime example is Cossacks: European Wars, where there is no population limit on units and there is no limit on how many units may be controlled at once.

Graphics

Command & Conquer: Red Alert (1996)

As the category grew, some real-time wargames attempted to break away from the 2D board-like view of Dune II and the original Warcraft to richer 3D environments, most notable among these Stronghold (1993). Myth (1997) pioneered the use of 3D in real-time wargames but was not a true RTS but a real-time tactics game, albeit influential on the development of the RTS genre. Total Annihilation (1997) was the first true RTS to utilize "real" 3D units made of polygons and a complete 3D environment. Homeworld and Warzone 2100 (both from 1999), however, were full-3D RTS titles. These games are played on a 3D battlefield. In the case of Homeworld, the game is set in space, offering a true 3D environment in which players are required to think three-dimensionally, as all units can move vertically as well as on a flat plane as was standard for RTS games of the time. Stronghold, and many future games including subsequent Command and Conquer titles, began to use isometric 3D graphics, and in later years these games began to use true 3D graphics, making it possible to rotate the view of the battlefield smoothly, instead of in 90 degree intervals as per Stronghold. These effects became even more visually detailed in later games, such as Warcraft III, Empire Earth, and Command & Conquer: Generals. A notable recent RTS game for breaking away from the trend is Phenomic's Spellforce - The Order Of Dawn, which incorporates the choice of a third person view of the main hero for you to control.

File:CCGenerals.jpg
Command & Conquer: Generals (2003)

As companies are striving to come close to cinematic level of visual quality, the improvements in graphics accelerate. In 2004 two landmark games were released: The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth from Electronic Arts and the real-time tactics/turn based strategy game Rome: Total War from Creative Assembly heralds the current state of real-time wargame graphics.

Another two notable games were released in 2005: Act of War: Direct Action and Age of Empires III. Both games featured realistic physics (Age of Empires III uses the Havok physics engine), realistically destructible buildings and ever more stunning graphics. In addition Act of War boasts a well developed techno-thriller story by Dale Brown told via machinima and live action cinematics.

Future games

Future games are likely to further enhance the realism of RTS games in various ways:

Some future releases:

See also

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