Hi guys,

I think RTS games of the future are going to be heading in a few different directions.

1. Within the next few years a MMORTS will come out that will take the world by storm. I know there are quite a few already out, but most of these are web based games and can''t really be classed as FULL games. The reason a MMORTS hasn''t been done so far is because it is just so hard to work. There are plenty of threads on these forums alone with people trying to work out how a MMORTS should play out.

After this game comes out we will have a lot of companies saying "wow, why didn''t we think of doing it THAT way" and as usual we will see quite a number of clones coming out to saturate the market once more. (perhaps combining the RTS saturation of a few years ago with the MMORPG saturation of today).

2. I can already see some games heading in this direction - where the player takes more of a commanding officer role. Instead of commanding individual units (micromanagement) the player will be more involved in the overrall strategies of his team. I was lucky enough to play Rise of Nations yesterday at my local computer shop, it was like this. As time went on the game built up my base and units allowing me to concentrate on the stratgies of attacking the enemy. This way you CAN micromanage certain aspects (like building 15 cruise missiles to begin my attack against the evil "green" army).

3. Another direction I see games heading is along the lines of "Platoon". Whilst this game was very average it showed a good RTT, where you control a small grouping of men. This has been done quite a bit in the past but I think there is still a lot of room.

4. And finally I see the combining of 2 and 3 (perhaps into 1). Where we have players commanding there individual platoon''s moving around a map, getting orders from a commanding officer player who is seeing a more abstract map of the whole battlefield. With broadband connections to the internet becoming standard (even here in Australia) I think these games are becoming more viable.

Dauntless - About your fears of war and your game being related, I can understand where you are coming from, but I have been reading your posts for just under a year now and I know that you have always been out to show the "other side" of war. It would be a grave injustice to the world if you were to stop working on your game.

Doolwind

I have played quite a few RTS games that are out there, and it seems that almoast all of them are about building a large army in a short time, whiel maybe including such stradegies as building a defense and attacking a base from the side rather than the front gate... I believe that a game that is perhapse not as realistic, but introduce more chances for the incorperation of stradegy will be the best game. That is why I am trying to put this kind of thing in my RTS... I will include daytime/nighttime (dis)advantages, Terrain (dis)advantages (up high attacking down), weather conditions, Scouts, Supply Lines, common routes, custom built units, etc. By introducing all of these stradegies, you will most likely increase the time to finsih a game which may be good or bad for one person''s point of view... A lot of times, RTS games are played over the internet or across a network and if a game can not be finished in 3-4 hours, will people want to save online games and try to arange a time to finish? probobly not... I am currently trying to figure out how to overcome this time issue...

Dwiel

[edited by - Anonymous Poster on Febtober 93, -4793 BC 56:69:80 MP]

quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster
STARCRAFT is just briliant for multiplayer, not surpased yet IMHO.

I agree. It even has it''s own language:

"3v3 ZeroClut NR20!"

"t"

"b"

"ac on"

"backstabber"

"mass "

"gg" - probably not the first time used, but the first time i saw it was playing sc

"ally?"

"noob" - again, first game i heard this expression

...and other fun phrases.

Amazingly, I''ve had the game for over 3 years and still play it religiously on Battle.net.

It also still remains on the shelves after 5 1/2 years since it was first released!

Awesome, awesome, awesome game. Broodwar makes it all that much better to.

-Q

This is awfully close to spam, but it is relevant and you might be interested: Emoticon

Stuff I did differently:
- All combat is meelee
- No units ever die (they are out of the game for a short period of time, then they respawn)
- When two units attack each other, *both* of them lose
- You never have many units to control (4-8)
- Not even a hint of realism
- No resources or resource gathering
- No base building (there is a flag which you must protect)



I originally had it as a more conventional rts, but when I played it, it wasn''t very fun at all, so I changed everything.

Trying is the first step towards failure.