What 3 RTS games would be on your list? I could have easily said something like Dune II, Warcraft II and Age of Empires! There were a lot of rubbish copies, but the mid-late 90s did give us some RTS classics...
@@ANN1H1LATE89 I loved the vibe of Tiberian Sun. It was definitely my favorite from that era :) Glad you enjoyed the video and thanks for the sub + your feedback, I appreciate it.
I played it the most over ra once it came out. Played it over ra 2 and 3, especially with core contingency and ta kingdoms Check out open ra and the other open source versions
If you're still interested in that style of RTS, B.A.R. (Beyond All Reason) is the latest iteration of the robot commander, energy, metal extractor style of games. and it's free :]
@blooddumpster3427 ahh yeah BAR is the other one, only tried open ra. Haven't been gaming as much these days Were all old here lol, time or interest wane
Who remembers playing red alert and changing the rules.ini files to mess about with the hit points? That being said, hell march - that tune back in 1996, as a 9 year old, got me into metal!
@@yuboka49 ahaha - yeah! I did have a super fucked up, totally unbalanced unit skew at one point. I don't think the game liked it... And then with the later titles, you got lazy and ended up downloading trainers with malware in them.
StarCraft, for being retooled from a failed Games Workshop partnership (was supposed to be a 40K RTS), was a phenomenal series with excellent storytelling and music. Great skirmish-level RTS, but doesn’t take the crown for me. Total Annihilation/Supreme Commander will always be king of the RTS landscape for me. Chris Taylor’s legacy is still updated and balanced regularly via Forged Alliance Forever, including it’s own campaign series. C&C, StarCraft, and TA/SupCom and definitely the legends of the genre.
Total Annihilation is neat because of how the two campaigns tie into both the mechanical reality of RTS games in general, and the narrative of this game itself. The end of one campaign leads into the begining of the other. Forever. It replicates the core (hurr) theme of the game.
Very nice retrospective, friend. Total annihilation is one game that was lost to memory, until I saw this video! Now I want an old windows pc so I can jump back in.
Myth II: Soulblighter from Bungie is a classic for me... the art style, missions with persistent units and very hard. Rise of Nations is also frequently forgotten
Who remembers playing classic rts games like Dark Reign, Star Trek Armada 1&2, Star Wars BattleGrounds, Age Of Empires, Rise of Nations/Legends and lotr the Battle for the middle-earth. There's more rts games I've played.
I played Armada i remember joining a clan and playing some promotion match to rise in rank. In one match totally annihilated the clan founders and rising to the rank of Lt. Commander very quickly. Great times was only 14 then.
Great video! My first experience with RTS was on an interstate school trip in the 90s. Our host family had a couple of laptops with a direct connection with Warcraft 2 and C&C - have been hooked ever since.
Hey - I appreciate it and glad you enjoyed. I used to launch nukes at my dad in TA and then run down the stairs (the network cable went out the window) to see them land on his screen lol
I loved playing Cossacks: European Wars. They also have a very good cinematic intro. And Red Alert 2 is my introduction to the RST game, so it was special to me and I still play it from time to time now.
Saved the best for last. TA was great. I remember playing the PC Gamer demo disc version over and over until finally buying a copy. Its amazing that the modding scene for TA is still alive after all these years.
Banger video mate, never played TA when it was current and watching this is feel a tinge of regret missing out. For me it was SC, WC, RA and ofcourse AoE!
I remember being in middle school late nineties, the only gaming I knew was the Gameboy and later the N64. My older brother brought me to a computer gaming shop, whatever they were called, and introduced me to Starcraft. First game playing Terran against AI Zerg, got a zergling rush within a few minutes. Terrifying experience. I didn't understand what was going on. Eventually got Starcraft and Brood War at home and that was basically my teenage years. What a time to be alive.
I clearly remember a friend of me calling me on the phone back in 1992, saying he has the best game ever, where you control multiple units at a time. I thought in the lines of Cannon Fodder or Syndicate. But no. He was talking about Dune 2.
Dune, Warcraft 1,2,3/ starcraft1,2 , C&C TS Generals / Red Alert1,2 , Cossacks, Supreme Commander, Homeworld pop to mind, i forget some others, but there you have a nice list of good "old" RTS Games ^^
StarCraft 1 & 2 fan here. I still play StarCraft 2's Coop mode from time to time. It's just fun going through the motions as what somebody described as a "glorified comp stomp". The cast of commanders feels about as diverse as a _Super Smash Bros. Ultimate_ roster, along with the various missions.
I never played the original Red Alert, I played Red Alert 3 which was great solo experience although at first I was very shock by how close the camera is from the map. Tiberium 3 was also a pretty good RTS for the solo campaign. When Red Alert was out I was probably playing Warcaft 2 then I transitionned to Starcraft I think. I freaking loved Warcraft 2 but it mechanics are just a pain to play nowadays I'd never have the willingness to do a whole campaign.
I remember playing Total Annihilation when it was released and was blown away. Even today it still looks better than other RTS games. And of course StarCraft Brood War is still the GOAT, so much that even SC2 cannot match it.
The best thing about the original C&C was that a lot of its units were still grounded in reality. It quickly jumped the shark in later installments with impractical mechs and whatnot
I just realized i was an rts nutter as a kid. I played dune red alert and starcraft the originals and sequels. My only question is how did i find so much time
Between autumn 98 and spring 2000 I went through Starcraft and Broodwar, Tiberian Sun, Age of Empires 2, and Settlers 3, among other non-RTS games. It was a real gaming golden age for me. StarCraft in particular is still my favourite game. Shout out to Settlers though. Not a hairy-chested RTS, but seeing the complex supply chains at work were satisfying - you could sit and watch the fisherman and know if the caught a fish it would feed the miner who'd dig the iron to make the steel to make the sword to arm the knight to attack the enemy castle.
It is hard to tell whether Westwood's history would have been much different it they had been bought by another big publisher. Tiberian Sun was the climax but also the end of the Command & Conquer boom. Around 2000 game development was changing in general: Games were more and more no longer developed by small developer teams but by a large staff. The production values were increasing as were the expectations of the potential buyers. Let's see Max Payne for example: - In Max Payne 1 most persons in the visual novels are portraited by developers and their friends. Max Payne himself is portraited by the story writer Sam Lake. - In Max Payne 2 most persons in the visual novels are portraited by actors. That looks more professional - but was of course more expensive to produce. :)
one of the coolest things about Warcraft/Starcraft was that it came with a map editor that you could make your own campaigns with. With Red Alert you'd have to use a 3rd party app to make your own campaigns
1. Command & Conquer The first RTS i played and it was awsome. Remember i made maps of basse i Wanted to build in that game when i was a kid. 2. Rise of Nations There was some kind of game mechanic regarding borders or something like that, anyway, played this titel alot! 3. Empire Earth This was my goto RTS for a long time and i loved it! I usually stopped at modern era, since im not much of a sci-fi guy :p have played alot of RTS but theese Where the ones that did something new and not just same Old but with new models.
Loved the video. I love rts so much. Please play B.A.R.! It’s the best and it’s free. One critical difference in TA is the reclaim/resurrection function that can turn battles around.
The best was Command and conquer generals and zero hour. In my opinion was the best of the series. I played this game for over a decade and never got bored of it, that shows how good and addictive those games were. I only stopped playing when Company of heroes came out and then that was my go to RTS game.
as much as i love metal marines i can't exactly call it a RTS ... primary reason is that attacks being sequenced and you can't attack while your opponent sends troops to you as the attack has to be finished first ... it feels like a weird realtime building + "turnbased" strike/combat hybrid
They are great indeed, but campaigns are written in a way that suggests different teams were doing them. So there is a Master writing of Ep1 and Ep2 and very dumb of Ep3 and Ep5. Then same happened with SC2, where WoL had was mostly well written, but HoTS was utter garbage and LotV being good only compared to HotS - but still illogical. Still balance was great. Not perfect (like ignoring balansing of Scouts), but very good. For me only backside is that SC and WC are part RTS and part arcade/agility games. That's why in my opinion Dawn of War is better RTS, as you command squads, not single units, and even them have some command "lag".
1. Red alert ruined my childhood... RIP MPlayer... 2. People still play Red Alert, even the old version (not the re-release) and are very competitive. 3. Thank you for making this video and featuring RA first... the "Q" mechanic changed my life sigh...
and funny enough the rumor is that the Q mechanic was implemented by accident... tanks Queuing up a command WHILE MOVING meant they would dodge 70% of incoming tank fire.... now you have a STRATEGY GAME. The ladder of RA 1 ruined my child hood I became instantly addicted.
@Ianbus123 their are indie devs making new RTS games too you know for example, alien marauder,tempest rising, interstellarus, santuruary shattered sun, industrial annihilation, stormgate and dust from.
it definitively is when a game's average matchplaytime is high ... by the time you finished a Total Annihilation or Age of Empires match you may have finished 3 Red Alert matches and now look at more action focused RTS like Battle Aces, basebuilding limited down to its essentials, limited but fully selfcustomised unitpool and 10 min playtime, within one hour you may finish 4 or 5 matches
@@Ianbus123 i really REALLY enjoyed the first beta despite having been skeptical about it ... i mean i usually play RTS such as Open Red Alert or Planetary Annihilation .. and then go to something this condensed .. i got addicted in a minute ... and it seriously brings that "just one more match" ... or "hmm let me try this "deck" of units"
@@MrTBSC I like the deck building idea of it with your unit loadout and the predictable match length. The amount of times I said "1 more game" of SC2 at night then got a TvT half mapper vs GoOdy...
Dune 2, Warcraft, Red Alert ... all amazing games and genre pushing / defining of that 90's era. But Total Annihilation stood alone. YEARS ahead of its time and the feel and scale of the game is still right there at the top. I'm an FPS gamer myself, have been since Quake 1 stole my life. But I do enjoy RTS games and my top 3 are still the same after all these years : 1. Total Annihilation 2. Warcraft III 3. Starcraft II Age of Mythology is a close 4th but I think the sheer polish of Starcraft II, and the amount of content you get for your money (3 huge variable campaigns, tons of multiplayer and custom games, etc) gives it 3rd spot. Even though I prefer Warcraft III, I can't deny that SC2 is Blizzards magnum opus in the RTS genre.
@@Ianbus123 Ah yeah the dreaded 56k modem era! I persuaded my Dad to subscribe to BT's "Wireplay" (at an INSANE cost) which halved my ping from around 110ms down to 60ms. That allowed me to be competitive, but restricted my playing time (cos phonebills). Managed to get ADSL in January of 2000 though - in time for Quake III. I skipped Quake II (in multiplayer at least). Nobody would play me at Quake or Quake III at our local LANS. For obvious reasons... XD
All good but Warcraft 3 deserves more attention. It developed the genre massively by introducing properly unique hero units with their own skills. It also led to the creation of World of Warcraft and effectively the entire MOBA genre of games through the DotA mod.
Yeah perhaps I should have gone with an honorable mentions section although it was already running pretty long! Ended up going for the flurry of ~1996 activity for my 3 picks
Man I love your video there is so much to think about. Yes Starcraft 2 left a bit of a sour taste but I do not count it as a failure, first of all because Wings of Liberty has the greatest solo campaign of all time and I am dying to see an RTS doing somehting similar or better. SC2 has its fair share of epic moments really, the first 5-9 months were great then it got kind of stuck into some boring balacing issues then it picked up again for HotS but really what made me quit instantly was how they changed all the mechanics for HoTS, I was disgusted. I worked so hard to learn my build and all I felt like pianist underwater at 220 heartbeat/s sweeting like from places I could never imagine I could sweat from, that was awesome. That said it's not a failure, I have too many memories the scene was too good between Day9, InControl and all the people I can't name them all even in my country. I hit diamond in HoS then left but everybody knows, everybody wants to be grandmaster ;)
SC2 definitely had its moments and I wish I could go back to that 2010 feeling of optimism and excitement, but in terms of replacing SC:BW it didn't manage to succeed, and it damaged the scene a lot as they were basically competing against eachother. Still the most high production quality single player RTS I think? Even so, paying $40 for each expansion (total 120) was also a bit steep imo. That greed + the poor support and understanding of the pro scene were early hints that Blizzard was on its way down I think in hindsight. Glad you enjoyed the video and thanks for your comment
very good video. I think the multiplayer aspect is overcooked though, in practice that scene was such a small part of total players that it sure enough did not dictate much at all and it should not have. With the huge exception of south Korea and sc1 of course, but even then, most players by far in sc1 and sc2 were single players. After arcade came to the game exploded. A true masterpiece
I suppose when you're guaging things based on online discussions multiplayer gets over emphasised. Lots of people enjoying games offline (until DRM happened anyway). Thanks for watching and glad you enjoyed it!
@@Ianbus123 True indeed. Interesting phenomena that multiplayer scene. Ive never been in to it but def. a single player vet for all 3 legend games you mentioned. Formed both my Child- and adult-hood. The MP scene creates viewers and competence hype, on the other side no company have ever tried balancing 2 scenes on that scale. I wonder what would happen if the mothership would keep its size meant for single players back in the day
@@Ianbus123 Ah I bet, think Ive heard of it. Sounds fun indeed. Man. Had so much hopes for stormgate. Homeworld 3 also, kinda. Even though ive never been to much into that macro scale. Stormgate dosent quite hit the art design for me. Big shoes to fill. Tempest rising could be amazing though. And BAR is awesome
This is the first time I've ever seen someone champion red alert 1 over red alert 2, and it makes me happy. Red alert 2 was entirely too childish, and while it was a lot of fun, it lost the pathos of the original red alert, which was what drew me in the first place. Gone were the adult themes, replaced with saturday morning cartoon violence. I was a child when i played red alert 1, and in my teens when i played red alert 2 and even then i could tell it just wasn't as compelling.
You aren't the only one. I will give RA2 its due, it was fun and continued the story. Just was never as good as Red Alert. It had very big shoes to fill and it just couldn't. Tesla's were weaker across the board and I LOVED going hard with Tesla tech. Coils, tanks, troopers. The works. Literally your first Soviet mission is wiping out Torun. Allies: Save this character! Soviets: Lets commit a war crime!
I don't know, RA2 felt like a huge upgrade over RA1 in so many ways, from better pathing, better visuals, more QoL features, somewhat better balance (still a mess, but atleast better than RA1's pure light/medium tanks vs heavy tanks spam) and more. RA1 was more "serious", but still had goofy stuff in it. I will give one thing to RA1 though. The missions were actually challenging, which is a good thing. RA2's campaigns were too easy.
@@SoulKiller7Eternalto be fair, RA1 teslas were op and were rightfully nerfed. RA1 Allies also didn't had any ground unit which could outrage them (artillery were crap), so it sucked having to penetrate a soviet turtle player.
Red Alert is the best video game ever made. Simple but addicting gameplay, memorable cut scenes and awesome soundtrack. I think Hell March is the most popular video game track of all times. On top of that, it teaches you European geography. Starcraft was not bad, but it was too complicated and too sci-fi for my taste.
I really like your video! But while talking about retroperspektive you'd better have choosen some footage of the original games instead of the remastered versions. Just to show, how the games really looked back in the days you were talking about.
Yeah, or perhaps using the feature in remastered to toggle on/off the HD graphics to show the contrast. I thought oldschool graphics might scare people away from the video though... Thanks for watching - appreciate your feedback!
@@Ianbus123 I agree! Had pretty high hopes for it, but it did fall flat. :( Rather i hope and believe in a mini renaissance of strategy games! Stupidly! :)
The most hardest Economy styled RTS game is red alert 3 due to players are encouraged to expand more and build walls at their ore collectors and refineries due to terror drones and spies and shinobi warriors trying to sabotage the players economy.
I would put Command and Conquer Tiberium Dawn, Tiberium Sun, or Generals over any of the Red Alert games. the Tiberium games have the Rocket armed motorcycles which are my favorite units in the franchise while Generals allows a mix of motorcycles armed with Machine Guns and Rocket Launchers. As much as I love Total Annihilation I would put Homeworld I over it. All your choices focus on 2D view or 2.5D view surface combat with air or space forces generally limited to supporting the ground troops.
great top 3; a lot of beloved RTSs to pick from, I would say warcraft3 is even more epic as it also has custom games - variety is just ridiculous. Oddly enough I never could play Age of Empires a lot, it just did not feel satisfying to play as much as others
I remember it. But I never really played it and therefore cannot judge about it. But I know that it has many fans. Once I tried Earth 2160 but got never used to it. It felt too slow and overcomplicated to me.
2150 was overwhelming if you played it for the first time and had no idea what it was about, I remember that at the beginning I didn't like it very much, but when I saw what vehicles you could build and the advanced upgrade system, I immediately fell in love with this game, and 2160 my computer wasn't even powerful enough to run it 😅 and when I had a good computer, I played something else.
You really should have mentioned C&C Generals as well as Red Alert 2... those games are timeless! 😄 If UBISOFT fails now, EA can still make remakes of these games, and take over the market.
Yeah those ones were enjoyed by loads of people but for me I kinda felt the shift in gameplay already since the EA acquisition. I did kinda skip over RA 2 though and should have included it.
Generals, while good, was essentially a re-skin of a Star Craft clone. It lead to half-assed attempts of games like C&C4 and Generals 2, in its many canceled forms. Had they stuck to the formula of the originals, I doubt it would be over a decade for a new game. Remaster doesn't count, it's not a new story.
If Ubisoft makes a WiC II, they could still contend the RTS market. WiC was and still is amazing and has a following. It was a great take on RTS. It was like Command & Conquer 4...but done right and wasn't trying to jack a known franchise.
What 3 RTS games would be on your list? I could have easily said something like Dune II, Warcraft II and Age of Empires! There were a lot of rubbish copies, but the mid-late 90s did give us some RTS classics...
Age of Mythology, Red Alert and Black & white series
@@arjunratnadev Black & White was really interesting. Waiting to see what the new Peter Molyneux game is like...
@@Ianbus123 I remember Black & White...pretty weird experience for an early title :D
Definitely Tiberian Sun, Star Craft and KKnD. Great video too, you have my sub👍🏼
@@ANN1H1LATE89 I loved the vibe of Tiberian Sun. It was definitely my favorite from that era :)
Glad you enjoyed the video and thanks for the sub + your feedback, I appreciate it.
Glad you talked about TA, people forget how good and influential it was at the time.
One RTS game that gets overlooked constantly is total annihilation. That game was so fun and so detailed.
I always remember total annilatron and kknd
I played it the most over ra once it came out.
Played it over ra 2 and 3, especially with core contingency and ta kingdoms
Check out open ra and the other open source versions
If you're still interested in that style of RTS, B.A.R. (Beyond All Reason) is the latest iteration of the robot commander, energy, metal extractor style of games. and it's free :]
@blooddumpster3427 ahh yeah BAR is the other one, only tried open ra. Haven't been gaming as much these days
Were all old here lol, time or interest wane
TA still the best RTS ever made.
Red Alert 2 is even better. My nostalgia for RA2 is peak. It’s the oldest game I still routinely play nowadays
Mental Omega is working on Act 3!
All feel the Foehn Revolt!
@@TheOldMachines Hell yea
Hell March is still one of the hardest video game songs of all time
Who remembers playing red alert and changing the rules.ini files to mess about with the hit points? That being said, hell march - that tune back in 1996, as a 9 year old, got me into metal!
That sounds too advanced to risk breaking the family computer at the time :)
That's for noobs. Adding nuclear warheads to Tania's guns, or Teslas to the guard dogs, that's what's at!
@@yuboka49 ahaha - yeah! I did have a super fucked up, totally unbalanced unit skew at one point. I don't think the game liked it... And then with the later titles, you got lazy and ended up downloading trainers with malware in them.
Didn't brittney spears start her live set with hell march at one point? Or was it just the same voice sample?
@@smash461986 That's news to me :O Is she known as a gamer?
Red Alert 2, Tiberian Sun, Age of Empires, Empire Earth, Cossacks … great games!
I played all 3 and loved all 3. But TA will always have a special place in my heart
StarCraft, for being retooled from a failed Games Workshop partnership (was supposed to be a 40K RTS), was a phenomenal series with excellent storytelling and music. Great skirmish-level RTS, but doesn’t take the crown for me. Total Annihilation/Supreme Commander will always be king of the RTS landscape for me. Chris Taylor’s legacy is still updated and balanced regularly via Forged Alliance Forever, including it’s own campaign series. C&C, StarCraft, and TA/SupCom and definitely the legends of the genre.
Knights and merchants!!!!
Total annihilation was completely lost in my memory. Thanks for reviving it.
i still watch the korean starcraft tournament.
Great video.
The ASL is really doing well :) Thanks for watching - appreciate it!
The original Dawn of War game was one of my favorites. The Micro and the Unit Variety was so awesome
And it was tied in to a much loved franchise. Just a win all round.
i really enjoyed KKND aka Krush Kill 'N Destroy friggen loved that game
I remember the red little scorpion all these years
Underrated game , bought it on steam a few months ago , great game!
I played KKND2 a lot, great game, campaign is merciless but feeling of progression and unit tiers does neuron activation for me, is 1 just as good ?
@@deadmeatSFM try extreme , it's a lot of fun with improved graphics
I kinda expected Age of Empires to be on the list. But he, choices have to be made! Ty for video.
Total Annihilation is neat because of how the two campaigns tie into both the mechanical reality of RTS games in general, and the narrative of this game itself.
The end of one campaign leads into the begining of the other. Forever.
It replicates the core (hurr) theme of the game.
You came arm-ed with a nice pun there
These puns remind me, I'm very tempted to get TA tattoos. One for each main faction. You can probably guess where each one would go.
@@BongoTurtlesneed the big Bertha or a kragoth
Very nice retrospective, friend. Total annihilation is one game that was lost to memory, until I saw this video! Now I want an old windows pc so I can jump back in.
It's on Good Old Games cheaply and runs on modern operating systems with no issues. Have a look!
Thanks for the feedback, appreciate it.
I can still hear “Unit lost” 25 years later!
Myth II: Soulblighter from Bungie is a classic for me... the art style, missions with persistent units and very hard.
Rise of Nations is also frequently forgotten
I remember exploding dwarves from myth! So bloody I really liked it!
Still play it every now and again. Still amazes me the multiplayer is still strong with Myth world cups still going
Who remembers playing classic rts games like Dark Reign, Star Trek Armada 1&2, Star Wars BattleGrounds, Age Of Empires, Rise of Nations/Legends and lotr the Battle for the middle-earth.
There's more rts games I've played.
Dark Reign - glad I am not the only one who mentioned it.
Tachion Tanks man...the fist of the Imperium.
I played Armada i remember joining a clan and playing some promotion match to rise in rank. In one match totally annihilated the clan founders and rising to the rank of Lt. Commander very quickly. Great times was only 14 then.
Great video! My first experience with RTS was on an interstate school trip in the 90s. Our host family had a couple of laptops with a direct connection with Warcraft 2 and C&C - have been hooked ever since.
Hey - I appreciate it and glad you enjoyed. I used to launch nukes at my dad in TA and then run down the stairs (the network cable went out the window) to see them land on his screen lol
Man i love these games. And wish these kind of games would come back in mainstream.
I loved playing Cossacks: European Wars. They also have a very good cinematic intro. And Red Alert 2 is my introduction to the RST game, so it was special to me and I still play it from time to time now.
Saved the best for last. TA was great. I remember playing the PC Gamer demo disc version over and over until finally buying a copy. Its amazing that the modding scene for TA is still alive after all these years.
I'm so old, I remember clearly moment of first time seeing Red Alert, TA and SC !
90s was really a creative era. I remember the first person view real time strategy game of uprising join or die.
Played all of them. And I really love all of them. but TA takes a special place in my heart.
Banger video mate, never played TA when it was current and watching this is feel a tinge of regret missing out. For me it was SC, WC, RA and ofcourse AoE!
I wouldn't be a gamer rn if it weren't for StarCraft, the very first game I have ever played.
Dark Reign was pretty good as well imo.
Red Alert was the first RTS I played, loved it!
StarCraft is such a brilliant game, apart from the game itself the map editor was fantastic. I spend so much time playing custom maps.
While not at the same level as these three I feel Ground Control released in 2000 is under appreciated for sure.
Ground control was solid and definitely had its own unique spin on the RTS formula that really helped it stand out.
I really enjoyed it. I'd switch between it and Tiberian Sun, later Red Alert 2.
I remember being in middle school late nineties, the only gaming I knew was the Gameboy and later the N64. My older brother brought me to a computer gaming shop, whatever they were called, and introduced me to Starcraft. First game playing Terran against AI Zerg, got a zergling rush within a few minutes. Terrifying experience. I didn't understand what was going on. Eventually got Starcraft and Brood War at home and that was basically my teenage years. What a time to be alive.
Did you end up playing StarCraft on the N64? Or did you make the switch to PC gaming? :)
I clearly remember a friend of me calling me on the phone back in 1992, saying he has the best game ever, where you control multiple units at a time. I thought in the lines of Cannon Fodder or Syndicate. But no. He was talking about Dune 2.
Then you got shocked when you found out it was actually one at a time. 😅
Dune, Warcraft 1,2,3/ starcraft1,2 , C&C TS Generals / Red Alert1,2 , Cossacks, Supreme Commander, Homeworld pop to mind, i forget some others, but there you have a nice list of good "old" RTS Games ^^
Cannon Fodder and C&C: RA gives me memory. Legends!
StarCraft 1 & 2 fan here. I still play StarCraft 2's Coop mode from time to time. It's just fun going through the motions as what somebody described as a "glorified comp stomp". The cast of commanders feels about as diverse as a _Super Smash Bros. Ultimate_ roster, along with the various missions.
Coop is very nice. Great for people who doesn't play SC for at least 10h a week for last 10 years.
I never played the original Red Alert, I played Red Alert 3 which was great solo experience although at first I was very shock by how close the camera is from the map. Tiberium 3 was also a pretty good RTS for the solo campaign. When Red Alert was out I was probably playing Warcaft 2 then I transitionned to Starcraft I think. I freaking loved Warcraft 2 but it mechanics are just a pain to play nowadays I'd never have the willingness to do a whole campaign.
I remember playing Total Annihilation when it was released and was blown away. Even today it still looks better than other RTS games. And of course StarCraft Brood War is still the GOAT, so much that even SC2 cannot match it.
My Top 3 RTS ever: Age of Empire 2: Deluxe Edition, Red Alert 2, Starcraft Broodwar
Nice picks :)
Dune 2000 , Empire earth , Rise of Nations: Rise of Legends , kkend Extreme were a lot of fun , and pretty underrated
Ra2 was a gem 💎 still play it and will play it for future
Recently finished the Allies campaign. Working on Yuri's Revenge.
The best thing about the original C&C was that a lot of its units were still grounded in reality. It quickly jumped the shark in later installments with impractical mechs and whatnot
I just realized i was an rts nutter as a kid. I played dune red alert and starcraft the originals and sequels. My only question is how did i find so much time
21:23 oh wow! That's now also a popular Red Alert remastered map!
I think it's called Seton's Clutch. The most popular 4v4 map in Supreme Commander
Between autumn 98 and spring 2000 I went through Starcraft and Broodwar, Tiberian Sun, Age of Empires 2, and Settlers 3, among other non-RTS games. It was a real gaming golden age for me.
StarCraft in particular is still my favourite game.
Shout out to Settlers though. Not a hairy-chested RTS, but seeing the complex supply chains at work were satisfying - you could sit and watch the fisherman and know if the caught a fish it would feed the miner who'd dig the iron to make the steel to make the sword to arm the knight to attack the enemy castle.
1998, when Westwood was acquired by EA was the year the decline began.
Yeah :( Sadly the EA or Activision acquisition story is the downfall of probably 100 good devs...
Even Tiberian Sun was rushed but I also heard it had feature creep.
It is hard to tell whether Westwood's history would have been much different it they had been bought by another big publisher. Tiberian Sun was the climax but also the end of the Command & Conquer boom.
Around 2000 game development was changing in general: Games were more and more no longer developed by small developer teams but by a large staff. The production values were increasing as were the expectations of the potential buyers.
Let's see Max Payne for example:
- In Max Payne 1 most persons in the visual novels are portraited by developers and their friends. Max Payne himself is portraited by the story writer Sam Lake.
- In Max Payne 2 most persons in the visual novels are portraited by actors. That looks more professional - but was of course more expensive to produce. :)
i can say they did make the greatest rts ever which is zero hour
Yeah, great times.
C&C, dune2000, star craft...
The whole genre peaked with warcraft 3.
I would love to see another one of those.
one of the coolest things about Warcraft/Starcraft was that it came with a map editor that you could make your own campaigns with. With Red Alert you'd have to use a 3rd party app to make your own campaigns
And it we ended up with maps such as DotA eventually!
1. Command & Conquer
The first RTS i played and it was awsome. Remember i made maps of basse i Wanted to build in that game when i was a kid.
2. Rise of Nations
There was some kind of game mechanic regarding borders or something like that, anyway, played this titel alot!
3. Empire Earth
This was my goto RTS for a long time and i loved it! I usually stopped at modern era, since im not much of a sci-fi guy :p
have played alot of RTS but theese Where the ones that did something new and not just same Old but with new models.
I really need to try Empire Earth. There's an 'Empire Eternal' project at the moment which has just picked up a publisher.
Loved the video. I love rts so much. Please play B.A.R.! It’s the best and it’s free.
One critical difference in TA is the reclaim/resurrection function that can turn battles around.
I have! There are several videos about it (or the TA/SupCom/ZeroK/BAR subgenre) on my channel - take a look.
The best was Command and conquer generals and zero hour. In my opinion was the best of the series. I played this game for over a decade and never got bored of it, that shows how good and addictive those games were. I only stopped playing when Company of heroes came out and then that was my go to RTS game.
Metal Marines was my first experience with RTS
as much as i love metal marines i can't exactly call it a RTS ... primary reason is that attacks being sequenced and you can't attack while your opponent sends troops to you as the attack has to be finished first ... it feels like a weird realtime building + "turnbased" strike/combat hybrid
Red Alert was aweome!
StarCraft and brood war are beyond video games, they are master pieces.
They are great indeed, but campaigns are written in a way that suggests different teams were doing them. So there is a Master writing of Ep1 and Ep2 and very dumb of Ep3 and Ep5.
Then same happened with SC2, where WoL had was mostly well written, but HoTS was utter garbage and LotV being good only compared to HotS - but still illogical.
Still balance was great. Not perfect (like ignoring balansing of Scouts), but very good. For me only backside is that SC and WC are part RTS and part arcade/agility games. That's why in my opinion Dawn of War is better RTS, as you command squads, not single units, and even them have some command "lag".
I went back to rts when i bought the miyoo A30 playing Red Alert PS1 🥰
Cool channel!
1. Red alert ruined my childhood... RIP MPlayer...
2. People still play Red Alert, even the old version (not the re-release) and are very competitive.
3. Thank you for making this video and featuring RA first... the "Q" mechanic changed my life sigh...
and funny enough the rumor is that the Q mechanic was implemented by accident... tanks Queuing up a command WHILE MOVING meant they would dodge 70% of incoming tank fire.... now you have a STRATEGY GAME. The ladder of RA 1 ruined my child hood I became instantly addicted.
Kane lives in death. Who knows, knows.
good video.. great games
Hey - thank you!
@Ianbus123 their are indie devs making new RTS games too you know for example, alien marauder,tempest rising, interstellarus, santuruary shattered sun, industrial annihilation, stormgate and dust from.
Yep and a lot of the more exciting ones are INdie early access games at the mo. Hodden Horse Studio are also doing a lot!
Nurple and the ant levels were amazing on ra 1
This was a really interesting video. Do you have any one size fits all tips for dominating RTS games?
Thank you! It just so happens I do:
th-cam.com/video/v7qZwjZb26s/w-d-xo.html
I must have sunk at least 300hrs into total annihilation, not to mention brood war over dial up with a school friend. Those were the days
Man, Hell March brought instant memories flooding back. A fucking classic!
We ever gonna get SC3?
I hope not - almost none of the people behind the magic are still with Blizzard. Only really Metzen the story guy
I wish I had more time to play RTS games, I feel that RTS games games are hard to enjoy for quick pickup and play sessions.
it definitively is when a game's average matchplaytime is high ... by the time you finished a Total Annihilation or Age of Empires match you may have finished 3 Red Alert matches
and now look at more action focused RTS like Battle Aces, basebuilding limited down to its essentials, limited but fully selfcustomised unitpool and 10 min playtime, within one hour you may finish 4 or 5 matches
I hope I get in the November beta test as I really want to do some videos on Battle Aces
Yeah I'm feeling that right now :(
@@Ianbus123 i really REALLY enjoyed the first beta despite having been skeptical about it ... i mean i usually play RTS such as Open Red Alert or Planetary Annihilation .. and then go to something this condensed .. i got addicted in a minute ... and it seriously brings that "just one more match" ... or "hmm let me try this "deck" of units"
@@MrTBSC I like the deck building idea of it with your unit loadout and the predictable match length. The amount of times I said "1 more game" of SC2 at night then got a TvT half mapper vs GoOdy...
The only RTS I played as a kid was Lego Rock Raiders and Age of mythology. Which aren't 90's games granted,
Dune 2, Warcraft, Red Alert ... all amazing games and genre pushing / defining of that 90's era. But Total Annihilation stood alone. YEARS ahead of its time and the feel and scale of the game is still right there at the top.
I'm an FPS gamer myself, have been since Quake 1 stole my life. But I do enjoy RTS games and my top 3 are still the same after all these years :
1. Total Annihilation
2. Warcraft III
3. Starcraft II
Age of Mythology is a close 4th but I think the sheer polish of Starcraft II, and the amount of content you get for your money (3 huge variable campaigns, tons of multiplayer and custom games, etc) gives it 3rd spot. Even though I prefer Warcraft III, I can't deny that SC2 is Blizzards magnum opus in the RTS genre.
Nice picks :) Shame my internet was so lousy I could only really enjoy Quakeworld at LANs from time to time.
@@Ianbus123 Ah yeah the dreaded 56k modem era! I persuaded my Dad to subscribe to BT's "Wireplay" (at an INSANE cost) which halved my ping from around 110ms down to 60ms. That allowed me to be competitive, but restricted my playing time (cos phonebills).
Managed to get ADSL in January of 2000 though - in time for Quake III. I skipped Quake II (in multiplayer at least).
Nobody would play me at Quake or Quake III at our local LANS. For obvious reasons... XD
Red Alert 2 was the peak in my opinion
All good but Warcraft 3 deserves more attention. It developed the genre massively by introducing properly unique hero units with their own skills. It also led to the creation of World of Warcraft and effectively the entire MOBA genre of games through the DotA mod.
Yeah perhaps I should have gone with an honorable mentions section although it was already running pretty long! Ended up going for the flurry of ~1996 activity for my 3 picks
Man I love your video there is so much to think about. Yes Starcraft 2 left a bit of a sour taste but I do not count it as a failure, first of all because Wings of Liberty has the greatest solo campaign of all time and I am dying to see an RTS doing somehting similar or better. SC2 has its fair share of epic moments really, the first 5-9 months were great then it got kind of stuck into some boring balacing issues then it picked up again for HotS but really what made me quit instantly was how they changed all the mechanics for HoTS, I was disgusted. I worked so hard to learn my build and all I felt like pianist underwater at 220 heartbeat/s sweeting like from places I could never imagine I could sweat from, that was awesome. That said it's not a failure, I have too many memories the scene was too good between Day9, InControl and all the people I can't name them all even in my country. I hit diamond in HoS then left but everybody knows, everybody wants to be grandmaster ;)
SC2 definitely had its moments and I wish I could go back to that 2010 feeling of optimism and excitement, but in terms of replacing SC:BW it didn't manage to succeed, and it damaged the scene a lot as they were basically competing against eachother. Still the most high production quality single player RTS I think?
Even so, paying $40 for each expansion (total 120) was also a bit steep imo. That greed + the poor support and understanding of the pro scene were early hints that Blizzard was on its way down I think in hindsight.
Glad you enjoyed the video and thanks for your comment
TA was amazing and really excelled once the modding community got involved and released some amazing unit packs.
very good video. I think the multiplayer aspect is overcooked though, in practice that scene was such a small part of total players that it sure enough did not dictate much at all and it should not have. With the huge exception of south Korea and sc1 of course, but even then, most players by far in sc1 and sc2 were single players. After arcade came to the game exploded. A true masterpiece
I suppose when you're guaging things based on online discussions multiplayer gets over emphasised. Lots of people enjoying games offline (until DRM happened anyway).
Thanks for watching and glad you enjoyed it!
@@Ianbus123 True indeed. Interesting phenomena that multiplayer scene. Ive never been in to it but def. a single player vet for all 3 legend games you mentioned. Formed both my Child- and adult-hood. The MP scene creates viewers and competence hype, on the other side no company have ever tried balancing 2 scenes on that scale. I wonder what would happen if the mothership would keep its size meant for single players back in the day
@@minidude112 There's a "true scale" mod for SC2 and it's pretty funny. Capital ships are enormous
@@Ianbus123 Ah I bet, think Ive heard of it. Sounds fun indeed. Man. Had so much hopes for stormgate. Homeworld 3 also, kinda. Even though ive never been to much into that macro scale. Stormgate dosent quite hit the art design for me. Big shoes to fill. Tempest rising could be amazing though. And BAR is awesome
This is the first time I've ever seen someone champion red alert 1 over red alert 2, and it makes me happy. Red alert 2 was entirely too childish, and while it was a lot of fun, it lost the pathos of the original red alert, which was what drew me in the first place. Gone were the adult themes, replaced with saturday morning cartoon violence. I was a child when i played red alert 1, and in my teens when i played red alert 2 and even then i could tell it just wasn't as compelling.
Tiberian Sun with Firestorm was the best. All adult themes with the state of humanity on the line.
I really loved Tiberian Sun's asthetic and the new units they added. It's my personal favorite but I was trying to be objective!
You aren't the only one. I will give RA2 its due, it was fun and continued the story. Just was never as good as Red Alert. It had very big shoes to fill and it just couldn't.
Tesla's were weaker across the board and I LOVED going hard with Tesla tech. Coils, tanks, troopers. The works.
Literally your first Soviet mission is wiping out Torun.
Allies: Save this character!
Soviets: Lets commit a war crime!
I don't know, RA2 felt like a huge upgrade over RA1 in so many ways, from better pathing, better visuals, more QoL features, somewhat better balance (still a mess, but atleast better than RA1's pure light/medium tanks vs heavy tanks spam) and more.
RA1 was more "serious", but still had goofy stuff in it.
I will give one thing to RA1 though. The missions were actually challenging, which is a good thing. RA2's campaigns were too easy.
@@SoulKiller7Eternalto be fair, RA1 teslas were op and were rightfully nerfed. RA1 Allies also didn't had any ground unit which could outrage them (artillery were crap), so it sucked having to penetrate a soviet turtle player.
Red Alert is the best video game ever made. Simple but addicting gameplay, memorable cut scenes and awesome soundtrack. I think Hell March is the most popular video game track of all times.
On top of that, it teaches you European geography.
Starcraft was not bad, but it was too complicated and too sci-fi for my taste.
Would have liked to see more of Warcraft
We did live through the best times, didn't we boys.
Wings of Liberty were the days!
I really like your video!
But while talking about retroperspektive you'd better have choosen some footage of the original games instead of the remastered versions. Just to show, how the games really looked back in the days you were talking about.
Yeah, or perhaps using the feature in remastered to toggle on/off the HD graphics to show the contrast. I thought oldschool graphics might scare people away from the video though...
Thanks for watching - appreciate your feedback!
My favorite RTS series is Pikmin.
Probably an unpopular opinion. But i regard Homeworld 1 and 2 as RTSs. And really good ones at that.
It's a shame Homeworld 3 didn't hit the mark :(
@@Ianbus123 I agree! Had pretty high hopes for it, but it did fall flat. :(
Rather i hope and believe in a mini renaissance of strategy games! Stupidly! :)
Joey Stax got his forklift license at 14!
The most hardest Economy styled RTS game is red alert 3 due to players are encouraged to expand more and build walls at their ore collectors and refineries due to terror drones and spies and shinobi warriors trying to sabotage the players economy.
The fact that infantry could get crushed by vehicles used to drive me nuts in C&C.
Harvester truck of doom!
I would put Command and Conquer Tiberium Dawn, Tiberium Sun, or Generals over any of the Red Alert games. the Tiberium games have the Rocket armed motorcycles which are my favorite units in the franchise while Generals allows a mix of motorcycles armed with Machine Guns and Rocket Launchers. As much as I love Total Annihilation I would put Homeworld I over it. All your choices focus on 2D view or 2.5D view surface combat with air or space forces generally limited to supporting the ground troops.
I remember Dark Colony
I loved TA 👍🏻
great top 3; a lot of beloved RTSs to pick from, I would say warcraft3 is even more epic as it also has custom games - variety is just ridiculous. Oddly enough I never could play Age of Empires a lot, it just did not feel satisfying to play as much as others
The WC3 custom scene should get a lot of credit for some of the games it helped launch, such as DotA and the entire MOBA genre.
I miss RTS games
Shout out to Warzone 2100!
Homeworld should a first ballot on this list.
Never heard of the 3rd one
I envy you - go explore!
TA is the GOAT IMHO
which red alert is the game at 00:14 with the tesla tanks ? I don't remember playing this one
It's Red Alert Remastered and that was a multiplayer game. Not sure if that includes units from an expansion pack or not?
@@Ianbus123 wow neat ! And it's on sale too, gonna try this gem !
This was the “Aftermath” add-on
@@The90sDoug Thanks ! I believe it's in the remastered collection too !
no one remembers Earth 2150 anymore
For some reason I didn't really click with me. But I know a lot of people loved it.
I remember it. But I never really played it and therefore cannot judge about it. But I know that it has many fans.
Once I tried Earth 2160 but got never used to it. It felt too slow and overcomplicated to me.
Both it and the expansion was good. They were definitely different with the base being a separate area.
2150 was overwhelming if you played it for the first time and had no idea what it was about, I remember that at the beginning I didn't like it very much, but when I saw what vehicles you could build and the advanced upgrade system, I immediately fell in love with this game, and 2160 my computer wasn't even powerful enough to run it 😅 and when I had a good computer, I played something else.
Quality
You really should have mentioned C&C Generals as well as Red Alert 2... those games are timeless! 😄 If UBISOFT fails now, EA can still make remakes of these games, and take over the market.
Yeah those ones were enjoyed by loads of people but for me I kinda felt the shift in gameplay already since the EA acquisition. I did kinda skip over RA 2 though and should have included it.
Generals, while good, was essentially a re-skin of a Star Craft clone. It lead to half-assed attempts of games like C&C4 and Generals 2, in its many canceled forms. Had they stuck to the formula of the originals, I doubt it would be over a decade for a new game. Remaster doesn't count, it's not a new story.
If Ubisoft makes a WiC II, they could still contend the RTS market.
WiC was and still is amazing and has a following. It was a great take on RTS. It was like Command & Conquer 4...but done right and wasn't trying to jack a known franchise.
StarCraft is the greatest RTS ever I spent so many hours on that it blew our balls off 😂
Affirmative
Oh man this nostalgia is throwing up some negatives, taken back to repeatedly failing certain missions.
Red Alert underground missions?