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Pick me an RTS

A

Actuary

2[H]4U
Joined
Feb 8, 2005
Messages
2,468
So, I was really in the mood for Warcraft 3 yesterday. It's an old game but it still holds my interest. I figured it would look even nice on my 22" widescreen Dell that I recently picked up. Wrong! No widescreen support (wtf). So, I'm left wanting some RTS action, but know nothing about recent RTS games. Barring getting into the Starcraft 2 beta (I forgot to opt-in earlier, will be doing that tonight), which I may even be too late on (is it?):

  1. What are the pros/cons of the following games?
  2. Do any of them not have widescreen support?
  3. How big is the multiplayer community?
  4. How are multiplayer games found/setup?

  • Empire: Total War
  • Supreme Commander
  • Company of Heroes
  • Dawn of War 2

I also never got around to Age of Empires 3, but I feel that it's a bit dated at this point. Stupid Warcraft 3 no widescreen support...

Edit: If anyone could tell me if there's been recent deals on Steam or anything for these and what those deals were so I don't overpay, that would be awesome.
 
Dawn of War is not RTS :) it's more tactical game - you do not build base, train units and so. THink of it like of Jagged Alliance in real time :)

From the list you made it's Supreme Commander all the way. Could also try Dawn of War: Dark Crusade, if you haven't - it's bit better then the next DoW addon - Soulstorm. In type of Total War you also get King Arthur, which is a decent creation.
 
Supreme Commander is a great RTS. Ever played Total Annihilation? If you liked it, you'll probably love Supreme Commander. I will warn you that you should play SupCom *last*, because the tactical zoom interface style will ruin you for other RTS's.

Dawn of War II is pretty fun, I've played a bit of the single player, but I've never gotten around to buying it. I want to convince my brother to buy it with me so we can co-op the SP campaign. Definitely worth looking into, but as mentioned, it's more of a tactical squad control game. You don't build a base and gather resources as in a traditional RTS.

Haven't played the other two, but I can recommend DoW II and SupCom(SupCom FA as well) for sure.
 
I'm a big RTS gamer, although I'm not a pro type. I really enjoyed C&C3 and C&C3: Kane's Wrath (full widescreen resolution support), and right now I'm playing the StarCraft II beta, which is really fun (and the competition is fierce!). You can also probably find C&C: Generals and Generals: Zero Hour for cheap, and those are good games (not sure about widescreen support).
 
I think Supreme Commander is/was $20 on Steam for both it and the expansion Forged Alliance. Excellent games, and yes, the strategic zoom will forever ruin every other RTS for you.
 
SupCom was great but sadly there isn't much to the single player campaign.

Company of Heroes was a good game, had a good single player campaign.

if you want something a different check out Men of War
 
dont get empire:TW...

i got it recently during the steam sale... and holy crap, what a piece of shit.... buggy as hell, and compared to rome or medieval 2, its amazingly boring.....

supcom *rules*
 
Men of War. Voice acting sucks donkey doodle but the underlying game is A++++
 
Company of Heroes was one of my favorite games in the past few years, you should definitely give it a shot. The difficulty of the game and the strategy that you must implore is more than most games, I guess I enjoyed the challenge of it. This may be a draw back for some people, but it was what dragged me into the game. There are usually about 1200 or so players on (or at least when I play there is). Definitely enough to find a match fairly quickly.
 
dawn of war 2, my favorite rts ever. I have a feeling it will be discounted on Steam soon with the impending Chaos release.
 
shiznit said:
dawn of war 2, my favorite rts ever. I have a feeling it will be discounted on Steam soon with the impending Chaos release.
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They will probably offer a gold version for $50 with both of them and just keep vanilla DoW2 at its current price.

There is a gold version being released in the retail channels for $50, surprised there isn't one on Steam yet.

Topic at hand, DoW2 and CoH aren't your typical RTS games next to like Warcraft due to no base building. But with that said they are both extremely great games, if you like the Warhammer universe you will really dig DoW2 I think. DoW1 and all its expansions are more like traditional RTS with base building and are also excellent titles.

Sup Com is great, I still play skirmish here and there, the sheer scale of it all is simply great.

No clue what the online communities are like for any of the games though, as I normally just play with friends or against the comp.
 
Right now I'm going through the single player in Dawn of War 2. It's more of an action RPGish kinda game. There is no base building or resource mining. It can still be considered an RTS though. It's much more a traditional RTS when it comes to multiplayer. Still no base building in multiplayer though.

I'm taking a break from Company of Heroes while I play Dawn of War 2. Company of Heroes is fun and is a good looking game.

Multiplayer in Dawn of War 2 is like playing on Xbox 360 (probably because it's Games for Windows Live). It's all peer to peer matchmaking like Modern Warfare 2. Maybe if you got some friends it'll be easier to get games going. For me though, since I have no friends I don't bother playing online. Company of Heroes is a lot better. You log in from within the game. There are a built in match browser, leader boards and chat rooms. It's a pretty complete package.
 
Multiplayer in Dawn of War 2 is like playing on Xbox 360 (probably because it's Games for Windows Live). It's all peer to peer matchmaking like Modern Warfare 2. Maybe if you got some friends it'll be easier to get games going. For me though, since I have no friends I don't bother playing online. Company of Heroes is a lot better. You log in from within the game. There are a built in match browser, leader boards and chat rooms. It's a pretty complete package.
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?

Most RTS games are P2P. DoW2 has a match browser and leaderboards as well.
 
Are there still a lot of people playing CoH then (i.e. it's easy/quick to find a match)? I'm also assuming it supports widescreen resolution (1680x1050 in my case)?
 
Actuary said:
Are there still a lot of people playing CoH then (i.e. it's easy/quick to find a match)? I'm also assuming it supports widescreen resolution (1680x1050 in my case)?
Click to expand...

In my previous post I mentioned there are still at least 1000 or so players online at any given time and finding a match is usually pretty quick. Quicker if you host one yourself. Widescreen is, of course, supported.

Edit: Didn't realize I posted from my other account before muffinman57! Sorry!
 
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out of your list supcom all the way. actually supcom anyways... most of the rts games that have come out over the years (including that pile C&C) are complete shit.

coh isn't a true rts. if you like micro/small scale tactical strategy it's a good game.
 
brucedeluxe169 said:
dont get empire:TW...
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Agreed, I played it for 3 days and never played it
CannonDub said:
SupCom2 in two weeks.
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WHAT THE FACK!!!!!!!! How did this fly under my radar?
I still play TA to this day.
ScYcS said:
Men of War. Voice acting sucks donkey doodle but the underlying game is A++++
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Yup, Men of War is amazing. I was dissapointed with the standalone expansion Red Tide, but the original Men Of War is a 10/10 game IMHO.
 
Warzone 2100??? ;o)

http://wz2100.net/ There's an open source team still working on this game. It's pretty cool.

I've never seen another game quite like Warzone, you'd think after 10 years somebody would have redone this concept. SupCom was kinda close, but I never could get into it. Still play warzone 2100 though, the artillery/counter artillery can be pretty challenging to master.


edit: oh and it's free :)
 
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shiznit said:
i must have missed men of war. I will have to check this out.
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Lots of people give up on it after the horrid voice acting...but man, its got so much cool to it. Requires a little bit of micromanaging, such as ammo gathering and such, but cover works, AI is good, physics are epic.

You'll love the heck out of it when you learn direct control and figure out how to shoot AP through buildings and cover to hit tanks that cant even see you.
 
MorgothPl said:
Dawn of War is not RTS :) it's more tactical game - you do not build base, train units and so. THink of it like of Jagged Alliance in real time :)

From the list you made it's Supreme Commander all the way. Could also try Dawn of War: Dark Crusade, if you haven't - it's bit better then the next DoW addon - Soulstorm. In type of Total War you also get King Arthur, which is a decent creation.
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dow2 is not really a rts.
dow1 and all the exp packs are an rts. and a truly great one in my opinion
 
If you like Sci-Fi/Spaceship Battles and base building Conquest Frontier Wars is fun.
 
Banyan said:
coh isn't a true rts. if you like micro/small scale tactical strategy it's a good game.
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You build your base/units and you fight the enemy with them thats an RTS to me.

A game like WiC on the other hand where you just get units to smash into the enemy is not an RTS imo.
 
For Warcraft 3 in widescreen just install it and change the resolution in registry.

I would recommend Anno 1404 and then the expansion Venice.

Also from older games, the whole Homeworld saga. That kics some serious ass.
 
Total Annihilation is still my favorite RTS to this day. It has to be 12 years old by now and it supports wide-screen.

Out of your list I would definitely pick SupCom. It's good but I always felt it was missing something when compared to TA.
 
The Earth series can be had for cheap on GoG.com. Earth 2140, 2150, 2160.

I do not know if you played them when they first came out or not but I liked this series of RTS.
 
aKrippler said:
You build your base/units and you fight the enemy with them thats an RTS to me.

A game like WiC on the other hand where you just get units to smash into the enemy is not an RTS imo.
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WiC is not an RTS in the strictest sense of the word, but you can call down reinforcements and air strikes, so you could think of the copters being your "base." You have a limited amount of reinforcement points which are your "resources." WiC is one of the greatest games I've ever played, regardless of what you call it.

I suggestion I have for a good RTS/RPG hybrid is the Spellforce series, although I liked the original better then Spellforce 2. They dumbed down resource gathering and base and unit building in the sequel.
 
CoH get's my vote. Dow and CoH is rather similar imo, but CoH is just overall much move inviting to gamers imo. The learning curve can be steep but that does not mean you won't enjoy the game while learning. It's the game that kept this genre alive for me. Hopefully SC2 will help continue.
 
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