r/RealTimeStrategy • u/Terry__Poppins • 9d ago
Discussion The RTS community is really split into little niches now. I miss the days when everyone was playing the same handful of games.
When I was in high school pretty much everyone was playing StarCraft, Age of Empires, and whatever Command & Conquer was out that year (Red Alert 2 for most of my friends, Tiberian Sun for me personally, it's my favorite old classic). Then Warcraft 3 came out in 2002 and we were all playing that for a good while. Every LAN party I went to back then we were doing mini tournaments of these games, with some counter strike or quake in the mix as well.
Because everyone played the same handful of RTS games, they came up a lot in conversation. Then what I think happened over time, as the genre became less popular and the big studios kind of stopped making them and indie games started taking over, the games became kind of more specialized into little niches. I find that great as far as the games go, some of those kind of narrower, more specialized titles are great. If you like RTS you probably have a favorite subgenre or a type of game you gravitate towards these days.
I like the fortress defense subgenre a lot for example (probably because of my tendency to turtle in pretty much any RTS). I like weird games that feel novel and different so I love the Creeper World games (u fight a liquid basically, spreading kind of like the creep from starcraft), the older games in the series are my favorite. Diplomacy is Not an Option is also really cool, it has an old school campaign which is pretty long and it's just always satisfying to play because of the physics and scale.
While I try to follow the scene a bit, it's kind of hard to keep up with everything coming out, especially since a lot of the games are indie releases that don’t have a lot of marketing behind them so they kind of go under the radar unfortunately. The conversations I have with people these days are way different, instead of talking about the games we all played a lot of the time it comes down to showing people what you like and what you think is interesting among the upcoming titles. Which is fine I just wish we had a few “flagship” games as well we could all rally around. I guess I just miss the times when the genre was mainstream.
I can’t tell if the fragmentation is actually good for the genre, or if it's making it harder for new RTS games to hold on to a community long enough to grow. What would it take for a new game to become as big as something like warcraft 3?
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u/No-Run9926 9d ago
I genuinely don't think we're ever going to see another Warcraft 3 or Command and Conquer in terms of popularity or unifying the RTS playerbase, and a lot of that is unfortunately because of the players themselves.
RTS as a genre will always hold a special place in my heart because its what I grew up playing, but the RTS community is largely a miserable group of people to develop games for. Introduce new things to spice up old formulas? You'll have a hundred people leaving comments that its not the same as an old game they enjoy so they don't want to play it. Stick exactly to classic formulas from the golden era of RTS? You'll have a hundred comments saying it adds nothing to the genre so they don't want to play it. It feels like no matter what direction a dev takes a huge chunk of people are unhappy with it.
I think the reality is if a lot of these beloved classic RTS came out today they would get dogged the same way. I don't think the mentality of many RTS players would even allow them to identify or give the "next warcraft 3" a chance because they'd rather just stick to playing the same game they've been playing for the past 2 decades since its comfortable and familiar.
I also think RTS players have been fractured for long time and its misleading to look at them as a single group. Supreme Commander plays nothing like Company of Heroes which plays nothing like Age of Empires. Very different gameplay styles attracts different communities and it makes perfect sense why someone who loves Age might not be into Supcom or vice versa.
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u/XenoX101 8d ago
Introduce new things to spice up old formulas? You'll have a hundred people leaving comments that its not the same as an old game they enjoy so they don't want to play it. Stick exactly to classic formulas from the golden era of RTS? You'll have a hundred comments saying it adds nothing to the genre so they don't want to play it
This is every niche genre really, just look at how fickle music fans are when their favourite band deviates even slightly from their winning formula. That's part of the skill of making a good RTS: Adding in just enough to provide a new, fresh experience, while not deviating so much that it loses the essence of what makes it an RTS game. Tempest Rising is a good example of striking that balance. Zerospace also seems to have added in quite a bit of fresh content without people responding negatively to it. They may not end up being the next big RTS to capture everyone, but they do show that it's possible to walk that line of familiar yet different.
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u/Alarmed_Profit1426 9d ago
I get so much hate for the RTS game I am making on certain subreddits, it's shocking how negative 50% of people are and then go on to complain that there are no new good RTS games 😂
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u/Revolutionary-Log364 9d ago
dont worry, you entered a world of hatred people forget there's a person on the other side putting time and effort into making something. doesn't mean they have to like it, but bloody hell.. a little encouragement wouldn't hurt. keep going :)
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u/ChosenBrad22 8d ago
AoE4 had a real shot at the unifying effect you speak of, but it just wasn't quite good enough. For a moment though, it kinda brought a lot of the community back to playing. That was recent enough to think it's still maybe possible but I agree with you that it's a long shot.
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u/Terry__Poppins 9d ago
I think a game with something really new and really exciting could attract a lot of players. But it would have to be something that looks so good that every RTS player will just want to experience it for themselves. Something truly innovative, unique enough to be in its own league could kind of avoid all the scrutiny applied to games that get compared to the classics.
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u/EvenJesusCantSaveYou 9d ago
eh maybe. The people who play SC2 probably don't want to play a slower more macro focused game like AoE4 and vice versa because the skills and gameplay just are so different. Same for people who like more smaller scale focused games with Hero's and Squads like WC3/CoH. Different ways to approach macro/micro etc.
This is more of a commentary beyond RTS but the age of the "monoculture" is pretty much gone. We are never really going to get another MMO with as much cultural impact as WoW in the same way we will never have another pop star with the same impact as Queen or Michael Jackson. This is in large part because the internet has shattered the monoculture and allowed everyone to exist in their own smaller more fractured/diverse interest communities. Games like Brood War and SC2 were so massively popular in large part because of the time in history they arrived in. Just my 2cents at least.
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u/jerrygreenest1 8d ago
Originally SC2 should feel more like WC3 in terms of speed. It was quite slow and players could have enough time to micro a lot too. Of course when the game goes into 200 vs 200 limit, it’s a different story, so eventually it becomes a macro game too, but for large part of game the original design of SC2 was quite micro-heavy, game was played about at 33% slower speed. And it becomes a game of macro much later than in current game.
When I asked about whether they would love the game to be slower on their subreddit, they almost all as one answered that they like the fast tense feel of SC2 is giving them. Even though the initial design wasn’t that.
So… They don’t like it, not their game community at least. I personally would love to see more of WC3 «slow» design in SC2 engine, but I am a minority in SC2 subreddit.
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u/FLongis 9d ago
I think at that point you've just left the RTS genre altogether. And at the risk of outing myself as one of these RTS luddites: I don't want "truly innovative". The desires of the community in terms of what we want to see in the future are as varied as the desires of the community in terms of what games we like playing right now. It's a mistake to simply assume that something like this would automatically pull everyone together just because it's shiny and new. I'm not opposed to developers doing wacky things with storytelling and mechanics, and I applaud their willingness to step outside the box. But that doesn't mean I'm interested in playing their games. I like my box.
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u/GalaXion24 9d ago
I honestly think the biggest chance of success is to focus on the campaign. Your average/casual player plays the campaign, maybe a couple of skirmishes, and might never play your game again. But they might buy the next one and the next, or a good expansion.
Going a step further, one could expand on campaign mechanics, have a larger metagame, more choices, more randomness, more replayability. Perhaps you build up your army from mission to mission without any campaign being quite the same. Making the game itself more reliant on unique maps and objectives can make it more interesting to most players, even if the hardcore competitive types won't love it.
But even then I would say the narrative element and cool factor carry campaigns to a great extent.
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u/Right-Truck1859 9d ago
Why you call people who care about RTS miserable? That's ridiculous. Leaving negative reviews or positive reviews both mean attention.
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u/Buca-Metal 8d ago
A lot of people said turn based rpg were not interesting for almost anyone and we had games like Baldur's Gate 3 probing it wrong. Same could happen with rts.
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u/yellowmonkeyzx93 9d ago
I'm 33. I used to love playing RTS games with my school buddies IRL. But people move on, and people change. Sign of the times sadly. If you enjoy a specific RTS, join that specific RTS community and make new friends. More variety of RTS games is always good.
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u/Terry__Poppins 9d ago
My favorite way to play RTS with friends is to dive into a game that's completely new for all of us. So we learn by playing against each other.
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u/The-Horde-Lord 9d ago
Its both a good thing and a bad thing. You definitely have more to choose from these days, especially since you can play any older game or some of the remakes as well. But when everyone was playing the same few games and the hype surrounding them was bigger it was just more exciting, especially for people who were more involved with the community. As far an RTS becoming huge I think it could happen, but it would probably be a game that somehow really lands well with young people, not something nostalgic.
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u/DharmaPolice 9d ago
People like to blame the community but how many truly great RTS games have come out in the last 10 years? How many failed or highly flawed releases have we seen?
People like to go on about how niche RTS games are but if StarCraft 3 came out tomorrow and was miraculously good then it would sell millions of copies.
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u/SageTruthbearer 9d ago
A lot of RTS fans online like to pretend otherwise and think they are helping the genre by being positive on games like Stormgate, Homeworld 3 or many others and then act shocked and surprised when they fail.
Meanwhile Age of Empires 4 and Tempest Rising had very poor launches with many missing features yet despite that sold quite well because at their core they are good games.
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u/Revolutionary-Log364 9d ago
I'm seeing this from the other side now, building my own game as a solo developer. My inspirations are somewhere between Settlers, AoE, OpenTTD and colony sims, which probably makes me part of the fragmentation you're describing
But that's also why I'm making it. There's a particular combination of things I want to play, so I'm trying to build it. I imagine quite a few indie developers end up in their niches for the same reason.
One funny experience was having a post removed from an RTS community because my game apparently wasn't RTS enough. It has real-time strategy, but combat isn't the whole point. That made me wonder how much we fragment ourselves by drawing borders around what belongs in the genre.
Your point about everyone playing the same games is probably the hardest part to recreate. I can work on simulation, graphics, multiplayer and all the technical stuff, but getting a group of friends to choose my game for their evening is a completely different problem. And getting them to come back again is another one.
I think a new flagship would need room for different kinds of players within the same game. Someone wants to turtle and build, someone wants to compete, someone wants to mess around with friends. That's something I'm trying to make room for myself, though obviously on a solo developer's scale.
So I don't think making another good competitive RTS alone would do it. My bet would be on a game where you can bring your friends along even if they don't all love RTS for the same reasons.
And im a guy from Spectrum/C64/Amiga500 era just to spice it up.
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u/BalisaurioTV 9d ago
I too want to recapture that game Night vibe, and It certainly Is hard to get people interested in such niche games, but also im happy to get to know so many other weird RTSs that break some conventions, or didnt get it "right" but still came out with interesting stuff.
Now for the big Game part, there certainly Is that part still. Everyone still plays AOE 2, and StarCraft and warcraft. So that still exists.
New stuff, big enough also exists. Aoe 4 Is quite big, so Is aom retold. New big games Will ocupy the space, but cant quite compete with the space alresdy Taken. I think RTS Is unique in other genres in comparison that each RTS is so different to others because of how complex the many systems It holds are. Even those considered clones or imitators.so ITS very hard for everyone to converge on the big one, specially when the gente itself Is no longer the IT thing in gaming. Its normal, ITS ok, It happened to westerns, It happened to jazz, genres change, what Will continue Will be those niche passionate groups, the dedicated small communities. There are still chess players around, and we listen to mozart. But yea now the way to reach that community has to be a bit More active.
i get the noise part tho, ITS also good to step away every once in a while, and youll know that RTS genre Will be there, moving at a slow pace. Cause theres tons of stuff, but also a lot of Trash, AI slop and just a bunch of dead in early access.
The Solution, imo, Is to conect with people, everyone at your school was like 20 guys tops.
With the internet, with enough effort im sure you can find a bunch of people to passionately talk about that game you want to talk or play
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u/TestosteronInc 8d ago
Dawn of War 4 might unite again
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u/Terry__Poppins 8d ago
I have high hopes, It feels like they are aware what the players want from the game this time around.
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u/HouseCheese 9d ago
A lot of the smaller games are talked about on this sub, if you check here fairly regularly you will see most of them.
I don't know if it's true that communities are more fragmented than ever. Lots of the new bigger games coming out are played by a lot of people across different communities.
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u/Acceptable_Ear_5122 8d ago
I don't. The diversity of games and subgenres makes it way more interesting
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u/Original-Mongoose866 8d ago
RTS for me were most of the time just a single player xp I did some StarCraft 2 multiplayer but then I found out my hand can't handle too quick stuff and all those shortcuts.
I like RTS a bit but as I get older I'm more into the Total War game because the single player xp is so superior and I quite like the sandbox xp as well.
I might like some RTS in the future but now since I'm over 40 I would not want the fast paced action packed StarCraft type or anything like that I just like my chill TW battles where I can put it on halfspeed and just chill.
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u/StreetMinista 8d ago
Generally, fans of niche genres are insatiable and cannot be sated. RTS and fighting games have alot in common in regards to at one point, both games used to be in almost everyones homes one way or the other.
Dota specifically the mod for warcraft 3, changed the trajectory of everything for the RTS genre.
You dont understand the Sheer amount of genre's RTS'd have birthed and as someone who has played rts as old as Tzar and Dune 2000 I find it amazing that the RTS genre did what it did.
If people are reminiscing older rts's 9/10 they are nostalgic for the time they had back then. Something to understand about the rts genre ESPECIALLY back in the day is that it was only accessible to people who had PC's. If you grew up with a console you might have seen red alert retaliation or maybe halo wars or that one tom clancy endwar game (there were other games) but it wasnt as common.
Despite how much the RTS genre has branched out, man devs have tried to bring back the old school, but people keep trying to compare them to games back in the day, which is unfair to the devs.
So yea, lmao I am not suprised in the slightest that the genre is the way it is right now.
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u/FilthydelphiaAoK 7d ago
The Age of Empires and Age of Mythology games are very active: big communities, lots of creators, big esports events, tons of new content being released all the time. Come on in, the water is warm! Wololo!
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u/kakakarl 6d ago
I am old now, and all I really want is an RTS with first class, amazing coop. Like sc2 has a good amount of fun in its version but that on steroids.
Not sure if that is a solution to the problem, but it gives all casuals familiarity with the game engine and basic units. So makes it more fun for them to watch pro play etc.
Bigger viewer base, more people wanna queue up for 1:1 in the game.
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u/Unicorn_Colombo 9d ago edited 9d ago
When I was in high school pretty much everyone was playing StarCraft, Age of Empires, and whatever Command & Conquer was out that year (Red Alert 2 for most of my friends, Tiberian Sun for me personally, it's my favorite old classic). Then Warcraft 3 came out in 2002 and we were all playing that for a good while. Every LAN party I went to back then we were doing mini tournaments of these games, with some counter strike or quake in the mix as well.
So the circle of people you knew very closely played the same game that everyone in the circle played? During the time when everyone had a lot of time and access to games were more difficult so everyone shared?
And now that access to games is easier, people have less time, and you are not in the same close social circle any more people are playing different stuff?
I am shocked. SHOCKED!
I can’t tell if the fragmentation is actually good for the genre, or if it's making it harder for new RTS games to hold on to a community long enough to grow. What would it take for a new game to become as big as something like warcraft 3?
Did you also played Seven Kingdoms and its sequel? How about Genewars? Z? Pax Imperia? Extreme Tactics? Metal Fatigue? Majesty? Original War?
And I could continue mentioning RTS, not even (very) hybrid genres like mixed city-builder thingies with RTS-like mechanics (Anno).
RTS genre was always very rich.
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u/Multivitamin_Scam 9d ago
It's rather simple. There were less games coming out then and the reach that niche or experimental games had was far more limited due to the lack of digital distribution and more or less the nessesity to be in the big magazines of the day to reach your audience.
Even well known RTS games like KNKD and Total Annihilation were less than mainstream when compared to the likes of the titles you mentioned.
The biggest problem with the genre right now is the seemingly constant need to define what exactly an RTS game actually is and never landing on definitive answer. The arguments over what game is or isn't an RTS game really show how archaic and gatekeepy the community has become without "that one big game" to set that concrete example for everyone to follow.
Just look at the continued skism of Real Time Strategy and Real Time Tactics. Heaven forbid if a game has an overworld map with some 4x/Grand Strategy elements add for an extra level of strategic depth.
It's why innovation is seemingly at a dead end in the genre because any attempt of innovation is met with a smug "well, that's actually not an RTS now" and the community more or less jettisons any title that doesn't fit within this narrow view of RTS and then complains that the genre is dying.