Dear all,

Back when graphics were minimal, strategy games, specifically civ 1 took on the most depth for me as a gamer.

Medieval 2 Total War has been my favorite lately, but what else is out there?

What are your favorite strategy games today? (Starcraft 2 looks promising.)

zoo

I think my fav's have got to be Starcraft, Warcraft III and the C&C series. I've also been a fan of the Civ series.

There's not actually a lot that I'm looking forward to in the Strategy games sector at the moment. I'm a big fan of engrossing stories hence the games I mentioned above. It just seems nowadays that games have lost this depth and its all graphics, graphics, graphics. I loved the Starcraft and Warcraft series as the stories were really engaging. Haven't had a similar experience since then really. Hopefully Starcraft II will be good though.

Just to add, the very first strategy games I ever played that I guess got me in to the genre were 2 real old school games on my Amiga called Syndicate and Utopia. Awesome games. Loved Utopia.

Starcraft. Next the C&C titles (especially Red Alert, gotta love HELLMARCH!) other than Generals.

Today, I don't really play RTS's, I play a bit of Supreme Commander and C&C3 Tiberium Wars, i've moved to FPSs.

But I can't wait for SCII! I'll be playing that against my uncle and cousins again (3v1 they still can't win).

Starcraft and the old warcraft games are good I like the whole C&C series though not generals so much. The Total war games are great I lreally like the realitic way that they reward good stratagy and not just massive swarm tactics. I like SupCom because of the huge scale and the massive number of units.

One of my current favorite RTS games is COH i like how the infantry will use cover inculding freshly made craters and how even 1000 rifle bullets won't hurt a tank and how the tanks can be damaged in different places like blowing up its main gun so it can't shoot. and its fun to make a group of tanks crash through a wall or watch then blast a big hole in a building that enamy infantry are hiding in.

I hope that SC2 is as great as the first on was when it came out, I still play SC1 every now and then even though the graphics are looking a bit old its still classic

Ghostwalker, Stemnin, GrandAdmiralThrawn,

The old school C&C series marked the start of it as far as I am concerned. It was the first get more land, get more money, get more army, etc game that I remember a thrill with. Warcraft was a great game, but Starcraft (though I never got real good at it) was a work of art. Games are definitely going all graphics these days but, that makes sence to me.

The coh demo was awesome, though, I have never played the full sized game and I agree that SupCom is what computers were made for, huge depth, huge scale, lots of units.

The FPS's are fun but I do not have the time nor the speed to play them "well." I was always a better medic on BF2 than anything else if you know what I mean. The ut3 demo has been fun to play and I am fairly interested in TF2, I just can't buy them yet.

Ghostwalker, SYNDICATE!, that was original and one of the best upgrade systems I remember. You had the game machine, an Amiga. On syndicate, which I played later on the PC, my favorite was a weapon called 'Satellite Rain' that would drop rounds and rounds of uranium on the area you told it to. I still enjoy the civ series, just not as much as the first versions.

Stemnin, if you want a real challenge on Starcraft...don't play me. C+C Generals just didn't for me either.

Grand Admiral, I too hope SC2 is going to be as good or better than the first. I may invest in COH when the price drops a hair. COH was a well thought through game. Good execution of melding strategy and the graphics that PC's are capable of.

Thanks for the responses. I appreciate the input and wanted to know what other gamers were doing out there and to see if I was missing anything.

Any thoughts are welcome.

lol, I was never a pro at ANY game, I consider myself jack of all trades, master of none gamer (I usually learn quick, and become quite good, but never pro). I learn as much as I can, like in BF2, I looked up all game's weapon stats, etc, I use that info partly in game to size up enemies etc. I had 2 friends in unversity that just smoked me at Starcraft, they just played that game, I only one very rarely, if they made a frekin huge mistake.

PS, it's UT3, not ut4. My uncle and cousins sucked at SC too, there was no challenge lol, I always prepared for their eventual backstabs too.

Fixed, thanks Stemnin.

I did research on build orders and watched some replays on SC and would wipe out a friend of mine that played with me often but I never advanced much further. Funny what a little research will do, nerdy or not.

zoo

Homeworld rocked. It took me so long to get good at that game.

Alpha Centauri/Civ 2

OMG, can't believe I forgot about HOMEWORLD, damn! I loved Cataclysm more, but damn that's one of the best RTSs ever! I never replayed a campaign so many times lol (never tried multi, had 56k at the time that was more like 24k.)

Ananan,

No joke! Alpha Centauri was one that I was just getting good at when I lost it. I am too lazy to go find it on ebay. Civ2 is still gold. Cataclysm was my favorite of the two, in fact, I still have it and will have to go dig it up. There were some great mods for that game, they let you have quite a few more ships then the default game. Great reminder man.

On that note, I think my other favorites, not mentioned, are the old school hex based movers, the panzer general series, perfect general etc. Their natural move was to the free moving games we know today like SC or Total Annhiliation -> Sup Com.

zoo

Civ II, Ceasar III, MOO II, MOM, Alpha Centauri

Microprose classics. Oh how things have changed. I was just playing Master of Orion 2 last year.

I'm going to have to be somewhat oldschool and say AOE II: The Conquerors.

It's not strictly in the genre because it fits into a couple of others, but I'd have to say Dungeon Keeper.

I was a master of the micromanaged imp rush. Build a T shaped tunnel as far out as you think is safe, and right across the map, then get the imps to fortify all the outside walls. It's very risky, but a guaranteed win when you've sealed off the enemy from the portals and gold/gem seams. And for when he gets round to researching the destroy walls spell, you've filled all the tunnels with lots of lovely traps, and hopefully teched/trained up a few high level vampires that you can possess (FPS elements) and walk to his dungeon heart, where they can cause a lot of damage.

I got hooked into the genre by Starcraft, played a lot of AoE 1&2, but had the most fun with Warcraft II...ZUG ZUG!

RTS:
Age of Empires 2
Caesar 3
Starcraft
Company of Heroes

TBS:
Master of Orion 2 (not 3!)
Galactic Civilisations 2 : Dark Avatar
Civilisation 2
Civ: Call to Power 2 was good as well - a bit different to Civ2.

Disciples Sacred Lands and Warlords. That's like the only TBS games I played much.

AOE II always looked cool to me, and seeing that many here like it, I may pursue that on a clearance rack somewhere.

Disciples Sacred Lands looks like the Heroes of Might and Magic series, but I have never played it.

Dungeon Keeper, is that the one where you design the dungeon with baddies and the 'hero' tries to get through?

I see COH again as a favorite. That demo was awesome, but I just cannot play that in front of anybody as the language is terrible. Personally, I sort of don't care, but it gets old and to me, it can be offensive. Does anyone that plays that know if there is a toggle for the language?

(I realize the fact that your are blowing people away and maybe that should be a bigger deal, but frankly, its a game, and that is all it is. I don't want to hear the same swearing over and over and over, I just want to play a game.)

The good games seem to stand the test of time as they are repeated here. I wonder how RobWright is doing on vacation? His Redsox are going to the World Series.

zoo

Portal, best "strategy game" ever.

Hell yah! Dungeon keeper rocked!!!

red alert as another good one because it had BOATS!
warcraft 2 over 3.. because.... of...BOATS

RTS don't appeal to me the older i get. Requires to much planning before playing the game. It's just like chess but moving pieces