A real time strategy game is a complex war game where you manage your armies from the ground up. The typical RTS game genre requires a player to farm resources, build structures and units, research technology, secure areas and destroy their opponents. The real time strategy genre evolved from the UK and North America with the introduction of games like Command & Conquer, Starcraft and Warcraft over the last decade or so. A typical real time strategy game will have the main screen map displaying the Terrain, buildings, units, etc with a command/production control overlay and a “minimap” or “radar” overview of the entire map. Most modern RTS games will have a 3-D isometric perspective of the map and a free-roaming camera view. A player will generally be started in game with a single structure or a handful of units and will be required to build specific structure to unlock required units.
All real time strategy games require a player to build an army to destroy their opponent whether it be AI or another human player. Gathering of resources is also a key focus but newer titles have shifted to a more combat focused game by advances in structure and unit capabilities. “Starcraft” is very popular and helped pave the way for current RTS game play in conjunction with other popular titles like “Dawn of War” and “Command & Conquer” which some have gained admirable titles like “Game of the year”, “Largest Income in Professional Gaming” and “Best Selling PC Strategy Game” from gaming industry leaders the Guinness Book of World Records.
The fast pace of real time strategy games has attracted common criticism and claims that they are a cheap imitation of turn based computer games however over the last decade real time strategy games have created a huge amount of popularity and revenue worldwide. Versions of RTS games in the early 90′s were more a game of tactics than strategy for example, the early days of Command and Conquer gave birth to the “tank rush” tactic which is commonly known as “zerging” where a player that acquires early access to resources would quickly produce large amounts of relatively cheap tanks or units and overwhelm their enemies before they have a chance to create adequate defenses or troop production. The most important aspect for success in any RTS game is the ability to multi-task as at times a player will be in control of hundreds of units, dozens of structures and can be in a multitude of battles at any one time.
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