What is Your Favorite non-Civ Game ? (Reviews Appreciated)

[The Mad Monk]

I almost forgot--the 500 unit max? You can set it as low as you please. I've read about twenty unit max games--they require a comletely different strategy...kinda like a Civ II OCC...

[The Mad Monk]

Ghen: I did the comparison because some one asked. I just realized the question was asked in a different forum--sorry!

[bomberman]

Let me clarify the 12 units thing. In SC the most that you can control at one time is 12. Meaning when you select units with the mouse the most you can grab is 12. In warcraft it was 9. In C&C and TA it was unlimited. You can hotkey these units. For instance, if I want to attack with 24 marines, 6 siegetanks, and 12 fire bats, the best way to do this is through hotkeys. I would assign 12 marines to 1, 12 marines to 2(since I can only put 12 in a group), the tanks in 3 and the firebats at 4. Then using 1, 2, 3, and 4 I would send these units to the opposing base. You can do the same thing in TA except you can have an unlimited amount in a group. Also there are hotkeys for almost every function in the game. When I select the barracks and hit M it will star buidling a marine. I assuming that TA has a similar structure(most RTS's have this). Personally I like SC much better than TA. The game had a much better story than TA did. I got bored with TA in about a week. That and SC has 3 totally different races, whereas TA they are almost the same and there are also only 2 races.

Just my 2 cents.

bomberman

[The Mad Monk]

Thanks for clearing that up, bomberman! I usually play TA in skirmish, so storyline isn't a major issue for me.

[bomberman]

No problem Monk. I would recommend at least giving SC a try. I was open minded and gave TA a try and this was after I had played SC for a long time. If you like SC you might want to give SC's expansion a try. That's what I play nowadays. They added several more units which added a lot to the game.

bomberman

[ghen]

In the defense of starcraft:

* Hotkeys: you can assign a 'squad number'(1-9) to units and factories, with no limits on unit types or group size.

Same with starcraft

* Enhanced Patrol: You can program factories with complex, repating patrol routes, that the units automatically
follow as soon as they are made.

Not neccessary since starcraft is a faster game

* 500 unit limit: Apparently SC has a 200 unit limit

...which is never reached in a normal game. But still, if you really wanted to you could have 200 of each race, giving you a 600 limit.

* 'Alliance Symbols': You can have up to ten players in TA (up to nine AIs), that can be set as two massive
alliances, ten armies out for themselves, or anywhere in between. Oh yeah--500 units apiece


8 people playing is enough for me, a 4v4 game lags the hell out of my slow modem.

* Map size: I know this was hit in the quoted post, but I would like to add to it. Original TA has a maximum map
size of 40*40; thats in 640*480 screens. 8*8 is considered 'small'; 3rd party designers have pushed the limit to
63*63, and are hinting that larger is possible. In addition, the maps, are considered to be 20% larger with regard to
aircraft, so they don't have to stop short at the edge of the map.

With starcraft you can do this as well. A 64*64 game is small, 256*256 is big. for wierdness, you could even make a 64*256 or some such.

* Naval Units: TA has them, complete with subs, amphibious unit, hovercraft, sonar, torpedos, and depth charges.
Units that are underwater are invisible unless you have an underwater unit nearby. Did I mention torpedo bombers?
http://www.aqueousrift.com


* Unit Types: Original TA has room for roughly 230 different units. I forget how many units are included, but I think
it's around 130. 3rd party designers filled in the rest pretty quickly, and figured out a way to squeeze in another
twelve...

If starcraft had that many units then games wouldn't be based on speed and micromanagement, its a whole different type.

* Unit Selection Options: there are hot keys to select all units, all armed units, all aircraft, all armed aircraft, all
construction vehicles, etc.

hotkeys for everything, spells, attacks, you name it.

* LOS options: Premapped or blacked out, True (to life), Circular (can see through hills), or permanent(everything
is revealed)...

There's more, but this is long enough.

Don't compare TA with a game thats not based with the same kind of strategy and say its better, look at the people playing it. Starcraft/Brood War has been out for 2 years now, and at any given moment there are 40,000 people playing them online. Weekends can get 60,000+

[Pren Draig]

My friend has TA and he reckons the only way to play it is in multiplayer since the AI is only average (he said this, not me - I haven't played it ). I have played SC though and it's a great single player experience as well as multiplayer.

I think this is how it pans out:

Total Annihilation - huge unit variety, increasingly new units (courtesy of the Net) and a more accurately represented battlefield.

Starcraft - more personality, much better singleplayer experience and is just a hoot to play.

[catullus]

Nobody mentioned XCOM? Shame. I almost voted for it on Gamespot's poll, but it's not strictly a strategy game.
First XCOM (Ufo: Enemy unknown) game is probably the best game ever created.

I also enjoy blasting away imps in DOOM at the end of a hard day at the office. No other FPS has managed to create so chilling and frightening athmosphere. While Q3Arena has more impressive graphics and sounds, and killing workmates is more fun than killing cacodemons, I've never been truly scared by Q3A (or any other newer FPS I've tried).

The best 4X space strategy game is MOO. Original MOO and original XCOM never leave my HD, and both tend to follow along onto every PC I own. With careful planning, the upcoming MOO3 might be the game to replace Civ2 as best strategy game ever.

C.

[The Mad Monk]

My brother loves X-COM, and I love DOOM. As for getting spooked, have you ever tried System Shock 2? It's the only game that has ever trully creeped me out. It shares a common engine with Thief.

edit: spell check and addendum.
[This message has been edited by The Mad Monk (edited April 07, 2000).]

[ir]

C&C series in RTS. Actually it has more convinient interface and easier to command compare to SC. Last has some good options but I can't say 'It's wonderful!!!'

MOO2.

Baldur's Gate. Well, if you finish it once you will know main locations but it's still fun.

[monolith94]

John-SJ: I haven't played it for a while, mainly because I have extremely little hard drive space (The best Myth 2 installation is 500m megs) for a while. . . Last time I was there, it was pretty good though. It also has a neato ranking system. They have made World War 2 mod maps, a Wild West map, and even two lego maps (They look like the real thing!!!), all third party for free of course.

Anyways, you might develop a love for your troops, be careful. With each passing, your unit gets stronger. Archers and dwarves get more accurate, and so on. . . Keep as many units as you can alive!!! It is hardcore tactical, not at all strategical.

[Jaakko]

catullus,

You're right, X-COM certainly deserves a place as one of the best games of all time.

My "playing now" list must get a new candidate on it as well, Jagged Alliance 2.
I bought it last Tuesday and I've been playing it non-stop ever since.
Damn but it's addictive!
It has most of the good stuff of X-COM (why is destructible environment such a hard thing to do?), and it's with real weapons! Now all we need is a couple of UFOs...

If you want a scary FPS, SS2 is excellent (as MM said), and I hear Aliens vs. Predator can soil people's pants too...

[KaiserIsak]

StarCraft is really great. I just never get bored of this multiplayer games, even if i have played for 6 hours or something. I guess SC is my favorite game (except civ).
Come play with me, my battle.net name is KaiserIsak, and my ICQ # is 42813434
Zerg is my favorite, but i am best with Toss. Terran really suck, they are just far to advanced to controll. With zergs and toss u can win a late game using hydras and goons, terran just dont have anything in compare, to win u need a combination between so many units, it makes it very hard to play.
I quited TA after only a few days, i realized SC was so much better.

[Pren Draig]

The Sims is great - however IMHO it's one of those games you pick up every now and then and play. If I try to play it day in, day out for a week it just gets too boring. I plyed it the other day for the first time in a month and I had a great time with it. Chances are though that I won't even look at it again for another month. It's that type of game for me.

[SpideyBat]

Here are some good games for you:

Elite II: Frontier - an OLD game, you can find it at EBay or download it from an abandonware site (the designer said it was OK for people to put it on there sites since its so OLD). A great game if you are a sci-fi fan, and think trading from different solar systems is fun.

Grand Theft Auto 2-A heck of a fun game if you like being chased by cops, stealing city buses, and other stuff, I got it a few days ago and I CANT stop playing it.

The Sims- A friend is going to loan me this game tommarow, but from what I heard, it can either be fun or boring, depending on your your own perspective.