List the greatest game ever created: by genre

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
edit: wiki has EU listed as a "Grand strategy" game. That sounds familiar.

Wiki also has it listed under TBS:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_strategy_video_games

Gonna call it turn based now?

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
And if you play, say, Deus Ex, which doesn't match your expectations (which plenty of people do believe to be an RPG or, at the very least, a FPS/RPG hybrid)?

Then I call it an FPS/RPG hybrid. As Zelda is Action/Adventure.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Wiki also has it listed under TBS:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_strategy_video_games

Gonna call it turn based now?

No. I don't claim wiki as some ultimate arbiter, but I do think it can provide evidence of what most people perceive a particular game to be (and genres are exactly that, what most people perceive them to be).

[Kuciwalker]

What, Rise of Nations is not an RTS game anymore?

Time in RoN is continuous. And RoN, while firmly an RTS, is a bit of an outlier (given how tightly clustered most RTS's are around a particular type of gameplay, with very minor variations between them). It was deliberately trying to bring in elements of TBS, as I recall.

There is unit building and controlling units though. However, they involve armies. And you do build up your provinces, approximating 'base building' functions. It isn't the same exact model as, say, Starcraft, but that doesn't mean everything is completely different.

They are completely different. On the level you're talking about, HOI is more similar to Civ (units and cities = units and bases) than C&C. Deploying a division of Semi-modern Armor in Berlin is different from a Mammoth Tank rolling out of your War Factory. And that reminds me - not only is time discrete in HOI, space is too. Space is divided into provinces, rather than being continuous like in RTS's*.

* yes, most earlier RTS's had space discretely divided up into tiles in the engine, but this was for technical reasons rather than as a gameplay element. Most modern RTS's are continuous or, if they aren't, use lots of tricks to hide it.

Instead of comparing GalCiv to Civilization, what about, say X-COM? The only common elements, really, there are turn-based gameplay and strategy.

GalCiv and Civilization are 4X TBS's; X-COM is a turn-based squad game, or whatever the specific term is. (I haven't played enough of X-COM to comment on the base-building stuff outside of combat.) Both are subgenres of TBS (arguably, the squad combat part is strictly turn-based tactical; let's not go there) and neither really fights the other for the title. 4X itself has subgenres, like Space 4X. EU and Starcraft are completely unrelated games which, due to a (poor?) choice of genre name have competing claims.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Time in RoN is continuous. And RoN, while firmly an RTS, is a bit of an outlier (given how tightly clustered most RTS's are around a particular type of gameplay, with very minor variations between them). It was deliberately trying to bring in elements of TBS, as I recall.

And yet, was considered to be firmly an RTS. Just because it brings in aspects of other games doesn't make it less of an RTS. Warcraft III brought in role playing elements... still a solid RTS there.

The time in RoN is just as continuous as EU games. Just because you can pause to set orders and restart them again, doesn't make it any more discrete. You can pause it at any time, or, get this, not pause it AT ALL during the entire game play, with the exception of an event though that came into play in EUII, IIRC, and really doesn't break up the game into any distinct measurably units at all.

Though it'll be really interesting to see if Supreme Commander has pause features. It'll definately be called an RTS and it'll be even harder to differentiate.

They are completely different. On the level you're talking about, HOI is more similar to Civ (units and cities = units and bases) than C&C. Deploying a division of Semi-modern Armor in Berlin is different from a Mammoth Tank rolling out of your War Factory. And that reminds me - not only is time discrete in HOI, space is too. Space is divided into provinces, rather than being continuous like in RTS's*.

* yes, most earlier RTS's had space discretely divided up into tiles in the engine, but this was for technical reasons rather than as a gameplay element. Most modern RTS's are continuous or, if they aren't, use lots of tricks to hide it.

HOI may be more similar in the way it uses its units and cities to Civ... aside for the fact that Civ is distinctly turn based... you didn't forget that did you? Though Civ's space (at least for the first two games) was continuous.

I don't really consider it to be an issue that moves it into another gaming genre, but the fact that you admit that earlier RTS games did have space discreetly divided up means that you can't particularly claim that a game with that now falls outside of TBS. Just because a lot of modern RTS games aren't doing it now, you can't ignore that it was done.

GalCiv and Civilization are 4X TBS's; X-COM is a turn-based squad game, or whatever the specific term is. (I haven't played enough of X-COM to comment on the base-building stuff outside of combat.) Both are subgenres of TBS (arguably, the squad combat part is strictly turn-based tactical; let's not go there) and neither really fights the other for the title. 4X itself has subgenres, like Space 4X. EU and Starcraft are completely unrelated games which, due to a (poor?) choice of genre name have competing claims.

X-COM was for a long time considered a turn based STRATEGY game. TBS, just like Civ. Recently a number of new games have created a Turn Based Tactical genre, but it was considered to be one of the major TBS games.

EU and Starcraft are probably as unrelated as Civ and X-COM are in terms of gameplay. They both fit under RTS, but are different RTS "subgenres" if you will.

Not every game which is innovative deserves its own genre you know? You would have been Half-Life in its own genre when it came out: First Person Story Shooter or something .

[Imran Siddiqui]

And, perhaps, to end this silly debate, Strategy First (ie, the publisher for EU 1 and 2) says on its website for EU:

http://www.strategyfirst.com/en/games/redir/?iGameID=17

EUROPA UNIVERSALIS... is a real time strategy game recreating world history from the Age of Discovery (1492) to the advent of the Napoleonic era (1792). The combination of real-time, multiplayer game play and historical accuracy makes Europa Universalis unique in the genre.

Genre: Real-Time Strategy

[Odin]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
EU gameplay is completely unrelated to C&C gameplay, though.

How does that make it NOT a RTS game? Your logic sucks.

[Odin]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
SimCity is a real-time strategy game (not war strategy, but still strategy). Should it be classified as an RTS?

SinCity is a simulation game, not a strategy game.

[DrSpike]

I think what everyone has to realise is that the genre classifications, like all such classifications, are just a tool to lend structure to what would otherwise be an even more chaotic debate. There are always cases that fit clearly within their genre, and cases where the boundaries are fuzzy.

In this particular case it is hard to argue with the point that EU is a strategy game played in real time and therefore RTS. Nevertheless Kuci's point that there is a clear distinction between it and the genre started by Dune2 and popularised by C&C is of course a fair one.

When Dune2 came out there was only a need to distinguish from the TB games that were the staple of the day (though there were some exception even then). The problem is that EU2 and its ilk which came later never developed its own classification in common useage despite being clearly different. Some like "grand strategy" though, which is a great deal better in my view than RTS.

[El_Cid]

Originally posted by cronos_qc
Tactical/Strategy: Syndicate ..........

Ah Syndicate - i'd forgotten about that baby, yeah definately had that special something.

[El_Cid]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui


Er... with all the talk/hype since Half Life 2 was released, you'd think someone would mention it (people are saying Half Life 1 so far). Just because you think something is a wonderful game doesn't mean you consider it to be the best of that genre of all time.. duh!

Maybe Jon Miller is right .

Well Half Life2 had Starforce i think - that p**sed quite a few people of(correct me if i'm wrong - i'm no fps fanboy), and it was also out a fair while a go.

Oblivion has been out for only a few months - no-one even talks about it anymore.......weird really when you consider how long lived both Daggerfall+Morrowind were in their day?

Jon Miller certainly isnt right about Oblivion being a great TES(which we agreed to disagree on) imho - but then that wasn't what you were alluding to

My beef with OB is that to me it represents ALL that is wrong with the games industry today(self-hype/gloss/graphics above everything else a game should be) and what next-gen will be for the future.

If people are happy to spend money on games like it then thats their perogative - i'm just counting myself out of financialy supporting such dross(imho).

and no it hasnt been responsible for the death of any family members or divorce - its commited a more serious sin to my gameing eyes

On the subject of EU - they remind me of the M.A.X games, psuedo-turnbased i'd call it, or RTS with a pause function would be another way to label it? wasn't it possible to make them act like a tbs though - in the options you could get it to stop untill you clicked a kind of 'end-turn' button?

Its been over a year since i played EU, and i might be getting mixed up with another game????

Still i never found they felt pure rts like AoE for example.

Best portable tbs: Advance Wars 1+2(gba)

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Odin
SinCity is a simulation game, not a strategy game.

There is an element of strategy to it, no? It's not just random clicking? Thus, RTS.

Yes, it's absurd. Thus, my point.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Odin
How does that make it NOT a RTS game? Your logic sucks.

Because I consider C&C, AOE, and Starcraft to be pretty much genre-defining. (Never played the Dune games so I can't include them.)

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
And yet, was considered to be firmly an RTS. Just because it brings in aspects of other games doesn't make it less of an RTS. Warcraft III brought in role playing elements... still a solid RTS there.

I agree, that's because in general the games in the RTS genre are very, very similar. Thus any significant deviation from Starcraft gameplay is easily noticed and attributed to the influence of another genre (or innovation).

The time in RoN is just as continuous as EU games.

No. RoN has time that is divided into steps far too small to have any human meaning (hence it being essentially continuous depsite discretization at a computational level). EU has time divided into days, with NO further division. And depending on the speed setting, it takes quite a bit of time for time to "step" to the next day and anything to happen at all.

Just because you can pause to set orders and restart them again, doesn't make it any more discrete.

I agree. You don't understand what I mean by discrete. The two were separate points.

Though it'll be really interesting to see if Supreme Commander has pause features. It'll definately be called an RTS and it'll be even harder to differentiate.

Isn't that game the one where you can zoom out from the Risk-map to the tactical-map smoothly? Depending on how the implement it, it could end up being just a very esoteric RTS or a smooth blend of TBS and RTS.

They are completely different. On the level you're talking about, HOI is more similar to Civ (units and cities = units and bases) than C&C. Deploying a division of Semi-modern Armor in Berlin is different from a Mammoth Tank rolling out of your War Factory. And that reminds me - not only is time discrete in HOI, space is too. Space is divided into provinces, rather than being continuous like in RTS's*.

* yes, most earlier RTS's had space discretely divided up into tiles in the engine, but this was for technical reasons rather than as a gameplay element. Most modern RTS's are continuous or, if they aren't, use lots of tricks to hide it.

HOI may be more similar in the way it uses its units and cities to Civ... aside for the fact that Civ is distinctly turn based... you didn't forget that did you? Though Civ's space (at least for the first two games) was continuous.

No, Civ's space is discrete. I don't think you understand the word.

I don't really consider it to be an issue that moves it into another gaming genre, but the fact that you admit that earlier RTS games did have space discreetly divided up means that you can't particularly claim that a game with that now falls outside of TBS. Just because a lot of modern RTS games aren't doing it now, you can't ignore that it was done.

I think you don't understand the word. As they were implemented on the computer, space was discretized, but that was not an element of gameplay (unlike space divided into provinces in EU) and in fact they often tried to mask it.

X-COM was for a long time considered a turn based STRATEGY game. TBS, just like Civ.

Didn't I say that?

Recently a number of new games have created a Turn Based Tactical genre, but it was considered to be one of the major TBS games.

Didn't I basically say that?

EU and Starcraft are probably as unrelated as Civ and X-COM are in terms of gameplay. They both fit under RTS, but are different RTS "subgenres" if you will.

See DrSpike's post.

Not every game which is innovative deserves its own genre you know? You would have been Half-Life in its own genre when it came out: First Person Story Shooter or something .

The difference between EU and Starcraft is huge.

edit: fixed quote tags

[duke o' york]

Best strategy-related forum bickering: This thread.