When you're playing video games, do you just want to turn off your brain, blow up stuff, and collect loot? Then Of Hydralisks & Phalanxes isn't for you. In a column with a name as awkward and parochial as some of the games themselves, strategy wonk Tom Chick takes a look at the latest and greatest in real-time strategy, turn-based games, city builders, wargames, and other such quasi-cerebral pursuits.
The Road to Perfection
I don't make games; I just play them. Which is too bad for you, because if I made games, I would make the perfect real-time strategy game. Not that I have anything against turn-based games, but the perfect one of those has already been made. Several times, in fact. Brian Reynolds' Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, Imperialism II: The Age of Exploration, and Sid Meier's Civilization IV, for instance.
Fortunately, most of the hard work for the perfect real-time strategy game has already been done. It just hasn't been done in the same game. All I have to do is clump together bits from other games, do some quick testing to make sure it doesn't crash, and, voila -- the perfect RTS! I'll give you a sneak peak, but you have to promise not to show it to any actual game developers who might steal my idea. The perfect RTS will include the following things.
The spectacle of Sins of a Solar Empire. You can't swing a dead Zergling without hitting a gorgeous RTS. But you won't find any built as carefully as Sins of a Solar Empire when it comes to letting you admire the graphics. Lovely, amazing spaceship models! Sublime, cosmic skyboxes! Explosions and lasers and missiles and fighters! And an interface to let you play from whatever view you want! Queue up a dozen frigates and rally them to a system halfway across the map, all the while admiring a border skirmish at some far-flung crystal mining outpost around a gas giant. Using Sins as a model, my perfect RTS won't make you choose between graphics and gameplay.
Perfect graphics!
The interface from Rise of Nations: Rise of Legends. Of course, no one has done an interface as comprehensively comprehensive as Big Huge Games did with Rise of Legends (and the original Rise of Nations before it). I'll just borrow everything these guys did for my perfect RTS.
The kick of Company of Heroes. No one in an RTS yells and grunts and shoots with as much oomph as the guys in Company of Heroes, whether they're stealing doilies, reminding you that war is no kinderparty, or letting an MG 42 rip. Developer Relic attempted similar oomph in the Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War games, but it's purely speculative oomph; no one knows what an orc or plasma bolster really sound like. But we've all seen Saving Private Ryan, so we can vouch for Company of Heroes' authenticity. My perfect RTS will be similarly realistic and visceral and all those other buzzwords.
The tech tree from Supreme Commander 2. One of the smartest decisions in Supreme Commander 2 -- a game chock full of smart decisions -- was a tech tree that doesn't cost the same amount of money that you spend on your units. You don't have to choose between an advanced army or a large army; instead, you and your opponent feint and juke your way through tech trees as a separate set of decisions, regardless of how big an army you field. Yep, my RTS will do that.
Perfect tech!
The asymmetry of StarCraft. As anyone bored of chess knows, asymmetry is inherently more interesting than symmetry. StarCraft introduced the idea that each side (you need at least three, natch) needs its own unique toys with their own unique rules. Since then, it's a rare RTS that doesn't try to recreate StarCraftian asymmetry. My RTS will be no exception!
The mix of fantasy and reality from Age of Mythology. One of the greatest innovations in Age of Mythology was putting a simple Greek soldier with a spear next to a raging minotaur who can toss dudes into the air. In a game full of centaurs, medusae, and crocodiles with laser beams strapped to their heads, a minotaur is just another unit. But add him to an army of mere historical soldiers, and you've got a minotaur that stands out. The best fantasy lets us see where we fit next to these fantastical creatures. My perfect RTS will have normal stuff to make the crazy stuff crazier.
The licensing power of The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth II. I don't really know what license my perfect RTS will have, but I know it needs one. Brilliant games aren't enough anymore; they have to be brilliant games based brilliantly on J.R.R. Tolkien movies or something. Once I finish my perfect RTS, I'll have to see what the new hotness is, and then I'll just slap it over the game. Stand by for more specifics.
Perfect movie tie-in!
The business model of League of Legends. Riot Games taught us that free-to-play is not a four-letter word. My RTS will be totally free, except for the stuff you buy.
The multiplayer community of StarCraft II. Again, brilliant games aren't enough anymore, because they're liable to have small groups of practiced players efficiently beating the snot out of each other. A game needs a massive community in which at least half of the people aren't as good as you. I'm sure mine will have no problem attracting players. Who's not going to want to play the perfect RTS, right?
The console-friendliness of Darwinia or Tom Clancy's EndWar. Very few RTS games work well on a console. Luckily, my RTS will be one of them.
Finally, I'll toss in the haunting minimalism of DEFCON, the endearing simplicity of Swords & Soldiers, the home cities from Age of Empires III, the heroes from Warlords Battlecry, the space/planetside split from Star Wars: Empire at War, and the almost-confounding uniqueness of Kohan: Immortal Sovereigns. The only thing left is to think up a name. See how easy that was? I don't know why game developers can't get it right.
Tom Chick thinks he knows more about strategy gaming than he really does. You should probably just humor him, or he'll try to use the word "emergent" and embarrass himself in the process. You can read more and find his regular podcasts at Quarter to Three.