EPT[Q] How did other RTS games fail? - Page 2
| Forum Index > SC2 General |
|
hazz
United Kingdom570 Posts
| ||
|
Puosu
7017 Posts
On January 03 2009 14:52 Hazz wrote: halo IS a failure - its boring and easy Ugh that is just ignorant, name one non-PC fps that would be a better e-Sport? +.+ And I do know that part of the success is just Microsofts clever marketing but it still is the biggest succesful e-Sport in the states and it really can't be said otherwise. | ||
|
DeepGray
United States214 Posts
On January 03 2009 14:54 Puosu wrote: Ugh that is just ignorant, name one non-PC fps that would be a better e-Sport? +.+ There's the problem. Nothing good can come out of an FPS without a mouse and keyboard. | ||
|
RaiZ
2813 Posts
Fuk w3 though. | ||
|
hazz
United Kingdom570 Posts
On January 03 2009 15:06 DeepGray wrote: There's the problem. Nothing good can come out of an FPS without a mouse and keyboard. | ||
|
Loanshark
China3094 Posts
On January 03 2009 14:54 Puosu wrote: Ugh that is just ignorant, name one non-PC fps that would be a better e-Sport? +.+ And I do know that part of the success is just Microsofts clever marketing but it still is the biggest succesful e-Sport in the states and it really can't be said otherwise. There isn't a non-PC fps that can be an e-Sport, except possibly COD4. Sure I wouldn't say Halo is bad, it just isn't good. Any person with half a brain can make a decent FPS that people like. Take Halo: characters with same health, nearly symmetrical maps, respawning, weapons scattered around map, nothing revolutionary, it's kinda obvious they didn't spend time on balance and relied on everything else to make a game that would appear great. It's like a RTS with only macro. Back to Starcraft. | ||
|
CommanderFluffy
Taiwan1059 Posts
anyway, i think a major problem with other RTS games i've played is game speed. Not just how long it takes shit to die, but game pace in general is very important to me. SCBW, we all know is fast, ruthless, and of course if you can't keep up, unfor-fucking-giving. Many games fail to deliver streamlined, fast paced gameplay. These days when i see other RTS games like CnC 3, DoW series, i think the devs are too focused on hyping how pretty stuff looks. I don't wanna admire the units/terrain, i don't want to zoom in and out of a battle to watch how it goes. No matter how you sugar coat shit, it's still shit. | ||
|
Fen
Australia1848 Posts
Balance - Obviously a game wont be perefectly balanced on release, but it is soo important that it is relatively balanced shortly after release. Ive been playing RA3 recently and the balance is terrible, (there are actually rushes that are physically impossible to stop). If you cant get balance right early, then people are going to give up on the game and remember it as the game where strategy x or unit x destroyed the game. Depth - It seems every game that comes out these days has a very linear and standard way of playing, then you have your cheese and thats it. There is no developing interesting strategy because the game designers have chosen exactly how the game should be played out and designed it around this concept. Instead of giving players unique and interesting units and let them discover interesting ways to use them, we get 2 generic tanks, an anti-air unit, an anti-infantry unit and a gl hf by developers. Strategy will never get deep if thats all we are given. Support - The amount of games that have been plagued by hackers, cheaters and nothing has been done about it is unbelievable. Also, the amount of games in which crashes or game breaking bugs go unfixed is terrible. RTS games need nurturing, you cant just throw them out on the market and think they will survive without support. Gladly, Blizzard have shown in the past that they own on all three fronts. So Im looking forward to seeing what SC2 becomes. | ||
|
anotak
United States1537 Posts
Warhammer 40k: Autobuild. What the hell? Not even talking about automine here, we're talking AUTO FUCKING BUILD. Second: 9 races in 45 matchups. I'd love to see someone make a game like that balanced. And some of the races violate the inherent setup of races (ex. Necron needing only 1 of the 2 resources unlike every other race in the game). Other mechanics are insane as well (free units for some of the races). Detection is confusing. Imagine having to fight dark templar but not having any obvious way of knowing what unit detects or what to build. And on the other hand some races THEIR WORKERS DETECT. WHAT???? Command & Conquer 3: In the amount of time it takes a missile to travel from the weapon it is fired to the target gives me enough time to go, get up, make a sandwich and come back and then micro my unit to dodge successfully. Extremely boring. Detection is unclear how it works... apparently units only detect in certain directions and other things? not sure. Plus a lot of people have anti-brand name recognition with EA. Plus the people interested in the plot of the game are confused as shit when half the stuff got retconned randomly. Too much focus on superweapons. Early builds were terribly balanced. I watched some WCG2007 vids of this game, the finals bo5 consisted of this: Scrin Vs. Scrin. Game 1: Player 1 does Seeker rush, Player 2 does slightly slower seeker rush. Player 1 wins. Game 2: Same as Game 1. Game 3: Same as game 1. ETC. utterly retarded. Red Alert 2: succeeded imo. Not on the level of SC, but sold very well. Too much focus on superweapons, thankfully they can be turned off. Generals: Slow, boring. Haven't played it much tbh. I do know that it heavily disappointed C&C players with it's more SC-like interface but at the same time SC players don't like it because it's quite obviously C&C. Too much focus on superweapons. Supreme Commander: I don't play it but I watched the best player in my town play it for about 2 minutes (literally) at a local tournament that he won. His actions consisted of the following: Zoom in. Zoom out. Select a group of units. Zoom out more. Click on the opposite side of the map. Zoom in. Sit and watch for about 30 seconds. Zoom out. Zoom in. Zoom out. site there for a little longer. At this point I got bored and decided to go play Street Fighter because my friend had showed up. WC3: Too complicated. I watch it and all I understand is shiny shit just got cast by one dude and then the other dude cast shiny shit and then town portal. Hell, I even play this with my friend and that's all I understand really. I've even beaten some of my worse friends at it and I DONT KNOW WHAT ANYTHING DOES. I've had this game for YEARS. And I don't UNDERSTAND ANYTHING. what the hell. Kinda slow too. Myth 2: No base management, I never tried multiplayer. I wouldn't be surprised if this game is kinda good multiplayer but idk. Also perhaps too obviously violent and it hurt sales probably. Like it's got a guy with his face mangled on the cover. And sure when I was a kid my mom bought me all sorts of violent games like UT and stuff but the game with the guy's face ripped off on the cover was a no-no. WC2: Mostly succeeded. Perhaps not deep enough. Also very hard to control, even at the time. The UI was lacking even when it came out. C&C tiberian sun: art style didn't stand out too much in most people's heads. very cheesy cutscenes. I loved the way this game felt, musically and in control but i was terrible at it. most people thought this game was worse than the previous ones just because it was "too futuristic" might as well be "starcraft 2 or something" c&c players said. kinda like how sc players have said that sc2 is like wc3??? | ||
|
CommanderFluffy
Taiwan1059 Posts
Game starts, both players pick heroes and build some tier one units, scout each other, go creeping, skirmish - player 1 retreats and eats candy, player 2 goes MFing with army, huge battle, player 1 retreats again, eats more candy, announcer says hes ahead.  | ||
|
GeneralStan
United States4789 Posts
Its that the units look and feel right. That when you move them, they do it how you would expect, that they feel fluid when they move, that they look sharp and distinctive, that they are varied and (mostly) balanced. Its that they have faces you remember, voices that fit into the combat, and they all have abilities that are just plain fun to watch unfold. Its the music, its the simple to watch graphics, its the sharp and clear gameplay. Blizzard polishes their games to perfection, they make (mostly) every unit fit and work and most of all fun. The difference between a Blizzard game and any other is that they give you units that you fall in love with and want to spend hours with. They give you control that makes you want more. Blizzard packages addiction in a box, and that's the foundation of a competitive game. Because they are so much fun to play, people do, and they play them a lot, and a competative scene just springs naturally out of so many people playing the game. Then Blizzard supports it and fine tunes it until the balance is perfect. On January 03 2009 15:29 Loanshark wrote: Sure I wouldn't say Halo is bad, it just isn't good. Any person with half a brain can make a decent FPS that people like. Take Halo: characters with same health, nearly symmetrical maps, respawning, weapons scattered around map, nothing revolutionary, it's kinda obvious they didn't spend time on balance and relied on everything else to make a game that would appear great. . This is so wrong. While the map set up and weapons are important components of a game, they aren't the true components that make a game great or not. It's like saying the reason that starcraft is great is because of the units numbers, without taking into account how the units move, they way they control, that they are distinctive and feel right. The same is true in Halo. The weapons (mostly) look and fire the way a player intuitively expects them to. They have a satisfying effect, they are diverse and (mostly) balanced. The characters movement and jumping is carefully tuned, and the graphics make it (mostly) easy to tell what is going on. This is the reason why Counter Strike is an international success story and similar half-life mod Firearms is a forgotten footnote. | ||
|
hazz
United Kingdom570 Posts
On January 03 2009 15:45 anotak wrote: Total Annihilation: Ass networking support. Badly balanced units. Both races have 200+ units. Guess what, about 5 are ACTUALLY USEFUL. Warhammer 40k: Autobuild. What the hell? Not even talking about automine here, we're talking AUTO FUCKING BUILD. Second: 9 races in 45 matchups. I'd love to see someone make a game like that balanced. And some of the races violate the inherent setup of races (ex. Necron needing only 1 of the 2 resources unlike every other race in the game). Other mechanics are insane as well (free units for some of the races). Detection is confusing. Imagine having to fight dark templar but not having any obvious way of knowing what unit detects or what to build. And on the other hand some races THEIR WORKERS DETECT. WHAT???? Command & Conquer 3: In the amount of time it takes a missile to travel from the weapon it is fired to the target gives me enough time to go, get up, make a sandwich and come back and then micro my unit to dodge successfully. Extremely boring. Detection is unclear how it works... apparently units only detect in certain directions and other things? not sure. Plus a lot of people have anti-brand name recognition with EA. Plus the people interested in the plot of the game are confused as shit when half the stuff got retconned randomly. Too much focus on superweapons. Early builds were terribly balanced. I watched some WCG2007 vids of this game, the finals bo5 consisted of this: Scrin Vs. Scrin. Game 1: Player 1 does Seeker rush, Player 2 does slightly slower seeker rush. Player 1 wins. Game 2: Same as Game 1. Game 3: Same as game 1. ETC. utterly retarded. Red Alert 2: succeeded imo. Not on the level of SC, but sold very well. Too much focus on superweapons, thankfully they can be turned off. Generals: Slow, boring. Haven't played it much tbh. I do know that it heavily disappointed C&C players with it's more SC-like interface but at the same time SC players don't like it because it's quite obviously C&C. Too much focus on superweapons. Supreme Commander: I don't play it but I watched the best player in my town play it for about 2 minutes (literally) at a local tournament that he won. His actions consisted of the following: Zoom in. Zoom out. Select a group of units. Zoom out more. Click on the opposite side of the map. Zoom in. Sit and watch for about 30 seconds. Zoom out. Zoom in. Zoom out. site there for a little longer. At this point I got bored and decided to go play Street Fighter because my friend had showed up. WC3: Too complicated. I watch it and all I understand is shiny shit just got cast by one dude and then the other dude cast shiny shit and then town portal. Hell, I even play this with my friend and that's all I understand really. I've even beaten some of my worse friends at it and I DONT KNOW WHAT ANYTHING DOES. I've had this game for YEARS. And I don't UNDERSTAND ANYTHING. what the hell. Kinda slow too. Myth 2: No base management, I never tried multiplayer. I wouldn't be surprised if this game is kinda good multiplayer but idk. Also perhaps too obviously violent and it hurt sales probably. Like it's got a guy with his face mangled on the cover. And sure when I was a kid my mom bought me all sorts of violent games like UT and stuff but the game with the guy's face ripped off on the cover was a no-no. WC2: Mostly succeeded. Perhaps not deep enough. Also very hard to control, even at the time. The UI was lacking even when it came out. C&C tiberian sun: art style didn't stand out too much in most people's heads. very cheesy cutscenes. I loved the way this game felt, musically and in control but i was terrible at it. most people thought this game was worse than the previous ones just because it was "too futuristic" might as well be "starcraft 2 or something" c&c players said. kinda like how sc players have said that sc2 is like wc3??? Agree with everything, have played all games save for Myth 2, and warcraft 3 extensively on a competitive level and I do agree. Unlike starcraft, you can't be a newbie and understand everything in warcraft 3 (which hurts eSports potential) China seems to have embraced it however. Red Alert 2 could have used some better online support imo, though it was pretty decent for its time. | ||
|
Drium
United States888 Posts
Most other rts games, whether it's due to their slower pace, some design flaw, or the developer's attempt to give the game more casual appeal, have lower mechanical requirements. BW demands a great deal of speed, accuracy and multitasking from the players before strategy even really becomes an issue, which makes it a lot harder to get easy wins by abusing small imbalances. Maybe with perfect or near perfect mechanics from both players, Starcraft is unplayable. It's possible that terran has some uber strat against protoss or that with perfect micro 4 pool is always insta-win. These problems will never come up for us because no game is just one players strategy against another's with an even starting point, but they will come up for games with lower execution requirements. | ||
|
SWPIGWANG
Canada482 Posts
Where are the macro-strategy supporters on this forum??? When someone said that Starcraft had the most macro strategy, I felt dizzy~~~~ Though to be frank, I don't think any of those macro strategy games ever came close in market penetration or audience to micro ones. I guess build orders complicated enough to fill a book just lacks mass market appeal.... | ||
|
[X]Ken_D
United States4650 Posts
| ||
|
Fontong
United States6454 Posts
On January 03 2009 16:31 [X]Ken_D wrote: RTS are a lot harder to get into than other games. They require a bigger commitment for the initial learning curve whereas games like FPS are a lot more accessible. As a result there are less people trying out new RTS. Unless they have a big company or brand backing them up, most don't have the financial support to make their RTS to succeed and even get noticed. Yeah teaching SC to people who have never in their lives played video games is kind of teaching a rock to read and write. On the occasions we had people who were new to gaming in general come to out LANs(whether they be girls or non-gaming guys) it was so hard to get them to get even a basic understanding of the game. I remember how hard it was to teach people to attack-move rather than right clicking 1 unit while their units run confused clumping around. Whereas games like SSBB they can pick up a controller and immediately get the idea that the character will move in the direction they point the stick and they should press A to make an attack but I guess you don't need to do that, just press B to spam Fox's laser. | ||
|
Shadowfury333
Canada314 Posts
| ||
|
anotak
United States1537 Posts
On January 03 2009 16:24 SWPIGWANG wrote: Comment About macro-thingys: Almost all the games listed here are micro games. There is no talk of games like Rise of Nations, or even more crazy european econ RTS (aka simcity with troops) like settlers or seven kingdoms, or even Age of Empire series..... Where are the macro-strategy supporters on this forum??? When someone said that Starcraft had the most macro strategy, I felt dizzy~~~~ Though to be frank, I don't think any of those macro strategy games ever came close in market penetration or audience to micro ones. I guess build orders complicated enough to fill a book just lacks mass market appeal.... Rise of nations: I haven't played it but i watched someone else play it. I didn't like the way the borders mechanic worked, haven't really played it. here's some others i thought of: Earth 2150: Design-your-own unit is a bad game mechanic imo. looks cool on paper, boring in practice. In the end very few designs will be that competitive. Visuals are very lacking. Battle Realms: SLOWWWWW SO SLOW. And the combat is really not that interesting to look at. The whole game looks kinda bland. Populous: doesn't really feel right. the game controls funny and just generally not what people are looking for. Sins of a Solar Empire: Every game plays the same way, builds are the same every game, and games are 4 hours long. Universe at war: SO SLOWWWWWW MOVE FASTER. and NO HOTKEYS??? WHATTTTTTTTT??? mind. blown. Perimeter: Haven't really played it, just my friends were playing it lately. Looks very slow. Apparently is entirely about base building. Idk it might be a good game but it also looks very slow. The single player the gameplay speed can be changed but for some braindamaged reason multiplayer is stuck at normal speed. Imagine if starcraft multiplayer was STUCK on "slower" speed. On January 03 2009 16:42 Shadowfury333 wrote: @anotak: Myth 2 was meant to be a tactics game, and it was rather hard to micro well with decently large armies, as projectiles could hit friendlies, and all units pretty much had to be babysat in order to really deal a ton of damage. That game didn't do too poorly either, it was supported well, it was fun to play, and it's only big downside was lack of marketing, but back then Bungie was a Mac-focused company, which explains that (Myth 2 was their first Windows game since Marathon 2 IIRC) ahh i only ever had the demo of it, i was mainly going on memory. | ||
|
doubleupgradeobbies!
Australia1288 Posts
On January 03 2009 14:45 Hazz wrote: Is there any game apart from starcraft with such diverse economy management? Every other RTS seems to devolve into unit spam and basic micro. I don't think its fair to say warcraft 3 has inherently flawed gameplay because macro isn't the focus Just to clarify, I'm not saying it's flawed because it's not focused on macro. I'm saying it's flawed cos macro isn't even really an option. There are basically no macro decisions to be made once you pass a certain(relatively low) level of play. And macro being what is normally considered a fundamental part of RTS's as opposed to RTT such as the battle mode for total war series games. Means if the macro side of a game is fundamentally flawed, then so is the game itself. | ||
|
Ancestral
United States3230 Posts
Now I realize the reason these particular games didn't succeed is because they were total jive ass crap, but there was a time when everyone and his brother was making an RTS game, and they were all so much worse than the games mentioned here. It really shows at least to me that SC is the standard, and any feature that is in an RTS game that was not in StarCraft is set to come under intense scrutiny, because it probably sucks and is unnecessary. In my opinion however, that's good, and an RTS e-sports scene with tons of random games and a largely divided community wouldn't be so cool. I think having two games that have withstood the test of time is good, I'm not as much a fan of WCIII, but I guess there is something about it that doesn't suck. The battles are intense, to say the least. | ||
| ||
