The Five Best Real-time Strategy Games of All Time:

Real Time Strategy (or RTS) is historically probably the second most popular video game gene, after only first-person shooters. The genre is either turn-based or real-time combat, in which the player normally controls an entire army of characters in an effort to eliminate the other army(ies). This genre has had an enormous number of games created over the years, but some stand out above all others. Here are the top 5 RTS games, measured both for gameplay quality as well as importance to the genre.

1. Starcraft

Starcraft is the unrivaled most important video game in the genre ever. First published in 1998, the game is still regularly bought and has an enormous following. It was developed by Blizzard Entertainment and published on Windows, Macintosh, and the Nintendo 64. A sequel is planned to come out sometime this year.

Starcraft is a science-fiction game, with a touch of fantasy. It is excellent for a variety of reasons. First, it was revolutionary as one of the first games ever to allow multiplayer combat online, and between any number of players. It also had a revolutionary two-part resource management system, as well as well-written stories, which is rare for a video game. The only noticeable weakness in this game is that the graphics are horrible today, which is definitely to be expected from a game that was made so long ago.

2. Command and Conquer Generals: Zero Hour

The original Command and Conquer game allowed you to control a small number of units in a standard base-defense style RTS game, controlling any of three different sides. The game was released in 2003. It was developed and published by EA games for Windows and the Macintosh platform.

Zero Hour was revolutionary in that it expanded the three original sides into three different "Generals" each. This allowed each side a whole variety of special abilities, all with positives and negatives. This allowed for a much larger choice of strategy in the game, rather than merely tactics. It also put an edge on games between the same countries. Putting this game at this position on the list also is an homage to the excellent and very fun gameplay and that even today, the online multiplayer system remains extremely busy, allowing all to find a game.

3. Dragonshard

Dragonshard (published 2005 by Atari, developed by Liquid Entertainment) had an excellent concept that, unfortunately, was not adopted widely through the RTS genre. The concept was that of a two-layer battle system. On the top layer, a character would have a large number of followers, but in the dungeon below, your character would be an avatar, similar to an RPG video game. Also, it used experience points as a resource, allowing you to upgrade your characters based on the number of experience points that you spend on them. A final revolutionary idea that the game had was that the way you build your base changed the abilities that your characters had. Unfortunately, the game did not sell very well, so few of the ideas were widely used in later games.

4. Age of Mythology

Age of Mythology (published 2002 by Microsoft and MacSoft, developed by Ensemble Studios) was an excellent game for two reasons. First, it had an incredible campaign that was very fun to play. Furthermore, it was very different from other games in that not only was the campaign a good story, it also really taught the person to play the game. How often do you find a tutorial in a game that really works?

Finally, the game introduced the ideas of single use powers and ages. Already there had been many different games that gave you powers with a cooldown time, or time before it could be used again, but never single use but incredibly strong powers. Finally, the progressive ages that changed the way the game unfolded was an excellent way to make the gameplay more dynamic.

5. Rise of Nations

Rise of Nations (published 2003 by Microsoft, developed by Big Huge Games) deserves the fifth position on this list merely for the excellent gameplay. The game had an unrivaled variety of nations, units, and ways to upgrade. This includes 18 different nations, and a total of 200 different units. Every single one of them could be upgraded in multiple ways. Also, the game developed systems that made sure that both strategy (long range) and tactics (short range) mattered. These included hot spots in each map that needed to be taken but took a very long time to do so. Therefore, strategic errors in the beginning could make a difference later on.