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Recommend me a RTS with good sp campaign

Taka-Haradin puolipeikko

Filthy Kalinite
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Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Bubbles In Memoria
Dark Reign might be the best pixel era RTS.
Scifi setting, much better UI than Blizzard and Westwood titles of that time.

Can you go into more detail? What makes this worth playing in 2019, specifically?
No idea how it scales to expectations of current year.

I just prefer game's UI compared to Warcraft 2 or Tiberian Sun.
You can do waypoints, set units to automatically scout, harass or seek & destroy enemies.
 

Dr Skeleton

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Scarping the barrel further:

Swarm Assault
Pure simplicity, no story, all factions are bugs. Each type of bugs has a hive that can produce 3 kinds of units, there are no resources, stronger units just take longer to make. Each hive can be taken over by attacking it, when its health goes to 0 it shoots honey (or whatever) all over and the side whose units pick up most of it takes over the hive. Hives have their own defenses and regenerate health faster if you don't make units at them. There are also some neutral units that attack all players. Has ants with bazookas. That's it. It does get boring eventually (I've never finished the campaign after 50+ missions) but for such a simple game it's pretty good, especially maps with multiple ai players and lots of hives.
shot3_02.jpg


Aztec Empire/Aztec Wars
Russian RTS with super cheesy story and acting. Aztecs invade steam-punk Russia, China is also involved but sadly there is very little of them in the campaign, and they are fully developed faction like the main 2. Flawed game to say the least but the campaign is long and difficult and it has some cool mechanics like taking over enemy bases and producing their units, alternate development paths for bases (rural/town/tech gives you different units, turrets and economy buildings), some units doing their own movement/kiting in battle.
aztec-wars_30.png
 

Darth Roxor

Royal Dongsmith
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Polanie 2, also known as "Knightshift" in the decadent west. Potato RTS in mythical slavland running on vodka, where your basic (and only) resource is MILK. Has some minor RPG elements too, mostly the way units can be levelled up and outfitted with items, sorta like in Jurassic War (also a gud and overlooked one that you should play if you haven't).



In fact, I shud play it again.

Though I wonder whether the game actually has the same value to non-potato as to potato.
 

Binky

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Hostile Waters: Antaeus Rising. Been ages since I last played it, but I remember it was pretty sweet.
498451-hostile-waters-antaeus-rising-windows-screenshot-our-first.jpg

498453-hostile-waters-antaeus-rising-windows-screenshot-resource.jpg
 

Galdred

Studio Draconis
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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Hostile Waters: Antaeus Rising. Been ages since I last played it, but I remember it was pretty sweet.
498451-hostile-waters-antaeus-rising-windows-screenshot-our-first.jpg

498453-hostile-waters-antaeus-rising-windows-screenshot-resource.jpg
Also, Battlezone. this one lets you control one of your units, and give your classic RTS orders.
Disclaimer: I have not played the remake, and I don't remember whether Battlezone 98 is better or worse than Battlezone 2.
BZ 2 feels more like a traditional RTS where you can hop in a hovertank to show the other pilots how it's done.

ss_a47117695416d35bee229ed99c4f226c104c7344.1920x1080.jpg

BZ2: commanding from the front:

maxresdefault.jpg

You also have Carrier Command, which is even further apart from your traditional RTS:
You get a carrier (I know...) that can produce aircrafts of tanks.
And you can pilot any of these.
The unit count is low. The AI feels like it was made to emulate a drunken baby pilot, but there is no other game like that.
The unit cap is very low (4 aircrafts and 4 tanks), but you can take over sectors to get better weapons to mount on your units.
It is still no traditional RTS at all, and not a very good game (mostly because the AI is completely unable to stay grouped, which forces you to do a lot of babysitting), but mods did somewhat fix it, and it was rather cool.
1-1024_440.jpg
 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Nobody mention the Earth series yet? Earth 2150 and 2160 are especially cool since you can design your own units by picking chassis, weapon, etc. Earth 2150 also has a very cool campaign where you pick a faction (Americans who have an army of high tech mechs, Russkis who have classic tanks, and the Lunar Corporation which is ruled by women because the low gravity of the moon causes more women to be born - they have hovertanks) and then you have to mine resources in order to build a spaceship to escape Earth, which somehow shifts its orbit closer to the sun and is going to get fucked soon. So in order to save humanity (or at least the part of humanity that is your faction) you need to collect resources and build a spaceship.

During campaign missions the main goal is to defeat the other faction on the map and mine all the resources, then send them back to your home base. This encourages non-wasteful play of preserving units and not building too many unnecessary buildings. Very cool campaign concept.
 

Jimmious

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
I definitely did not expect it to take 4 pages to mention Warhammer: Dark Omen (unless I missed it somehow?)
No base building but a decent fantasy story, EXCELLENT combat and units that transfer experience/items in the campaign etc. One of the best, if not THE best, single player RTS experiences.

 

ArchAngel

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Mar 16, 2015
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Lots of older games suggested, many of them over and over.
Let me then suggest some new ones (some mentioned already):
1. Grey Goo - modern graphics and animations; 2 factions have base building, 3rd plays like Zerg but with a mobile base. Single player campaign is pretty cool and gameplay is decent.
2. Act of Aggression - close future setting where world factions starts blowing each other up. Influenced a lot by C&C/Generals. Single player campaign is decent (whole story is told by playing both campaigns), some missions are pretty hard like classic RTS used to have. This is a modern game, graphics are so so. Has some nice explosions.
3. Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak. Very strong storytelling parts. Gameplay is less classic RTS although you still need to gather resources and make units from your mobile HQ. Also a modern game with nice graphics.
 

Neanderthal

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You can get Shadow of the Horned Rat off GOG, campaign has some advantages over Dark Omen, UI and graphics are arse though.
 

anvi

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World in Conflict

Perimeter

I was gonna suggest these ones. I beta tested World in Conflict and then got it mostly for the single player. I would also suggest Tiberian Sun which imo is the best RTS ever made. Although the whole C&C series is pretty good in terms of campaigns.

I also play Men of War: Assault Squad 2 sometimes which I like mostly because of how it looks.

Also I like to play all the Supreme Commander series for the single player campaigns but I think most people might not like it. They are nothing special in terms of missions, there is no sneaking a single commando around enemy bases or whatever like fun C&C missions have you do. In the SupCom games it is only really building up your base and beating some enemies, not much different to a skirmish, but there are some interesting missions and I find the game endlessly fun to play anyway. I can't remember if Total Annihilation was fun campaign but it probably is. Then Supreme Commander, expansion called Forged Alliance (maybe the best of all), and then a sequel called Supreme Commander 2 which I enjoyed a lot and although the skirmish in that game kinda sucked, it has a mod which makes it miles better.

Also a bit different, but if you are up for playing a very old game but a really great one, check out the original Dune. (Not Dune 2)
 

Cael

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I am trying to think of one that has not been mentioned already, perhaps Age of Mythology? The novelty was playing with various mythological units, but I remember the missions feeling somewhat grindy or repetitive at times.


The campaign cutscenes were hilarious, though. Any scene with Ajax in it is comedy gold.

"We surrender! Come a little closer!"
 

Maculo

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Strap Yourselves In Pathfinder: Wrath
The campaign cutscenes were hilarious, though. Any scene with Ajax in it is comedy gold.

"We surrender! Come a little closer!"
I remember it being hammy and enjoying it. At the same time, I guess the gameplay did not leave a huge impression for me, because I barely remember the missions.
 

Iluvcheezcake

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Citizen

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I definitely did not expect it to take 4 pages to mention Warhammer: Dark Omen (unless I missed it somehow?)
No base building but a decent fantasy story, EXCELLENT combat and units that transfer experience/items in the campaign etc. One of the best, if not THE best, single player RTS experiences.



I never considered it an RTS game, because for me RTS associates with a classic formula of base-building and resource harvesting (aka RTS == DUNE 2 clone). Darkomen, mechommander and other games where you command a squad without basebuilding and transfer your troops between missions is a different genre, realtime tactics or something like that
 

v1rus

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Jul 14, 2008
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Finished with Winter Assault.

Tried Dark Crusade. Not sure I like it. While I love the idea of it, it doesnt seem particularly worth it. Perhaps Im just getting burnt out, and I def shouldnt have gone with Tau, knowing next to nothing about them.
 

Citizen

Guest
Finished with Winter Assault.

Tried Dark Crusade. Not sure I like it. While I love the idea of it, it doesnt seem particularly worth it. Perhaps Im just getting burnt out, and I def shouldnt have gone with Tau, knowing next to nothing about them.

Yeah, campaigns in DC and Soulstorms are bland, they are worth getting only for additional factions in multiplayer
 

v1rus

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Finished with Winter Assault.

Tried Dark Crusade. Not sure I like it. While I love the idea of it, it doesnt seem particularly worth it. Perhaps Im just getting burnt out, and I def shouldnt have gone with Tau, knowing next to nothing about them.

Yeah, campaigns in DC and Soulstorms are bland, they are worth getting only for additional factions in multiplayer

Shame, since I really love the idea of a proactive map and character progress.
 

v1rus

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Gave it another shot with Space Marines, way easier, since I actually know how that faction works.

Such a nice Catch 22. Right now I know how most of factions work, but Im burnt out. When that passes, Ill forget how factions work, and the campaign throws you right into it, without taking time to familiarize you with factions again. Fun.
 
Last edited:

Galdred

Studio Draconis
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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Gave it another shot with Space Marines, way easier, since I actually know how that faction works.

Such a nice Catch 22. Right now I know how most of factions work, but Im burnt out. When that passes, Ill forget how factions work, and the campaign throws you right into it, without taking time to familiarize you with factions again. Fun.
You could try Chaos then. They are somewhat similar, but not quite. I switched to chaos when I got bored with SM in MP, and never went back.
 

tindrli

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Homeworld 1 2 and 3 and all related to it
and ofcourse dwarf fortress
 

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