The Rise and Fall of the Real-Time Strategy Genre

Real-time strategy is the name given to a genre of video games in which the player builds and maintains a large military force which he or she then takes into battle. The genre is differentiated from turn-based games by taking place in real-time, requiring fast reflexes and a good spatial awareness to keep track of multiple areas of the battlefield simultaneously.

The genre was codified in the mid-1990s by games such as WarCraft: Orcs and Humans (1994) and Command and Conquer (1995), although the earliest examples of the genre are generally held to be Carrier Command (1988), Herzog Zwei (1989) and Dune II: The Battle for Arrakis (1992). The genre was massively popular in the late 1990s, arguably reaching an apex with Command and Conquer: Red Alert (1996), Total Annihilation (1997) and StarCraft (1998). The genre subsequently struggled with a move into 3D and a series of commercial failures followed. The genre became significantly less popular in the following decade, although WarCraft III (2002), Dawn of War (2004), Company of Heroes (2006) and Supreme Commander (2007) all proved successful. Which the exception of StarCraft II (2010) and several expansions, the genre has not achieved any major sales successes in recent years. Popular wisdom has suggested that the genre has been supplanted by the MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) subgenre, which evolved out of RTS games.

Command and Conquer: Red Alert II (2001, Electronic Arts/Westwood)

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GROUND CONTROL released on Steam

Steam have added the classic Ground Control real-time strategy game series to their store.

The Ground Control games have the best artillery units in any games, ever.

Ground Control and its expansion, Dark Conspiracy, are available under the title Ground Control Anthology. Ground Control II: Operation Exodus is available separately or as part of a bundle deal with the anthology. The anthology and GCII are also available DRM-free on GoG.

Ground Control was originally released in 2000 and was groundbreaking in its day. It had a full 3D map and camera, had no base-building or mid-mission reinforcing and - controversially - no mid-mission saving. It was a challenging game that rewarded tactically ingenious play, but was also furiously action-packed and has some visuals that were jaw-dropping at the time and remain pretty impressive today. Its minimalist UI also puts most modern strategy games to shame. It's absolutely brilliant, the equal of the likes of Homeworld and far superior to the likes of Dawn of War, and is highly recommended.

The sequel has better visuals and allows mid-mission saving and reinforcing, so is a bit less hardcore. It also has a better story and more unit variety with asymmetrical factions (the original game is more balanced between the two sides, although the mercenaries in the expansion bring a bit more variety to the table). Both are among the very best RTS games ever made, and are very highly recommended.

Ground Control II: Operation Exodus

Three centuries after the war between the Crayven Corporation and the Order of the New Dawn for control of Krig 7-B, another battle is raging for control of a world on the edge of human space. The corporations were long ago consolidated under a central authority known as the Terran Empire. The Empire has gradually absorbed all the colony worlds one by one, until now the sole remaining stronghold of resistance is Morningstar Prime. Captain Jacob Angelus is tasked with the by the Northern Star Alliance with the task of holding Morningstar against increasingly powerful imperial forces led by Imperator Vlaana.


As the siege of Morningstar draws tighter, the enigmatic alien Virons enter the fray. Driven by an internecine conflict, different factions side with the two sides on Morningstar, and Angelus learns of a way that he can save the people of the planet. But it involves a long and dangerous mission into the Ragnarok Nebula, to a long-forgotten world called Krig 7-B...

Ground Control II, originally released in 2004, is fairly obviously the sequel to Ground Control, the classic real-time tactics game. GC2 picks up the story centuries further on and it initially appears that there is no relationship between the two games, save being set in the same universe. However, as the game continues it becomes clear that the events of the original game set in motion a chain of events that are now coming to fruition, and a new generation of heroes must complete the work begun by Major Sarah Parker and Deacon Jared Stone in the first game.

There are, however, some significant differences between the two games. Ground Control was excellent because it strictly limited the military forces available to take into battle, putting the emphasis firmly on tactical decision-making, battle formations and picking the opportune route across the battlefield. With no ability to save mid-mission, the game encouraged genuine tactical decision-making rather than quicksaving and then hoping for the best. Whilst for hardcore strategy fans this was good stuff, more casual players were put off by the game's rock-hard reputation, despite fantastic reviews at the time.

GC2 is, by contrast, far more commercial. You can save mid-mission and you can reinforce your army in the field at any time through the seizing of landing zones and the deployment of dropships. Destroying enemy forces, seizing 'victory locations' and achieving objectives earns you points you can put towards recruiting new units or upgrading the dropship. You can order the dropship to remain on-station after delivering units and use it as a gun platform or a scout before it runs out of fuel and has to return to base. This is actually a pretty clever idea, and it's not unusual for the success or failure of a mission to turn on how you outfit and deploy the dropship effectively.

You control both the NSA army and a Viron taskforce during the two campaigns. Both sides are well-developed and fun to play, but the Virons take the edge for ingenuity and originality. They are based on organic technology and have both secondary modes granting them different skills and the ability to 'meld' two units together into a more powerful one. Playing as the Virons offers superior tactical possibilities and a greater variety of units and tactics.

Unfortunately, the addition of the in-mission saves means that getting through missions is sometimes more a question of stubbornness and reloading than using genuine tactical skills. The game creators minimise this as best they can by making the missions quite challenging and not having a quicksave key (you have to go through the menu), encouraging more experimenting with unit combinations and formations.

Graphically, the game uses a very similar engine to the original GC, although the maps are not quite as insanely huge. Obviously for a game that's four years newer, the graphics are notably better than the original game (which still had very impressive graphics for a game released in 2000), but the UI is, curiously, a lot more restrictive than the original. The viewing area of the screen is reduced by at least a third due to a fancy border and lots of unnecessary buttons you never use, standing in contrast to the smooth, streamlined and (ironically) far more modern interface of the first game.

The game has an excellent storyline with some really good twists and turns, and the characters are a pretty cool bunch. Their desperate struggle against the odds is compelling, although sadly incomplete: the game ends on a cliffhanger with a number of questions left dangling. Although the primary story arc of the game is complete, the fate of several key characters is left up in the air. It is clear that Massive were going to release either a third game or an expansion to address these elements, but the relatively mediocre commercial performance of GC2 meant this did not happen. Massive went on to develop World in Conflict and its recent expansion for a different publisher, and it sounds unlikely there will be further Ground Control games, at least not in the near future.

Ground Control II is a fast-paced and very satisfying real-time strategy game, with frantic combat, excellent graphics and sound (the game has aged very well indeed) and a challenging difficulty level. However, the commercialization of the game means that some elements of uniqueness from Ground Control have been lost. The game is rather more traditional and less ambitious than its forebear. Still, it remains a very fine example of the RTS genre and was a notably superior game to Dawn of War, which came out several months after it and used some similar ideas, but to weaker effect.

Ground Control II (****½) is a very satisfying and enjoyable RTS, and if it disappoints it is only in comparison to its excellent forebear. The game is available in the UK via Amazon, but a better and cheaper options is to get the game (fully legally) from the GoG website, where its currently available for just $6.

Wertzone Classics: Ground Control

In the 25th Century, huge corporations exploit the resources of distant worlds. One such world is Krig-7B, where the Crayven Corporation finds itself opposed by an army of religious fanatics, the Order of the New Dawn. As the two sides battle for control of the planet, the discovery of ancient 'xenofacts' puts a new spin on the conflict, and the discovery by the battlefield commanders of both forces that some in their ranks are engaged in their own agendas makes the war even more complex and multi-layered than first believed.


Ground Control was released in 2000 and is a relatively rare breed, a 'real-time tactics' game rather than a real-time strategy. The difference between the two is that in an RTS the player has control of resources and unit production (or reinforcements) whilst in an RTT the player has to make deal with what they have and cannot construct new units in-theatre. Some games, such as the Total War series, appeal to both by having a turn-based campaign map mode where units are constructed and assembled into armies and then a real-time battle mode where the battle is fought with the units that have been brought to the field, with no prospect of reinforcements arriving mid-battle (with some exceptions if there are other armies nearby when the battle starts).

Ground Control doesn't have that, although you do have some larger choices about the mission before it starts. You can customise your attack force and decide which units to take into the battle before dropping into the fray. The game is pretty hardcore though, as Massive Productions were unhappy with players simply quick-saving their way through battles in other games instead of deploying proper tactics so they simply dropped the ability to save mid-mission from the game. And considering some of the later maps can take up to an hour to finish, that's a pretty ballsy decision. To be honest, it works. Playing Ground Control is much like playing a Total War game, with intelligent decisions and tactical planning (but retaining flexibility to deal with changing circumstances on the battlefield) required rather than simply sending your army off willy-nilly and reloading if they happen to get wiped out.

The biggest surprise on playing this nine-year-old game is that visually it still looks pretty smart. Its 3D units are low-textured compared to modern games, sure, but are detailed enough to remain impressive (down to the individual soldiers' guns ejecting shell casings as they fire, and the tracked vehicles leaving churned-up trails across the battlefield). The game looked astonishing in 2000 and remains more than attractive enough to get the job done today. And, as with many of the older games I've recently reviewed on the blog, it's so old that even the more humble modern laptops should be able to run it with everything turned up to the maximum without breaking a sweat. In addition, I encountered zero problems on running it with XP on modern graphics cards, but I cannot speak to its compatibility with Vista.

As mentioned previously, the game is pretty hardcore and unforgiving of mistakes. The more powerful units, particularly the heavy artillery, are fully capable of wiping out your entire attack force in a few minutes if you blunder into an enemy position, chokepoint or crossfire area. As a result, careful deployment of recon or stealth units to map out your path is required. Later in the game the addition of aerial forces and high-speed scout aircraft makes this a lot easier (although additional precautions have to be taken: aircraft are highly vulnerable to ground AA fire and, unlike ground vehicles, cannot be repaired). Positioning and deployment of your forces is also critical, and in fact it is interesting to realise that you're putting your heavy armour at the front, lighter, faster forces on the flanks and heavy artillery and the command vehicle in the middle, almost as if this was a high-tech version of the Napoleonic Wars (albeit one with bombers capable of dropping small nuclear bombs roaring overhead).

The missions are challenging, although the learning curve is decent enough, and keep forcing you to re-evaluate tactics. For example, once you get artillery it initially appears that the game is essentially over, as you can sit a mile outside the enemy base and pound it to rubble. However, the deployment of enemy counter-battery units, fast intercept aircraft which can bomb your defenceless artillery (unless you have AA units) and so on keep you on your toes. Enemy AI is excellent, and does a good job of keeping you busy, especially on the harder difficulty settings.

Ground Control's mobile artillery are the best artillery units ever seen in a game.

The storyline, although unlikely to win awards, is well-told and enjoyable to watch unfold. The music is excellent and the graphics engine is fantastic. Ground Control wasn't the first real-time combat game to use a fully-3D engine, but it was certainly the first one where you didn't spend half your time battling the camera controls as well as the enemy. In fact, Ground Control and its successor engines (the ones used in Ground Control II and World in Conflict) remain the finest 3D battlefield engines yet seen in the genre, and certainly put the much newer ones in the likes of Company of Heroes, Dawn of War, Command and Conquer III and so forth to shame. It also has the best user-interface of any RTS or RTT game I've encountered. The minimalist UI which allows the graphics to take up the bulk of the view is fantastic.

On the minus side of things, the primary problem is the lack of in-mission saving (although the game naturally does save after and before every mission). Whilst it does make you play the game in a much more logical manner, it isn't very forgiving if you suddenly realise you're about to miss a dentist's appointment 20 minutes into a long mission, forcing you to restart later from scratch. However, that hardcore element is part of the game's lasting appeal, and with the in-game saving it would be a far easier and more simplistic game. Another slight criticism is that aircraft are of dubious value (since you can't use them until your ground units have destroyed all AA forces in an area, and by that time you've pretty much won anyway) and that the two sides are pretty much just reskins of one another, with only a couple of unique units.

Ground Control also comes packaged with its expansion, Dark Conspiracy. Dark Conspiracy furthers the story of the war and its characters in an consistently interesting and entertaining manner. The expansion also takes the war off Krig-7B to other worlds and introduces a new faction, the Phoenix Mercenaries, who have very different vehicles, weapons and tactics to the existing two sides. There are also some interesting and original new maps, such as airless moons and other planetary environments. However, the expansion isn't quite as well paced as the original game and its later levels are astonishingly rock hard, to the point of frustration which the original game just about avoids.

Still, Ground Control (*****) is an excellent tactical game that rewards careful consideration of the battlefield and due attention to military tactics and unit capabilities. It is perhaps not as tolerant of casual players as some other real-time strategy/tactics games, but making the battles more challenging is part of its appeal. It is available now (for £4!) in the UK and (for the truly ridiculous price of $40: what the heck?) in the USA. Far more preferably, the game is actually available for legal, free download from here, although I have no idea if it works any more. If not try here, where it is available for $6 with the expansion, which notably is not included in the free download pack.