Interesting...
Lord_Frodo
Join Date: 2002-09-26 Member: 1333Members
Join Date: 2002-09-26 Member: 1333Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Blah blah.</div>Some time ago my friend and I were discussing gaming in general, and the topic of conversation got steered to RTS gaming. In a nutshell, we were sick and tired of playing tank-rush over and over and over again. Really that's what all strategy games boil down to, see how many units you can build quicker than your opponent, send them all at him and smash his base. Granted, there are a few permutations you can put on that with the direction you attack from, simultaneous attacks with allies, etc. But the point was that both of us considered RTS gaming to be rather 'shallow' beyond a certain point, which we had reached.
So it's really quite ironic (hmm, not quite the word I wanted but it'll suffice) that about a week or two after I had this conversation with my friend I find out about Natural Selection while I was reading penny-arcade.com's latest foray into journalism. Basically, it seems like NS is exactly what my friend and I were looking for. It brings to RTS gaming that 'next level' that we have been so desperately searching for. Now a commander is actually a commander, not some sort of supreme overlord commanding an army of mindless drones. Not only do your units not have to follow your orders (although they would want to if they recognize a good commander, it seems 'respect' actually comes into play here too), they are able to follow them in <i>the way they choose.</i> It's not going to be a situation where some little crappy super-manuverable tank gets the crap kicked out of it because it doesn't move and fire at the same time. Even if a person is outgunned, tactics and individual skill come into play and can still make for at the very least a good fight before the undergunned person dies. And the ALIENS! WOW! Just when you think the aliens vs. marines premise has been overdone, something like this comes out. The 'hive mind' system is absolutely amazing. Not so much innovative I would say (there's already plenty of telepathic type species out there in sci-fi) as it is bloody brilliant implementation. The whole concept of being able to launch a team attack without ever talking on voice comm or something, and reacting to attacks on your teammates without them even having to call for help is genius.
In short, if NS lives up to my expectations and if the "Tales From the Front Lines" thread's stories are true, Counter-Strike will be getting a LOT less play time on this machine. It sounds, honest-to-god, like the best game concept I've ever heard of to date. Extremely ingenious as far as ideas and new innovations go, and brilliant implementation, coding, etc.
Way to go, NS team.
So it's really quite ironic (hmm, not quite the word I wanted but it'll suffice) that about a week or two after I had this conversation with my friend I find out about Natural Selection while I was reading penny-arcade.com's latest foray into journalism. Basically, it seems like NS is exactly what my friend and I were looking for. It brings to RTS gaming that 'next level' that we have been so desperately searching for. Now a commander is actually a commander, not some sort of supreme overlord commanding an army of mindless drones. Not only do your units not have to follow your orders (although they would want to if they recognize a good commander, it seems 'respect' actually comes into play here too), they are able to follow them in <i>the way they choose.</i> It's not going to be a situation where some little crappy super-manuverable tank gets the crap kicked out of it because it doesn't move and fire at the same time. Even if a person is outgunned, tactics and individual skill come into play and can still make for at the very least a good fight before the undergunned person dies. And the ALIENS! WOW! Just when you think the aliens vs. marines premise has been overdone, something like this comes out. The 'hive mind' system is absolutely amazing. Not so much innovative I would say (there's already plenty of telepathic type species out there in sci-fi) as it is bloody brilliant implementation. The whole concept of being able to launch a team attack without ever talking on voice comm or something, and reacting to attacks on your teammates without them even having to call for help is genius.
In short, if NS lives up to my expectations and if the "Tales From the Front Lines" thread's stories are true, Counter-Strike will be getting a LOT less play time on this machine. It sounds, honest-to-god, like the best game concept I've ever heard of to date. Extremely ingenious as far as ideas and new innovations go, and brilliant implementation, coding, etc.
Way to go, NS team.
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
Welcome to the forums, Lord_Frodo!
<!--EDIT|Flayra|Sep. 27 2002,11:26-->
uninformed = not as flame
explaining your idea = not flame (try it dude)
ok, as for RTS
I hate em (well I have for the longest time)
here is the deal however, reacently I have been playing war craft 3 (I play it in the CS lab at my school)
this game is not all about rushes, though they are fairly decent strats at certain points
however if you want to see real strat, get like a 4 on 4 with 4 ppl being in one lab and the other 4 being the comps (the comp cheats and thus you need alot to be able to beat it)
this was realy fun to watch (I didn't playu b/c I still suck)
there were some decent strategys going on in there
oh, and also Home world (gona start playing that tonight in CS games night, all of us are new to in thus it should be funny)
oh well, as for NS, yes I think it will live up to most expectations (I am a pesamicst, so I am always pleasntly surprised ;D)
oh well, ats all (oh and welcome <!--emo&:)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'><!--endemo-->)
Age of Empires II: Age of Kings
Two excellent RTS games. While you can play them the 'tank rush' way, there is room for much strategy that which if necessary can even beat those 'tank rushes'.
WCIII is also excellent, but in a different (and interesting) way.
Then, you have the atypical RTS games like Medieval: Total War which is VERY tactics oriented.
Anyway, what I found interesting was that while most people I'm looking at NS as an advancement in FPS games, you're looking at NS as an advancement in RTS games. As they are my two favorite genres, I love the opposite perspectives. I've always wanted a game like this since I first laid my hands on a RTS. I'm so glad a group with the skill and same drive decided to create this game. Not only that, but to be so dedicated to keeping this a FREE game. There's not even ads on this site.
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Tank-rushes on the other hand was almost always domed to failure because of the powerful defenses you could get and the fact that the strongest were un-able to shoot over the remain of the defenders/allies. Yes you heard right REMAINS of the units in the game!!
If the game took long enough you could use nukes, but it took ages to construct one and even then it could be blown away by automated anti-missile sites.
TA was probably the ONLY game where you could see an enemy halfway into the construction of his/hers attack and still be able to mount a effective defense against it....
and Homeworld? It just plain rulez. You have a ton of attack angles to defend..... literally
The marines listen to the commander, because he is the key to winning. However, the commander is not god. Marines approach everything on their own manner and do not walk EXACTLY where the commander placed them, while that is what's in most RTS.
I liked Dungeon Keeper a lot, because your creatures walk and do as they want to. You say 'built there' and someone has to built it, but you do not control whom and when. Thats what i liked about NS too; your minions have there own 'lives'...
-dio<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Oh, this is good... now I get a chance to make all of you stop calling me ignorant AND show off my massive knowledge of RTS gaming.
Total Annihilation is by far the best RTS out there, at least in my opinion. Despite the fact that it's still a tank rush (and vober hit the nail on the head with his description), it's a very well designed game. Still, all the berthas in the world will not destroy an enemy's base totally and completely. Essentially the terrain in Total Annihilation always provides some sort of cover for your base. The map "Welcome to Core Prime" on the Arm campaign is an excellent example of this. Build all the berthas you want, but they're not going to totally destroy that base because of all the huge metal walls. Ever heard of a "mass brawler rush"? That's when you build about a million brawlers (assuming you're the arm) and send them at the enemys base. Wow, sounds like a tank rush to me, only with air units. Theyre's no way to defend against a brawler force of sufficient magnitude (unless you've got a special units pack like TAUIP). Also, if you're playing with the Core Contengincy installed, Krogoth is the name of the game. If you get more Krogoths than the other guy, you win. Period. Berthas don't help, not even the buzzsaw or vulcan cannons (which are rapid-fire berthas) can take down a krogoth rush. It's a tank rush game at heart, it just takes some time to get there sometimes. Nukes are pretty useless in TA as well, since the time it takes to build about a million anti-nukes is the time it takes to build like half of a nuke. In a good game of TA, bases are almost immediately fortified with all manner of anti-nuclear capability.
Starcraft, bah. If I had a nickel for every time some little elitist kid who think's he's all that comes up to me and says "STARCRAFT 4M TEH B3ST GAEM EVAR!!!!" and I said "no it sucks" and he runs away in horror... Seriously though, starcraft sucks. For one thing, you have to stop building units about half an hour into the game because you can have like a max of 200 between 4 players... naturally that fills up quick. That's just the start of starcraft's horribleness. Not many people play as the Terrans in starcraft. Or the Zerg. In fact, it's pretty much just the protoss.... uhhh, because they ALWAYS FREAKING WIN!! wow, what a balanced game. two obsolete races.
I better stop myself before this turns into just a big rant about how much I hate starcraft. Point is, it's still a tank rush. Be the protoss, get a bunch of good units, and rush the hell out of the enemys base. Repeat.
As for atypical games like Medieval, they're usually horrid. Speaking specifically about medieval, I hate it. That's all I'm going to say about it. Similar games were wretched, and in my opinion (although I realize some people like it) medieval follows suit nicely.
I can't believe someone had the audacity to mention Age of Empires II. I'll leave the first one out since saying the title makes me gag. Everyone build priests! Lots of priests! If you don't build priests there is no hope! BUILD SOME ####### PRIESTS!!!!!! If you can build priests, you win. Yay. You must be 1337.
Frodo's in depth strategy guide for AOE2:
1. Build a lot of priests
2. Build a lot of strong melee units
3. Build a lot of siege weapons
4. send them all at the enemys base...
sounds like a tank rush to me.
Now I apologize for responding with the er.... vehemence with which I did. But the point is, you called me ignorant. That irks me. A lot. I am about as far from ignorant about RTS games as you can get. I was playing them when you were at your mother's teat. So there.
Is that enough of an explanation for you?
Yeah. Just ask Silverfox!
^_^
BTW, this is my first post so i guess i should go ahead and say "LONG LIVE NS" or something, so... LONG LIVE NS!
I quite agree, that was precisely the point of my first post.
and @Jboy:
darn tootin'. Penny Arcade is GREAT.
Just wanted to throw in my 2 cents.
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Oh, wait, no.. silly me.. yes. Hmmm.
I once tried mass rushing in NS too, but I couldn't find enough pies. Make of my tales what you will.
Woohoo. Someone mentioned the game I worked on <!--emo&:D--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':D'><!--endemo-->
I happen to agree- that most RTS games turn into rushes, be it tanks or peons. But I'd just like to defend starcraft a wee bit. Why? Mainly because I couldn't think of anything else to do right now. Sue me.
The protoss were physically strong, and were hard to overcome with brute force using the other two races. However, that doesn't make them "obsolete". A zerg plague, or a terran EMP reduces protoss effective life to half. I've seen a great many tactics used by REAL players. Terran players even. Albeit, very RARELY did I see them.
Truly what I think it boils down to is that it's easier to select a horde of units and tell them to attack, than it is to micro manage 4 or 5 units to use special abilities (Storm, plague, Emp or what have you) that could easily turn the battle.
*scratches his head* yeah, ok so all I really wanted to do was say that protoss were not as uber as they were made out to be.
On the topic of the forum and website... I have been looking at NS for the last 2 days and found myself salivating with anticipation. Heh, it sorta sux though cuz I was never an HL player counter-strike or otherwise.. I need to find a copy of it before too long... and I really don't want to pay 30-50 bucks for the stupid Platinum and anniversy additions. Guh, I can't find a normal copy anywhere.
So, as everyone else has said by now: The game sounds awesome and I can't wait to play. Thanks for all the hard work and time you guys put into this. Happy hunting.
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<span style='color:Red'>This is borderline. Frodo's was okay because it was not directed at anyone in particular. Try not to through mud slings at people so hatefully. That is all.</span>
Bah. All you did was explain your ignorance a little more. I'm not trying to be mean, but SC and AOK are great games. If the community is bad, that's not the game's fault. If you haven't played some skilled players, that's not the game's fault.
If found it humorous that you complain about mass unit building and then you complain about the pop-cap for SC. (which you barely ever reach in a real game)
Squeal Like a Pig, I beta tested Empire Earth. (I was even in one of the first clans for the game) I even know a scenario designer from the game. It's very well made and I always have a desire to play it more, but none of my friends want to. Oh well. It's not exactly the prettiest looking RTS, though.
<!--EDIT|rob6264|Sep. 28 2002,01:38-->
Everyone should realize that people have differing opinions on what makes a good RTS. To one person, a game in which a single race can win every time is a wonderful RTS, and to others it constitutes everything that is evil in the world. I'm not going to say where I stand. But just because someone prefers other games than the ones you do doesn't mean that you should call them 'ignorant' or insult them.
I don't really care for conventional RTSs, they mostly involve building a shatload of one type of unit and swamping your enemy, not terribly fun.
--Scythe--
But yeah, it's addicting.. and it's cool and it's 20 bucks. I also reccomend it =)
Everyone should realize that people have differing opinions on what makes a good RTS. To one person, a game in which a single race can win every time is a wonderful RTS, and to others it constitutes everything that is evil in the world. I'm not going to say where I stand. But just because someone prefers other games than the ones you do doesn't mean that you should call them 'ignorant' or insult them.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I was just defending some excellent games and the justified opinions of those who also enjoy the strategic quality that is in those games. I didn't want to offend him, but by just informing him of the truth I indirectly assault his opinion. If he doesn't like the games, that's fine.
I'm a nice guy, but at the same time I don't sit idle when there's a lack of information. If your comment was directed at me, I'm sorry for being who I am.
<!--emo&:D--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':D'><!--endemo--> That being said, I'm going to wait still longer to play some NS with all you guys. I can wait. It'll be worth it, I'm sure.