Red Alert 3

[Slamz]

BFME2 was fun, but I didnt really see a major difference in it then the starcraft / CC / RA games. Most of which I all liked alot.

The biggest difference was resource collection. In BFME2, it's literally about how much territory you control, whereas in most other RTS games, you only need to control certain resource spots as well as your home base and then the rest of the map is largely empty/irrelevant.

In BFME2 you would obtain resources by plopping down a building anywhere on the map. The building had a radius of influence and the more it overlapped with some other structure's radius of influence, the less money it brought in. So the ideal income came from spreading these resource buildings evenly across the map (or as much as terrain would allow, anyway) with little overlap. There were also diminishing returns, though, so that someone who controlled 75% of the map was not making three times as much as someone who controlled 25% (though he still made substantially more, which meant that "turtling" just was not a viable strategy).

It also did most of the commanding by the brigade. So you'd have 100 orcs but they were already in groups of 20, so effectively you were only controlling 5 "units". The significance of this was that there was no way to micromanage targeting. I could tell my 5 brigades to focus fire on one of your brigades but I couldn't tell my 100 orcs to focus fire on your elves, 1 elf at a time. This eliminated what was, to me, the most aggravating aspect of C&C and Starcraft: micromanaged targeting. It still helped but not nearly to the extent of other RTS games.

Without micromanaged targeting, you were able to focus on a multi-front war, or on higher level maneuvers like flanking. You got a flanking bonus if an enemy brigade was firing in one direction (e.g., East) and you attacked them from another direction (e.g., South).

It's really the most strategic of any RTS game I've played. I usually argue that most "RTS" games should be called "RTT" - real time tactical - since you have to spend the majority of your time telling individual units how to fight rather than overseeing a wider scope war.

I dont understand why console guys haven't packaged lab based wireless keyboard and mice with their consoles.

TV + couch. If my Xbox 360 supported a mouse I don't know where I'd put it. I'd have to play from a TV dinner tray or something.

A big part of RTS evolution was due to the available controller (mouse). IMO, consoles shouldn't even bother trying to replicate such controller-specific game types. They just need to think, "this is OUR controller, what kind of strategy games can WE make?"

You could do some good stuff with the Wii controller, but then you have to deal with the Wii's graphics capabilities and resolutions...