Some lively discussion in the PCShooter main message board prompted me to write this article as I feel the Real Time Strategy genre has seen it’s golden days and is headed swiftly for the scrap heap of gaming.

I realize I am going to upset many of you and I am sure there are thousands of people who will strongly disagree with the statement that Real Time Strategy (RTS) is dead. In my career as a gamer I have seen many games come and go. I see hundreds of avenues with untapped potential that games can go which sadly remain untapped. On the other side of the coin I see games that start great but over time have been so thoroughly squeezed of fresh ideas that I am amazed they still manage to produce a few new games each year. Sadly I feel Real Time Strategy has reach this point.

I am hopeful for the First Person Shooter (FPS) genre as I see it branching into new directions, from tactical shooters, to RPG shooters, and beyond. I am surprised that the old blowhards with minimal or no storylines, like the Quake or Unreal series, still manage to entertain gamers. I fear those types of games that don’t evolve will find their way to extinction. I do see room and signs that the FPS genre and other genres are evolving to newer and better heights, however I see little going on in the RTS camp other than better graphics.

I noticed this about a year ago when I picked up the latest RTS game that was being released at the time. I ran home installed it on my machine eager to play my newest acquisition. I watched the intro movie and started into the game itself. After playing for about an hour I realized I was already bored with it. I asked myself why and found I really didn’t have an answer. Three or four games later I realized what the problem was. Other than a few insignificant changes in the key commands, technology trees, and graphics I was playing the same game over and over and over. I was tired of RTS.

I know that RTS has entertained me for hours before so I sat down and tried to figure out why I was bored with them. I realized there were several major flaws inherent to all RTS games that make them tedious at best. A few different games have managed to correct some of the problems but none of the games have yet incorporated all of the changes others have made to make the genre better.