This is a list of RTS games either no one or very few have ever heard about. Obscure games are those are not on Steam or have lesser than 10,000 reviews or are not on a top list anywhere. Not-That-Obscure Games are those that are obscure by the fact they aren't Command and Conquer or Starcraft or from a well-known RTS developer.
Obscure:
Deep Quest
Submarine Titans (All-Time Favorite)
Harpoon series
Pacific Storm series
King Arthur: Role Playing Wargame series
Kohan series
Globulation series (free)
Glest series (free)
Sun Age: Battle for Elysium (Kinguin Steam; starting at $10, usually $15)
Machines At War series
Warrior Kings series
Warlords Battlecry series
Battle Realms
Order of War
Warzone 2100 (free)
Armies of Exigo
Close Combat series
Universe A War: Earth Assault (First Impressions)
Star Wars Galactic Battleground
Tooth and Tail (upcoming)
Northgard
Outpost 2: Divided Destiny (free)
Ultimate General series
Folktale
Infested Planet (Kinguin Steam; starting at $4, usually $15)
Warshift
Drone Swarm (upcoming)
Battleships Forever (free; Game Jolt)
Joint Task Force
Worldshift
Maelstrom: Battle for Earth Begins (Kinguin Steam; starting at less than $1, usually $6)
War Front: Turning Point
Maestros
Ground Control series
Dark Reign series
Original War
Scourge of War
Histwar
Knights of Honor
Star Command Revolution
Highland Warriors
Startopia
Netstorm
The Guild
Battlezone
Kingdom Under Fire
Not-That-Obscure:
DEFCON (Kinguin Steam; starting at $2, usually $9)
Anno series
Banished (Kinguin Steam; starting at $5, usually $20)
Dwarf Fortress
Creeper series
AI War series (Kinguin Steam; starting at $3, usually $10)
Majesty series
RUSE
Impossible Creatures (First Impressions)
The Settlers series
Iron Harvest (upcoming)
Planetary Annihilation (Kinguin Steam; starting at $3, usually $29)
Prison Architect (Kinguin Steam; starting at $4, usually $29)
Achron
Rimworld (Kinguin Steam; starting at $23, usually $30)
World In Conflict
Tom Clancy's EndWar (First Impressions)
Art of War: Red Tides (free to play on Steam)
Men of War: Assault Squad series
Total Annihilation series
Sacrifice
Not-At-All-Obscure:
Paradox games
Eugen System games
Dawn of War series
Company of Heroes series
Sins of a Solar Empire series
Stardock games
Battle for Middle Earth series
Supreme Commander series
Total War series
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Our game http://maestrosgame.com/ is pretty obscure :P It has been in public testing on/off for a couple years and just got greenlit for steam to come out later this year.
ReplyDeleteGood job scouring the internet for lesser known rts games. I feel like one of the biggest issues this genre has is that so many fans have this laser like focus on StarCraft 2 as the one to beat, either because they think it's the only viable rts today, or they view even the inclusion of units as too similar. It feels like much of the community is being blinded by the light from Blizzard's battlecruiser size behemoth and forgetting all the weird and wonderful ways you can make these games. Speaking of which, I'm wondering what you count as an rts game. I saw that you included Total War, which to my knowledge only included unit creation in its battles in the two Warhammer games, and even then it was specific to certain factions. I think it's more of a real time tactics game, but I suppose such concerns are secondary.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I have blog where I(occasionally) talk about this genre. It's Notesfromthestarlab.wordpress. I can't say I update frequently, but you might like it.
Thank you.
I had Outpost 2 and Dark Reign back in the day. It saddens me that Dark Reign was overshadowed at the time, it was pretty good. I also enjoyed Outpost 2, but I can appreciate why others didn't.
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