Experience Roundup – Strategy Edition
First there was the FPS Experience Roundup, then there was the MMO Experience Roundup, this week’s roundup ditches the acronyms and puts us in the “thinking man’s (or woman’s)” genre – Strategy games! We’re talking about the games that you take a step back from the menial rigors of the battlefield and embrace a higher sense of control. So click through, because a bevy of strategy experiences await after the jump!
First up we have an experience from a2nt, a Command and Conquer player who writes about a touching family moment with his post, “Why bumping with bulldozers is a bad thing for a 5 year old”:
I set him up with a game with no enemies. He could build the base. He loved it. In fact to this day we still call it the ‘building game’. I then set him up with a game with several other armies on the same team to give it more of a community feel. He could explore their base, etc. Then boy-i-fest destiny kicked in [I see what he did there] . He learned he could attack neutral buildings. Then he began to capture his allies buildings. Then he learned to bump (i.e., squash) his allies soldiers with his bulldozer.
So, bumping with bulldozers is how my son was yanked from the comfy world of Reader Rabbit games into the harsh, C&C-flavored lessons of imperialism and world domination.
All of the Command and Conquer games had vehicles that could be used to crush infantry units, and you of course got that satisfying “squish” that a2nt was talking about.
The Command and Conquer line of games is a great set of strategy games for those with an itchy trigger finger and a short attention span. If you’re looking for a longer-paced game with a more chess-like approach to thinking (planning two or more moves ahead), look no further than Civilization IV, one of the most popular turn-based strategy games out there. GamerDNA member eidanch writes about a particularly long game in his post “Epic Civ game with my firends” [sic]:
So my friend comes up to me and he says, “Hi we are going to have a 2 month vacation (almost), lets play civ, we have a lot of time” I said: “Sure why not, lets tell omer (the third friend we had to tell him we will hit him if he wouldn’t install the game)” any way we got it and I played the game today with them. My friend setup the game in marathon and this game was so slow plus i got screwed so that I had limited access to resources and such things. so we played and after 2 and a half hours we stop cause my friend can’t beat Caesar. this was depressing and we are not even close to finishing the game. Now we gotta start over with some decent time settings.
Civilization IV is one of those games that takes awhile to finish. However, this time investment could lead to an awesome payoff at the end when you realize that you’ve conquered an entire continent! Unfortunately, there are times where you’ve sunk hours into a game only to realize that Gandhi has developed Stealth Bombers and all you have are archers with bronze armor.
Of course, the glory of victory isn’t restricted to just turn based games as member Hobo4President points out with his Company of Heroes experience aptly titled “Owned in Company of Heroes”:
Well I was playing CoH with a few friends, me and 3 friends were Nazis while 4 other friends were American. My friend/rival player took over a church and fortified the position, I then sent in a tiger tank to take him out but was met with 3 anti-tank weapons and a lot of men hiding in the church, he also had a machine gun set up. I needed help and just before I died my friend brought down 4 transport vehicles with flamethrowers on top, 2 panther tanks and about 30 grenadiers. He managed to kill all of the anti-tank weapons and destroy the machine gun and then set the whole church ablaze and killing all the enemies inside!
Looks like the Allies need to work on their battle plan a bit more, especially the part where they thought it was a good idea to stay in the church while a flamethrower convoy rolled up.
Another enduring Strategy franchise is the Age of Empires series, spanning three games, two ports, and a successful spinoff. Member Glean writes about a decisive victory through fortification in his post “Your army vs My Fort”:
When I played Age Of Empires, most of the players would just built big armies to clash against other big armies. I decided one game to built a 3 layer wall with no gates. And behind the wall I built 4 rows of the highest level towers and stocked them with archers. And in the middle of the fort I had 6 castles built and stocked with more archers. The archers were the highest level, The other player laugh at it and said their would destroy it, to make a long story short I beat them.
It sounds like Glean used the strategy commonly known as “turtling” where a player constructs base defenses and locks himself or herself in. While the enemies try to break in from the outside, the player either builds a massive army or holds out until his opponent quits out of frustration. Want to know how much of a turtler you are? Check out our RTS Quiz!
One of the key issues behind any Strategy game is balance, and no Strategy game’s balance has gone through quite as much scrutiny in both the professional and amateur gaming community as the world (especially South Korea) famous game Starcraft. Still, a lot of players find something to gripe about – especially if they’re coming out of a loss. Member Protieus takes things personally when he writes the rant “Guardians are Broken”:
You hear that Netris? Every ****** time. EVERY. *******. TIME. We’d play Starcraft and we’d say “Netris, no Guardians. They’re cheap.” And he’d reply with “Ok” and then take us out back and shoot us with about forty guardians.
….
Blech. And they’re ugly too.
Protieus takes good care in explaining why Guardians are Broken in the full experience, but I would just like to let it be known that if your name is Netris you better watch your back!
Well, that’s it for this roundup! Stay tuned to the blog, let us know about experiences you loved, and keep writing your own!
