Real-time tactics
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Real-time tactics (RTT) is a computer game genre of tactical wargames that simulates the considerations and circumstances of operational warfare and the military tactical aspects of battles. The real-time tactics genre is also sometimes called military strategy or real-time combat simulator.
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[edit] Characteristics
Real-time tactical gameplay is characterised by the expectation of players to complete their tasks using only the combat forces provided to them, and usually by the provision of a realistic (or at least believable) representation of military tactics and operations. This contrasts with other current wargame genres: for instance, in large-scale turn-based strategy games battles are generally abstracted and the gameplay close to that of related board games, and real-time strategy games de-emphasise realism and focus on the collection and conversion of resources into production capacities which manufacture combat units thereafter used in generally highly stylised confrontations. In contrast, real-time tactics games' military tactical and realistic focus and comparatively short risk/reward cycle usually provide a distinctly more immediate, intense and accessible experience of battlefield tactics and mêlée than strategy games of other genres.
As suggested by the genre's name, also fundamental to real-time tactics is real-time gameplay. The genre has its roots in tactical and miniature wargaming, the recreation of battle scenarios using miniatures or even simple paper chits. These board and table-top games were out of necessity turn-based: real-time tactics marks their digital transposition into a real-time format (and turn-based strategy and turn-based tactics their pure translations).
Compared to other strategy games, games of the real-time tactics genre often have distinctly detailed and complex environments due to the tactical implications of elevation, hard cover and true line of sight. Due to the demands of realism units in real-time tactical games also often have a significant degree of autonomy over their actions within the context of their orders compared to the relatively or fully passive units of other strategy genres (e.g. units in MechCommander 2 are remarkably autonomous).
Further, in many real-time tactics games a player's force is maintained between battles. This allows units to become more proficient as they gain more battle experience and can even encourage an affinity between the player and his or her troops, breaking down the stereotypical anonymity of the expendable, mass-produced units found in strategic games. To this end Bungie Studios' Myth series gave each soldier a unique name, and in Warhammer: Shadow of the Horned Rat and Warhammer: Dark Omen units were individually named and under the leadership of their own captains with distinct visual and vocal feedback.
[edit] Genre classification debate
The genre classification of real-time military computer games is a topic of dispute. Real-time tactics, which is a genre comparatively sparse of titles, often sees its games categorised as exemplars of the more popular, well-populated, and thus recognisable real-time strategy (RTS) genre. This has been a source of dispute between two principal camps: those who argue lexicographically that all games of military or strategic nature that are played in real-time are "real-time strategy" games; and those who argue that "real-time tactics" titles display enough fundamental and consistent differences from other related or established genres to make it unique.
It is worthwhile comparing the real-time tactics template to that of real-time strategy: Real-time strategy games are characterised by that the player exerts direct control over individual units, resource gathering, base and unit construction and technology development, micro-managing a complete albeit stylised production economy, as well as a likewise generally simplified and stylised combat model that generally bears little resemblance to actual military tactics. Thus, real-time strategy titles generally encourage the player to focus on logistics and production as much as or more than combat. In fact, as much as 80% of active gaming time can be spent on non-combat gameplay aspects.[1]
In their pure, form real-time tactics games on the other hand do not feature resource-gathering, production, base-building or economic management, instead focusing on tactical and operational aspects of warfare such as unit formations or the exploitation of terrain for tactical advantage. The expectation of players to finish an engagement with set resources radically veers gameplay away from the standard real-time strategy form.
This debate can be argued to be part of a greater lack of definition of genres. Various games of distinct and recognised genres, such as SimCity (which is a city-building game) and Railroad Tycoon (an economic simulation game), have recurringly been classified as "real-time strategy" for being more-or-less in real-time and of a strategic nature. [2] The difficulty of keeping up with genres and opinions has been recognised in some quarters: the Swedish arm of games magazine franchise PC Gamer generally use only the genre denomination "strategy" to refer to games of RTT, RTS or similar genres. [citation needed]
While some publications do specify "RTT",[3],[4],[5] others simply do not know to separate the terms: awareness of real-time tactics' distinct existence remains relatively low though as of late 2006 the term is increasingly appearing in various media. Nonetheless, the need to make a distinction from the "RTS" denomination is frequent and various neologies can be seen; titles of the genre has been described as "real-time combat simulators" and "military strategy" games, Nexus: The Jupiter Incident was called a "tactical fleet simulator" by its developers, and Blitzkrieg II was somewhat verbosely called a "real time simulator of WWII battles on company regimental level" rather than "real-time strategy" in a review.[6]
[edit] Brief history and background
Wargaming with items or figurines representing soldiers or units for training or entertainment has been common for as long as organised conflicts: Chess, for example, is based on essentialised battlefield movements of medieval unit types and, beyond its entertainment value, is intended to instill in players a rudimentary sense of tactical considerations. Today, miniature wargaming, where players mount armies of miniature figurines to battle each other, has become popular (e.g., Warhammer Fantasy Battle and Warhammer 40000). Though similar to conventional modern board wargames (e.g. Axis & Allies), in the sense of simulating war and being turn-based, the rules for miniature wargames tend to lean heavily towards the minutiae of military combat rather than anything at a strategic scale.
Though popular as table-top games, tactical wargames were relatively late in coming to computers, largely due to game mechanics calling for large numbers of units and individual soldiers, as well as advanced rules that would have required hardware capacities and interface designs beyond the capabilities of older hardware and software. Since most established rule sets were for turn-based table-top games, the conceptual leap to translate these categories to real-time was also a problem that required time to overcome.
Free Fall Associates' Archon, from 1983, can be considered an early real-time tactics game, built upon Chess but including real-time battle sequences. Archon was highly influential, and, for instance, Silicon Knights, Inc.'s 1994 game Dark Legions was virtually identical to it, adding only to Archon's concept that the player, as in many table-top wargames, purchases his army before committing to battle. Another predecessor was Bits of Magic's Centurion: Defender of Rome (published for the PC by Electronic Arts in 1990), in which, similar to the recent Rome: Total War game, the game took place on a strategic map interspersed by battle sequences. However, though the battles were in real-time they were of small scope and player interaction was limited to deciding the inital troop disposition.
[edit] Establishing the genre: the late-nineties rise in popularity
Perhaps the first game that can be recognised as a qualified exemplar of the real-time tactics genre was Fields of Glory, released in 1993 by MicroProse. The game was a purely real-time tactical wargame that attempted to realistically recreate several of the major battles of Napoleon Bonaparte's Waterloo campaign. Though meticulous and ambitious it suffered from the low-resolution graphics of the day and had to compromise with the visual presentation of its large-scale battles and abstracted away low-level battlefield aspects.
Around 1995, however, computer hardware and developer support systems had developed enough to facilitate the requirements of large-scale real-time tactical games. It was in 1995 that the regimentally focused wargame Warhammer: Shadow of the Horned Rat was released, groundbreaking not only in that it focused purely on the operational aspects of combat (with all aspects pertaining: regimental manoeuvring and formations, support tactics, terrain, etc.), nor only in that it was entirely real-time, but also that it introduced zoomable and rotatable 3D terrain. In 1997 Firaxis Games' released Sid Meier's Gettysburg!, a detailed and faithful recreation of some of the most significant battles of the American Civil War that introduced large scale tactical battlefield command using 3D.
3D visuals only became established in the real-time strategy genre around eight years after their advent in real-time tactics; it could be argued that the nature of real-time tactics games and the genre's focus lends more naturally to 3D representation, for instance to check line of sight, while the faster pace, rapid-click, highly stylized nature of real-time strategy games were better presented in 2D. Real-time tactics games need not be in 3D however: the Close Combat series as well as Sudden Strike, both successful titles, functioned in two dimensions. Released in 1996 by Atomic Games, Close Combat is a simulation of squad- and platoon-type WW2 combat tactics which introduced a higher degree of operational realism than seen before. Further, as Warhammer: Shadow of the Horned Rat was a translation of the Warhammer Fantasy Battle table-top system, FASA Studios' MechCommander from 1998 was a translation of the BattleTech boardgame into a 2D computer game format.
In 1997, Bungie released Myth, which introduced radically larger battlefields than ever before, and in 2000, Creative Assembly created Shogun: Total War taking map sizes even further as well as introducing historical and tactical realism on levels until then unheard of in real-time computer games. Ground Control was also released in 2000, gaining much attention for its luscious visuals but earning developers Massive Entertainment few sales.
[edit] Archetypes
[edit] Historical and Contemporary settings
Real-time tactics games with historical or contemporary settings generally try to recreate the tactical environment of their selected period, the most common eras and situations being the American Civil War and European Napoleonic warfare, though ancient warfare and World War II settings are also common. Numerically they make up the bulk of the genre.
While the degree of realism is appreciably uniform, the scale of command and precise mechanics alter radically across the various popular periods. Real-time tactical games recreating the Napoleonic Wars are played at a platoon level for example, with players controlling groups of sometimes hundreds of soldiers as a single unit, whereas recreations of modern conflicts (such as the Iraq War) tend to occur at a squad level, as suits contemporary tactical thought.
Battles from The Creative Assembly's Total War series, the first exemplar of which is Shogun: Total War (2000), are widely-recognised examples of large-scale tactical recreations. Units are organised and controlled in regiments, frequently of several hundred soldiers, and the games are built to encourage the use of authentic tactics (however, Rome: Total War (2006), has been criticised for violating realism and several mods have been made to correct this). Battles are freeform and generally take place in open country; there is no plotted side-missions like in the Warhammer games discussed below.
The most familiar examples of Napoleonic simulations are Firaxis Games' American Civil War recreations Sid Meier's Gettysburg! (1997) and its sequel Sid Meier's Antietam! (1998), though a number of less-known titles have been produced but mostly been found by enthusiasts. Common to these games is the recreation in detail and scale of a particular set of famous and significant battles. Using the same engine Firaxis and BreakAway Games also released Waterloo: Napoleon's Last Battle which recreates Napoleon Bonaparte's last and most famous battle of 1815. Also noteworthy is Imperial Glory (2005) by Pyro Studios which recreates the multipolar conflicts of colonial dominance of Europe between 1789 and 1830.
Atomic Games' Close Combat series are tactical battle simulations set in WWII known for a very high degree of realism and takes into account limited ammunitions, severity of wounds, and the psychology and mental welfare of individual soldiers in combat squads. In contrast Fireglow Games' Sudden Strike (2000) focuses on larger-scale operations and mechanised tactics rather than low-level details. Currently (2006) under development by Ubisoft is Faces of War, which similar to Close Combat is a combat simulation where individual units have great autonomy, takes WWII combat tactics into 3D.
Pandemic Studios' Full Spectrum Warrior series provides examples of modern combat simulators. Set in a fictional country identical in all relevant regards to Iraq, the games revolves around at most two squads of four soldiers each and offers engagements at a far more intimate level than the Total War series, and indeed the genre at large, and also emphasise story more than most real-time tactics titles. The games' camera floats at head-level near the selected squad, very much a part of the environment, and as such restricts orders to visible areas of the typically dense and urbanised battlefield. Despite a visual affiliation with first person shooters the player does not directly control any character, instead only issuing orders to his troops, has been described as 'strategic' [7] and is firmly within the RTT genre.
[edit] Fantastical settings
Like Futuristic settings, Fantasy real-time tactics titles offer a great deal of room for new ideas. While most bear some resemblance to a historical period (usually medieval), they also incorporate fictional creatures, areas, and/or magic into their stories and gameplay.
High Fantasy real-time tactics games are fronted by licensed Warhammer Fantasy Battle titles. The loose series began with one of the earliest mainstream real-time tactics games, Warhammer: Shadow of the Horned Rat (1995), and formed and followed the modern real-time tactics template. While the games' depth of tactical simulation is similar to that of the Total War series it leans towards skirmishes over epic battles and features both unique hero characters and a tightly authored story. The sequel Warhammer: Dark Omen (1998) refined these aspects into one of the most representative real-time tactics exemplars to date, but was by the press misunderstood as an incomplete real-time strategy game and largely overlooked at its release. The very influential Myth (1997) emphasised formation cohesion less than the Warhammer games and introduced extensive maps. In 2006, Warhammer: Mark of Chaos was released; a game of similar kind to the two preceding Warhammer titles, but taking game play away from their realistic focus and fidelity to the Warhammer rules to a more arcade- and micromanagement-oriented form.
Low Fantasy real-time tactics games like Massive Entertainment's upcoming World in Conflict usually take the form of 'what-if' variations on actual events.
[edit] Futuristic settings
Futuristic settings offer greater freedom for real-time tactics developers, and to date are typically associated with action-oriented games more accessible than historical simulations. Ground Control (2000) is a prominent example of these traits: a fast-paced game with a squad-based interface to ease control, its setting allowed it to innovate with air units in an RTT environment. Ground Control II: Operation Exodus was released in 2004 but introduced a number of real-time strategy elements and veered away from the original's real-time tactics status.
Blue Tongue Entertainment's Starship Troopers: Terran Ascendancy (2000) is a squad-based action-oriented RTT based on Robert A. Heinlein's book Starship Troopers and is characteristic in that it is more action-oriented and smaller units is controlled than common in real-time tactics, even compared to other futuristic exemplars, and the units are highly autonomous.
FASA Studios' squad-based MechCommander 2 (2001) is notable for implementing a lightweight resource acquisition system without damaging its real-time tactics nature. Resource Points were either 'gathered' by capturing specific buildings or vehicles or allocated at the start of the mission, but could only be expended on support tasks; save for repairs and plucky on-field salvage operations the system did not affect the player's combat force.
Mithis Entertainment's Nexus: The Jupiter Incident (2004) is a another example of a progressive real-time tactics game with a futuristic setting, taking the genre into space and replacing most normal sensibilities (not least of all terrain) with its own in the process.
[edit] Chronology
[edit] Gallery
 Infantry assault a bridge in dismal weather in Shogun: Total War. |
 Crusader army assembled for battle in Medieval: Total War. |
 Scene from Myth. |
 Confederate troops advancing on Union positions in Sid Meier's Gettysburg!. |
 Union commander overseeing troop disposition in The History Channel Civil War: The Battle of Bull Run. |
 French cavalry charging British position in Waterloo: Napoleon's Last Battle. |
 Battle in the seas in Imperial Glory. |
 Screenshot from Sudden Strike. |
 Bugs burning in Starship Troopers: Terran Ascendancy. |
 Battlemech combat in MechCommander. |
 A semi-arid battlezone from MechCommander 2. |
 Opposing fleets battle in an asteroid field. Nexus: The Jupiter Incident. |
[edit] See also
- RTT games in the List of computer and video games by genre article
- List of military tactics
- Real-time strategy
- Strategy game
- Tactical role-playing game
- Tactical wargames
- Turn-based strategy
- Turn-based tactics
- Warfare
[edit] References
- ^ A practical definition of innovation in game design. Retrieved on September 3, 2006.
- ^ [1][2][3][4][5]
- ^ Review - Warhammer: Mark Of Chaos. Eurogamer (23 November 2006). Retrieved on 23 November 2006. (Review of Warhammer: Mark of Chaos explicitly calling the game a "RTT" as compared to a "RTS" game and discussing the difference)
- ^ Exclusive : Warhammer Mark Of Chaos: How is the RTS game shaping up?. HEXUS gaming (24 July 2006). Retrieved on 2 September 2006. (uses "strategy game", "real-time strategy", and "real-time tactics" in the same article)
- ^ The State of the RTS. IGN (7 April 2006). Retrieved on 14 September 2006.(Article at IGN discussing their perception of RTS and related genres as of 2006. RTT is discussed as a new and not yet established genre from the publisher's perspective.)
- ^ Blitzkrieg II Review. [www.strategyinformer.com Strategyinformer] (4 November 2006). Retrieved on 4 November 2006. (Review of Blitzkrieg II as an example of intentially and obviously avoiding the real-time strategy.)
- ^ Dan Adams, , 'Full Spectrum Warrior Review', IGN.com.
[edit] External links
- The State of the RTS, IGN, 2006
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