What happened to the RTS genre?

[Iamanerd]

it went the same way the crpg, survival horror,and platforming genres went. they were considered not a financially viable genre for the mainstream market and so were taken out back and shot. repeatedly. it's why i rarely buy any newer games because i like crpg's and turn based strategy and the base building strategy games. every new base building game seems to have some kind of gimmick.

Luckily crpgs have had a resurgence recently and seem to be doing very well now.

As for RTS games, it comes down to time and dedication, most people don't like putting that kind of time. Contrary to the poster a few posts up going on about "special Snowflake" bs it comes down to people not wanting to be as dedicated to games where you have no teammates and requires a lot of time. Personally I've loved RTS games and played a shit ton of SC2 the first few years it was out, I'm looking forward to AoE 1 remake this Thursday as well.

[Deleted]

1 vs 1 pvp is stressful and you can't blame the healer.
Consumers wanted more accessible games, developers delivered more complicated (higher apm requirements, more unit types, more hard counters) stuff.
MOBAs happened - and are way easier too monetize.
Also Warcraft III possibly was 'too good'. Players and games testers barely looked at new games, then went back to Warcraft.
Blizzard drew the wrong conclusions from Starcraft I. Outside of Korea, it never had a huge, fanatical following and the majority of consumers don't consider bad graphics, bad UI and bad unit pathing the epitome of game design.

[Wildmoon]

If you look at what's popular right now you will see why RTS genre is not suit to the mainstream crowd these days. SC1/SC2 for example have astronomically high skill-cap that people are just put off from trying to learn in the first place. They are both mechanically and strategically demanding. You not only have to think well but quick too. It's simply bullshit that people who click the fastest win. It's just that if your mechanical skills are lacking then you are not going to execute your strategies well in the first place. People can be very strategic when they pass certain level of mechanical skills that lets them compete with the top. Strategies in these games are refined to the second. They are made and refined with mechanical skills in mind too.

The recipe for success in today's market always include being relatively accessible and "intuitive" by design which heavy multitasking is really not.

[Deleted]

Older generations moved on, new generations don't care about the genre. Just like many other things in life.

[Selastan]

If I had to build my ideal RTS game:

1. Unit fatigue. Biological units or piloted vehicles would suffer fatigue, reducing health and damage per application, for the times they spent outside certain building perimeters.

2. Day and night cycle. Fatigue would exponentially increase at night, accuracy would be reduced, etc.

3. Consistent resource gain. Resource mines are almost cliché in RTS games. I would keep things like mines, as well as abandoned buildings and other places your army can loot to gain resources, but they would only be one time bonuses. Both sides would have constant income, but have optional buildings and units to increase that influx, at the cost of the initial investment. Players can sabotage other's income without actually destroying their mines, using things like spies or assassins, building communication jammers, or defeating their opponent in small tactical battles that make their opponent's benefactors less likely to invest, which brings me to...

4. Morale and patriotism rating. Your money has to come from somewhere, namely, your superior's faith in you. If you win skirmishes, act honorably in the name of your army, and keep collateral damage to a minimum, you look better in the eyes of your superiors, and thus they may wish to invest more credits in you. If you fight dirty and commit war crimes, destroy parks or monuments, and send troops needlessly to their deaths, it makes your commanding officer look bad, and they are less willing to endorse your dirty tactics. Get too bad, you may even have deserters.

5. Randomly generated maps. I find RTS games get somewhat boring once you have a map learned. Random maps, the more asymmetrical the better, add to the excitement and help create more interesting strategies. This is warfare, not chess!