Strategy games may not be all the rage these days, but some of the greatest gaming experiences have come from the RTS genre.

In a strategy game, it’s your brain that has to do all the work, not your shooting and reflex skills. Which makes your wits, not your thumbs, the deciding factor.

There are thousands of different strategy games in a variety of forms such as cards, board games and of course video games, which we are interested in here.

It may not be the dominant genre it once back in the 1990s, but there’s a ton of absolute classic and incredibly addictive games that exist in this sphere. So without further ado, let’s look at some of the best strategy games of all time.

Command & Conquer

This cult-classic war strategy game set up an extremely successful franchise of subsequent titles that still resonate with the gamers who played them to this day.

Developed by the once highly thought of Westwood Studios, C&C was an RTS in which a global war ensues between the UN-formed Global Defense Initiative (GDI) to contain it and the cult quasi-state revolutionary Brotherhood of Nod, led by the enigmatic Kane, which seeks to harness it.

In Command & Conquer the player has to construct a base and acquire resources, in order to fund the ongoing production of various types of forces with which to assault and conquer the opponent’s base. When a construction yard has finished building a new structure, the player can select a spot near to a preexisting structure in order to place it, where the prefabricated building will rapidly unfold in a distinctive manner.

Units are created out of the various military structures, while Tiberium is gathered by trucks from the ore refinery, which acts as the currency to fund the further construction of your base.

Once sufficient defensive buildings and military units have been created, said units can form into groups to search across the map for more resources – as there is a finite amount of Tiberium available in any one node – and of course, to eliminate opposing forces and enemy bases, the last faction standing being the winner.

It introduces a new level of sophisticated strategy to the RTS genre, as you carefully balance your differing military units to form an effective army, whilst expanding your base to be both more advanced and better protected. All the while, attempting to time your construction and exploration to maximise your available Tiberium resources.

In 2020, the game was re-released as Command & Conquer: Remastered (pictured above).

StarCraft

Building upon the qualities of C&C, Starcraft took the RTS genre into the fantasy realm whilst adding a greater depth to the games imaginative military units.

Developed by legendary studio Blizzard Entertainment, StarCraft’s use of 3 distinct races is widely credited with revolutionizing the real-time strategy genre. 

StarCraft focuses around three distinct interstellar species: the psionic Protoss, the adaptable Terrans, and the insectoid Zerg.

All units are unique to their respective races, and while comparisons are often drawn between certain types of units, every one performs differently and requires different tactics for a player to succeed.

According to the game’s manual, the overpopulation of Earth in the early 24th century has caused the international governing body, known as the United Powers League to exile certain members of the human race, such as criminals, the cybernetically enhanced, and genetic mutants, to colonize the far reaches of the galaxy.

Unlike C&C, Starcraft features a far richer lore, with stand out characters that accompany the campaign such as Jim Raynor.

In 1999, the expansion StarCraft Brood Wars was released and earned great praise for being great value for money, introducing new campaigns, map tilesets, music, extra units for each race, and upgrade advancements. 

Homeworld

Another game that revolutionised the genre, Homeworld was one of the most visually stunning games you could play when it came out in 1999.

Featuring fully rendered 3D graphics and a majestic deep space setting, Homeworld took RTS strategy literally into another dimension.

The gameplay is focused, as we’ve come to expect, on gathering resources, building military forces, and using them to destroy enemies in order to accomplish an objective. The game includes both single-player and multiplayer modes, the latter of which received high praise from the gaming community at the time.

The single-player mode consists of one story-driven campaign, broken up into levels. In each level, the player has to complete an overall objective in order to progress, though the ultimate objective of the mission can change as the level’s story unfolds. Between each of the 16 levels is a hand-drawn, black-and-white cutscene with narrative voiceovers.

In its first 6 months, the game sold over 500,000 copies. It also and received several awards and nominations for best strategy game of the year and best game of the year. A release of the game’s source code in 2003 sparked unofficial ports to macOS and Linux. To date, three more games in the Homeworld series have been produced.

XCOM-2

Developed by Firaxis, XCOM-2 came to define the turn based RTS genre in the modern day.

Building on the success and popularity of the original XCOM story in Micropose’s UFO Enemy Unknown, released some 20 years previously, 2016s XCOM-2 was an instant hit with players and served to remind everyone of the importance of a good strategy game and how relevant the genre can still be.

In XCOM 2, the player-character is the commander of the XCOM military organization that is now reduced to a resistance force opposing the ongoing alien occupation of Earth. Played from a top-down perspective, the game uses turn-based tactics in which players issue commands to a squad of human soldiers to eliminate the aliens in a map and dependent on missions, complete secondary objectives.

The battles get trickier with each turn. You need to travel around the tight play area carefully while setting up cells and traps for aliens, as well look to collect resources in order to construct better weapons.

Upon release, the game received very favourable reviews, the journalists praising the game’s expanded tactical options and new enemy types, which forced the player to think more carefully before launching an attack.

It sold 500,000 copies in its first week on Steam, helping publisher 2K Games make better than expected financial results that year.

Civilization VI

Civ VI is the latest turn-based strategy game in the long-running and beloved series. Also made by Firaxis, the game centres around the creation and furthermost of a player’s chosen historic civilisation, and is one of the popular franchises in the genre’s history.

Typically starting in an ancient era, you must establish a city and from there look to expand not only your territory but the technological, cultural, financial, religious and military might of your chosen nation.

As you progress through history slowly unlocking advancements that creep toward the state of the present day, the player must decide which paths to focus on in order to achieve a victory condition.

Unlike most strategy games which make military conquest the ultimate goal, Civ presents multiple paths to your actions ultimate opportunity to dominate the globe. Whether you choose to focus on a science victory, being the first country to conquer space, or to spread your culture astound the globe until it achieves dominance, or to convert every major capital to your religion, there are many paths the player can take, and which you choose can be highly depended on the inherent strengths of your chosen civilisation and their associated leader, which acts as your avatar to negotiate with other historic leaders controlled either by other players or AI.

Sessions of Civ can be incredibly engrossing and last for many hours at a time, with the popular moniker “just one more turn” becoming common parlance in the gaming community when referring to the franchise.

Initially related on PC in 2016, Civ VI has gone on to host two major expansions and be released on a wide variety of platforms, including games consoles and mobile platforms.

It is not the highest-rated Civ game on Metacritic, that would Civ II, but in our opinion, particular with the additions to gameplay that the expansions have brought, such as diplomatic victories and natural disasters, it stands out as the most significant in the series to date.

Bottom Line

If you’re a fan of this genre you will have undoubtedly played one or more of these titles, but if you’re yet to try out RTS games, stuck as you are in your FPS or sports games bubble, we couldn’t recommend these 5 classics highly enough.

There’s an incredibly refreshing feel to great RTS games if you’ve been overexposed to the genres that dominate current gaming, and any of these games can, if you give them a chance, forever change your perception of what good gaming experience really can be.

So get your brain in gear and start strategising…