[It's time for another Monthly Musing -- the monthly community blog theme that provides readers with a chance to get their articles and discussions printed on the frontpage. -- CTZ]
Just about a month ago, I got together with my friends for the first time in quite a while for a night of Starcraft. I remember getting that game when it first came out, along with Brood War, and while I was never obsessed with it, I absolutely loved it. I'm way more of a futuristic-setting type of person than something that takes place in the past, so it seemed perfect for me.
There was just one problem -- I. Was. Horrible. I still am. I don't think I've ever won a single game of Starcraft or Warcraft on my own in my entire life. The only way I can even come close to winning is when I'm part of a team of people who have been playing for years, and who specialize in the strategy genre. It doesn't matter what game in the genre it is, I can't seem to win. Or come even close to winning, for that matter. In fact, I've never even finished any of the single-player Starcraft campaigns to this day.
When I was in middle school, one of the teachers in a computer class I had was really laid back, so we'd play stuff like
Starcraft and
Command & Conquer whenever we had some downtime, and that's probably where I played those games the most. All the computers in the room were always networked, so we were always on big teams. Well, you know how there are those TV shows and movies where the kids in gym class in school are being picked to be on teams, and the non-athletic kids are always picked last? That non-athletic kid was me when it came to downtime in that class. I was always shuffled from team to team because everyone knew how I played, and I honestly can't say I blamed them one bit.
I wanted to make me stop playing half the time. No matter what happened, I was always swarmed from all directions by the enemy, seemingly only a minute or two into the game. I never even had time to build up a defense.
And that's when I realized what my one true weakness is when it comes to RTS -- I hate the pace. I'm not a strategical player; I'm all about run-and-gun. When it comes to stuff like
Starcraft, I'm always trying to go faster than I should be. I always concentrate on nothing but offense, and way too little on defense, leaving my entire base wide open and ripe for the picking. And you know what really sucks? I
know that it's my weakness. I just never seem to be able to adjust my play style to do what I know needs to be done, so my suckiness is my own fault. I'm always relying on my teammates to come and bail me out, but I'm always worried that they'll be slaughtered in the process. I love RTS games, but I think they actually stress me out more than anything.
You know what type of game I'm even worse at than strategy? Tactical. No, not like Tactical Espionage Action -- I mean grid-based. Limited movements per turn, straight-up tactical stuff. I can't play games like
Ogre Battle or
Final Fantasy Tactics to save my life. The kick in the crotch when it comes to that is the fact that I don't even know why I suck so badly at them, which means it's really hard to write about it here. I think part of it is the fact that most tactical games that I've seen look like they want to have free-roaming or real-time battle systems, but the grid system restricts that free movement. Now, I realize the grid system is there purposely, and it's not meant to restrict anything. It's just that when I'm playing, I feel like I'm purposely being held back not for the sake of gameplay, but just because the game wants to be a bitch. It feels like a negative thing to me. I'm not saying the games that utilize this system are bad by any means -- I just can't adjust and plan to move along the ground in a thoughtful way. It goes back to that run-and-gun mentality of mine, I suppose.
Another thing that tends to distract me in tactical games, for lack of a better term, is the sheer size of the fights. Some of the fights in tactical games tend to last a very long time, and I'm more of a quick-but-many type of guy when it comes to battles. I can do long battles, but I much prefer a break now and then instead of just one drawn out battle sequence. I tend to start falling asleep if it's the same exact thing for such a long period of time. I can't remember which game this one friend of mine was playing, but one battle seriously took about 45 minutes from beginning to end. Come to think of it, maybe that's another thing that makes me suck at RTS games.
I'll tell you what, though. There's one tactical game that I truly do love and that's
Valkyria Chronicles because that game does stuff differently than any other tactical game I've ever played. It still limits your movement for the turn you're taking, but everything is absolutely free-roaming and half the game is a third-person shooter. As you move, you're being attacked by all the enemies in range in real-time, and once you're done, you can take cover and manually aim your weapon to attack. You have much more freedom than any other strategy/tactical game I've ever come across and half the time it doesn't even feel like it's a part of that genre. I'm good at third-person games, and I think that's what helps me like
Valkyria Chronicles so much.
So there you have it. I suck at RTS and tactical games, I know this fact, and I'm fine with it. I do like what I've played of them, but I think the pace of them is just too slow for me to ever truly get into them, which is a shame since I'm extremely excited for
Starcraft II. I'm sure I'll still buy it, but I probably won't be winning any games, at least not until I have about four years of practice or something. I'll start winning games in
Starcraft II once
Starcraft III comes out.
Contest:
6:40 PM on 08.05.2009
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This was a funny read, good job. :)
Yet I'm good at grid-based games like Fire Emblem. I don't know why.
I tried playing Fire Emblem once. That did not go well.
I'm also an SMT fan, and I want to try Devil Survivor, but that looks like it'd be way out of my skill range.
I eventually quit out of frustration, because one of the missions in the later half of the game got ridiculously difficult. It consisted of the enemy having a bunch of factories to make troops, and the whole map nearly covered in the Fog of War. So the A.I. easily had the disadvantage on me.
I played that level for three days before I gave up, because it would always end in one of two ways. 1) I kill some enemies, the enemy makes enough troops to make up for the casualties, forcing me to play an endless loop with no progress at all. Or 2) I get ready to push forward, only to have my main troops get killed by an enemy coming out of nowhere due to the Fog of War thing hiding the enemy troops.
I didn't have the patience to push myself through that, I didn't do severely deep research on the genre to know where the enemy will move if I move to a certain location, I haven't touched a block-style RTS game since that day.
I still play some games in the RTS genre, like a little VC, maybe something in the Total War franchise, but I don't do it often. Because they always remind of the frustration I've gotten from that one game, frustration that I do not want to recall for a very long time.
Good blog, by the way.
Also, those aren't RTS games becuause they're not in realtime(What the R in RTS stands for). Advance Wars is a TBS if it's anything. But that's just me being nitpicky.
@OP: I'm kinda the opposite of you in SC, I was always really good at mustering up an early defensive perimiter, but I couldn't go offensive if my life depended on it, which it often did. I also tended to fall apart in the late game when the big guns started to come out. I could never manage the larger amounts of money being tossed around. this holds true even today in other games, as I tend to fall apart in games like Advance Wars towards the latter parts of maps when me and my enemy both have large sums of money to play with.
Yeah, the later part of the game is a problem for me, too. I think another problem of mine is that I can never remember to start building a second base.
Congratulations pedroray2003!
I miss the old days of Turn-Based Strategy games, they dont even make those anymore, what the hell. I can play those more like a chess game instead of a million things running around the screen at once and me not knowing which fire to put out first.
Woot Frontpaged! Grats!
@manasteel88
The camera could be an issue, actually, although I don't think it is. Maybe the control scheme? Maybe controlling everything with mostly the mouse makes me sad inside? I have no idea. But the camera angle thing is an interesting observation, seeing as how I love Valkyria Chronicles and that definitely doesn't have an over-the-top view.
You summed up my RTS skills exactly, bravo!
Strangly though im really good at tactical RPGs like i remember i beat andvance wars ds hard mode so easy, but then getting stuck on like the 10 mission in the terran campagin in starcraft
But you should really try fire emblem or batallion wars you just can't miss out on those games
Haha me too. I'm too embarrassed to show the world that my only RTS strategy is to turtle, which is a pretty simple strategy to deal with for anyone with an actual human brain.
I think the problem is that once I'm all set up, I have fun just watching my defences shred tiny AI attacks, which gives me no incentive to improve my skills.
Then again, I also can't aim for shit, so I'm a bit worried about what's gonna happen when I play Valkyria Chronicles.
Nice read. For most of my early gamer life I played nothing but RTS games. Surprising I now find them to be the most stressful and tense games to play multiplayer. I used to sweat bullets playing Warcraft 3 while playing with my friends. But a come from behind win in an RTS is truly wonderful. Knowing you out smarted someone, as opposed to out twitched someone, is great feeling.
Damn those Battlecruiser-shaped Zergs! DAMN THEM ALL!!! :P
Good read, yo. I'm with you on the whole "can't win alone" thing. I like to think I'm okay at the games, but if you put me alone, I will inevitably do something to screw me up. Have fun with it, sure, but it's that one mistake that makes me rebuild my fortress from square one 3/4ths through the game. :-\
As for Devil Survivor... That game is *relentless*. I'm finally keeping up with the pace of the game and having a good time with it, but I'm pretty sure I fought one boss early on (FUCK IMMORTALITY) for at least a day of reloading and readjusting tactics. Felt damn good once I beat him, but man.
Although I'm pretty decent at Disgaea. Big ups for that.
I'm not good at multitasking, so I find it nearly impossible to keep all my units in order and try to plan a strategy at the same time. >.<
I can't stand it - all the finger twitching, needing to LOOK UP STATS for certain units on the internet, getting the PRECISE ordering of your drones/SCVs/Probes to get the maximum amount of units..... I can't stand it. It's not fun anymore, when it just becomes a bunch of numbers and timed steps. It's also too stressful - in order to win against the good players, your timing needs to be ABSOLUTELY SPOT ON, NO MISTAKES. If you click the wrong probe or forget to build that extra pylon, you're screwed and you might as well quit.
RTS games were good, until people started taking them seriously.
nice article m8 :) gr8 work!!
Yeah, I know... Getting that picture hurt me a little bit. :P If it's any consolation, I actually got it from Google, not GameSpot. ;)