I don't agree on many titles. If I would, I'd name Dark Reign, too.

I just realized that GOG does not have many RTS in supply, rather more TBS or RTT. It used to be my favourite genre, once.

Earth 2150 is just not great and one of the early attempts to translate RTS into 3d. Mainly the UI holds the player back. The animations of the menus are time-consuming, the frames for building the buildings and units far too big. The minimap is lagging. Being able to transform the terrain sounds interesting but does not proof to be effective. Controls are bad.

thanks for all the suggestions

I already have Sacrifice, Dark Reign, and both Ground Controls but I haven't played through them yet.

If any of these are part of the daily sales I'll make sure to check them out.

On a related note, if someone has a walkthrough for Dark Reign GIMME! That game is impossible! Or maybe I'm just really bad at it?

I know that there are quite a few FPS out there that focus on multiplayer and either don't have a single player mode at all (not even against bots) or a rather basic one. But for RTS I can't name a single game that only has a very shallow SP but a great MP. Especially the older games you are looking at are probably all fine in this regard.

I guess you are a defensive player, too? I just can't get into RTS mutliplayer because it all seems to come down to who is the best rusher which is just not my cup of tea.

StrongHold Crusader has a great single player campaign I enjoy it as much as starcraft!

Homeworld cannot be beat when it comes to single player RTS play.

Command & Conquer comes close though.

HOMEWORLD! - another one of my faves. shame theres no 3rd installment in sight

Nothing quite like a good RTS campaign, no? Let's see...

-StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty
-Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance
-Supreme Commander 2 (the original campaign was really sort of meh)
-WarCraft 3: Reign of Chaos
-WarCraft 3: The Frozen Throne
-Sacrifice (most missions aren't much different from skirmishes, but the presentation is great)
-World in Conflict (dunno about expansion)
Ground Control (tough as nails, haven't played the sequel)
-Dawn of War (it and Winter Assault might qualify, but they're not fantastic; Dark Crusade and Soulstorm both follow the same pattern as Emperor: Battle for Dune, meaning lots of Skirmish games punctuated by a handful of scripted missions)
Dawn of War 2
Dawn of War 2: Chaos Rising
Dawn of War 2: Retribution (note that all campaigns are functionally identical, with factions permuted as necessary, and overall storyline varying slightly)
Original War (more of an honourable mention - game is tough as nails and not all that polished compared to the rest)
Command & Conquer (any game in the main series, although I haven't played 4)
AI War (never got far in it, it's more of a coop game, or so I hear)

Unfortunately, RTS games, while popular, are, from what I can tell, an easily satiated market, and good games with good campaigns are few and far between. I'm sure there's a whole bunch of games I forgot to mention, but I'm pretty sure this is the meat of it.

Well, I'm a Total Annihilation fan, myself, though mainly just for the skirmishes, so I'd mention

http://springrts.com/

It's like T.A., but with a more modern interface....and many different types of game to choose from. ( I prefer Balanced Annihilation and Zero K.).

And, it's free.

Warlords Battlecry 2 has a pretty cool campaign IMO. It lets you play as any faction and has virtually unlimited replay value.

I love WB 2 but I always considered that more of an extended skirmish rather than a campaign. However you are dead on regarding the unlimited replay, kind of. I always got my ass handed to me halfway through conquering the world.

Yes, as I forgot (and someone eles pointed out) the Stronghold games are great single player RTS games, one of the best castle building/defense games too and it does have a storyline.

I'd suggest Stronghold/stronghold crusader for the best in the series.


Might I also suggest the Majesty series? Both I and II are good games and have a single player storyline. They are also unique compared to most RTS games as they do not play like your typical ones.

You can build things, but you can NOT order units around. Instead you have to entice people to do things. If you want people to say, hunt a monster down or travel/explore you have to put out rewards and things for it. Units over time will level up and gain expeirence. It's a very fun RTS series.

For example if you come across a dangerious cave full of monsters, you can put a "bounty" on it and soldiers/etc will destroy/fight the monsters to get the rewards you placed on it. You also have to find a good balance for this, as very small bounties will not entice the more well trained/higher level units.

Units can train/level up depending on what things you build, as well they will spend the money you give them on things such as inn's, etc.

I've looked into Majesty 1 before.

the gameplay sounds pretty unique, I'll definitely keep a lookout for any sales.

I like Perimeter, it's great fun and quite challenging even without multiplayer. Unfortunately, it's no longer available here.

I also love Warzone 2100, which is available for free. I usually do skirmishes, but it does also have a campaign you can play. And they're still tweaking things.