It might seem pointless to write this topic when StarCraft 2 is out (disclaimer: DON'T mention StarCraft 2 here, please.), however when I was browsing bargain bin, I have found a game that I didn't even know about: Rise of Nations 2: Rise of Legends. It cost me 7 euro and boy, that game's fun. Actually, I haven't had so much fun with any RTS since Dawn of War 2 was released (yeah, not so long back, still, I've played quite a few RTSes in between).
I just love the design of the game, how missions are composed (every single one has something unique to it), and I was kinda afraid that it'll be the typical "fantasy vs. technology" like usual from the beginning, but the first whole campaign seems like pure steampunk.
And as for that, there are 3 races in the game: Steampunk, Fantasy and Hi-tech. Every race has unique design and differences that make their gameplay different. Really, I have expected that I'll get 3 basically same races with units that have the same purposes with slightly different stats ... How wrong I was. As far as units goes, every race has just a handful of unit types (don't get mistaken thou, long battles get massive), every and each of them has a distinct purpose, however.
And as I said, beginning is almost pure steampunk. That doesn't mean, however, that you get to fight one opponent over and over again. They've made special units for each race you fight, or they made them to focus on specific units, and so fighting everyone feels different.
And for Steampunk: I was surprised by quality of story cinematics, and story itself seems quite nice. I just WANT to know what will happen next, even thou it's nothing extremely unique I admit.
And the way you unlock units and level up heroes quite nicely done as well, along with somewhat non-linear approach to campaign. I have not yet finished the first campaign so take me with a grain of salt, I just want to share the little surprise I've had when I have encountered this game.
Oh and please, PLEASE, when you talk about the story, even if you say "Story gets terrible later," give it spoiler tags. I often find good what others find bad: but I tend to get affected by other people opinions, well when I put some weight on them. I put some weight on yours.

Years ago I bought Rise of Nations Gold and loved it. Easely one of my favorite strategy games ever. I thought about buying Rise of Legends, but the price together with the reviews didn't help much.
Please note that here in Brazil the average price for the game is still around R$100,00.

I got it at the px for 10 bucks, after liking RoN I figured I would give it a shot...
So far Ive only done the first two sections, but... it aint bad at all.

I'm positively glad to see an other RoL enthusiast!
I got it last year from one of CD Project Hungary's game collections, and was also thrilled by this game; I do think it's a real RTS jewel. However, campaigns are usually not my thing, and I mostly just play skirmish games in RTSs (not that I haven't completed a few maps in campaign, though).
Too bad it got a very poor reception on its release.
(Oh, and do you recognize my avatar now? ;-))

Can it be bought digitally? I did not find on Steam, GamersGate and Impulse.
The aggregate scores are not bad (around 80%) and I thought your avatar is a hobbit (Frodo?) from LotR.

As far as I know, no one distributes it digitally. However, given that you're Hungarian, it can be bought in CD Galaxis. You can have it delivered if you don't live in Budapest.
Critic acclaim was good for it, yet too few players were interested it. It had its own FilePlanet site, but it got locked due to the lack of interest.

Thank you, but this part: "Honosítás: magyar felirat" always scares me away. :D

I know what you mean, but fortunately, it's not as bad as some other translations I've seen (I'd even say it's pretty decent). I'd say if you're interested in RoL, get it with the translation, rather than miss out on it due to its being in Hungarian.

Found it in a bargain bin this winter I think. Installed it but never got around to play it and then forgot about it. Thank you for the reminder.

Well it's only subtitles: I mean, as long as they're not trying to dub the thing, it's ok. I have it with quite horrible czech translation as well and simply don't really mind the text other than unit descriptions, which are fine. And I don't really need those anymore either :D

I bought it this week (after hearing Tom Chick praising it) for 39 BRL. You just have to look around and you should find it cheaper than 100 BRL.

Yeah only subtitles, but that means I can't apply any patches and can't use any 3rd party mods or bug fixes. So I never buy translated games even if the translation is only subtitles.

Well... It seems to be patched to the latest versions and the only mods to speak of are for demo version of the game, I've just checked. Other than that, there are just little tweaks. Nothing to miss out the game for, really.

Starcraft 2! Starcraft starcraft starcraft!
*Whew!* Okey, now that I got that out of my system, I think I remember the ads of this one, but never played the game and it looked interesting. There was a race called the Da Vinci i think and another that had fat guys on crab/scorpion like legs or something like that.
Personally, whenever someone tells me a story is bad, I really lower my expectations but that usually helps because with your expectations lowered, you end up finding entertainment or interesting tidbits in an otherwise average story. High expectations is what kills a good or decent stories for me.
Wish this was sold online, i have no way of getting it otherwise.

It's a solid RTS. I got it when my kid was going through an RTS phase and we still play it every once in a while. Paraworld is another RTS that you might have missed that is pretty fun. Rise of Legends is better, but Paraworld also has a nice story and enough unique game play (the unit management) to make it fun.