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Tactical Strategy Games
durandal4532
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I was looking through past threads for tactis games that were not Disgaea or Front Mission 4, and came up reasonably empty. Then I realized, there really haven't been many tactical strategy games period in recent memory beyond the Japanese SRPGs.
So I decided that instead of a request thread, I'd just make a general love thread.
I think my favorite experience so far, actually, has been Battletech, through both the boardgame version and MegaMek. There are a million mechs and loadouts, and each has a great deal going for it. A little while ago, I lost to a friend of mine, 4 well rounded medium mechs to 5 small ones, because the small buggers never left cover except to sprint behind me and release SRMs. The game manages to be diverse as hell, while still being fair enough that you know there is some way to beat that opposing force if only you can figure it out.
The other game I've played on and off since discovering it has been "The Legend of Wesnoth". It has gaping flaws in some areas, but the way that random attacks come together with simple, solid rules for movement and unit types, really makes the game a joy to play. It manages to avoid the bloat that usually comes with open source, have a few important statuses and unit abilities, and just lets you figure out the best way to use and abuse them. Plus, it tells you how likely you are to give and take damage each attack, and the transparency is nice, especially for a beginner.
And, though I said turn-based, I remember Myth being a wonderful game for people who like tactics more than unit-production. The online play was gold, just you, 20 points, and any units you felt like.
I decided to try Front Mission 4 and so far it seems really really fun. I like that it's much more of a "pick a good loadout and team" game than a lot of SRPGs. I know the one NIS game I tried (Phantom Brave) was pretty fun, but quickly became "beat the boss in ten seconds with any class, or level until you can".
So, what tactical strategy games do people really love? What makes a good tactical strategy game in general? What have I missed?
So I decided that instead of a request thread, I'd just make a general love thread.
I think my favorite experience so far, actually, has been Battletech, through both the boardgame version and MegaMek. There are a million mechs and loadouts, and each has a great deal going for it. A little while ago, I lost to a friend of mine, 4 well rounded medium mechs to 5 small ones, because the small buggers never left cover except to sprint behind me and release SRMs. The game manages to be diverse as hell, while still being fair enough that you know there is some way to beat that opposing force if only you can figure it out.
The other game I've played on and off since discovering it has been "The Legend of Wesnoth". It has gaping flaws in some areas, but the way that random attacks come together with simple, solid rules for movement and unit types, really makes the game a joy to play. It manages to avoid the bloat that usually comes with open source, have a few important statuses and unit abilities, and just lets you figure out the best way to use and abuse them. Plus, it tells you how likely you are to give and take damage each attack, and the transparency is nice, especially for a beginner.
And, though I said turn-based, I remember Myth being a wonderful game for people who like tactics more than unit-production. The online play was gold, just you, 20 points, and any units you felt like.
I decided to try Front Mission 4 and so far it seems really really fun. I like that it's much more of a "pick a good loadout and team" game than a lot of SRPGs. I know the one NIS game I tried (Phantom Brave) was pretty fun, but quickly became "beat the boss in ten seconds with any class, or level until you can".
So, what tactical strategy games do people really love? What makes a good tactical strategy game in general? What have I missed?
We're all in this together
durandal4532 on
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Squad-based combat that uses the environments for cover, and you can't see the enemies unless you're looking right at them(which means they can kill a party member very easily by coming up behind you).
And I like the visual style/story of Stella Deus, but the gameplay can get annoying. It's more along the lines of FFT though, so that might not be what you have in mind.
Aye. X-Com made portable is a fine bet for strategy.
It's really just everything I look for in a strategy game.
You can buy X-Com: Terror From the Deep on Steam for something like $2 right now. It's not as good as the original, but it should do.
I loved this one. Made my roadtrip across the US fly by.
Always.
I entirely forgot about Close Combat. I had a friend addicted to that when I was little. I should pick that up.
I found myself really let down by Front Mission 4. It was just so easy because of the healing wanzers, and really short. I was considering picking it up after I rented it, but checking online revealed that I was on the last level already.
Front Mission 3 was just a better game in every way (except graphics) and was longer too!
SE++ Map Steam
And the plot sucks, and everything progresses about half as fast as it should due to the split characters. All in all, FM4 kinda fucking sucked.
I'm still mad we didn't get FM5, since by all accounts it was pretty good.
Advance Wars never set quite right with me because I hate building units mid-mission in anything.
But, a lot of people really love AW.
Anyone ever play Ring of Red? I was interested and then forgot about it, it's a really old PS2 game. Wonder if it's worth digging around for.
edit: Actually, yes. I saw Ring of Red on the Giant Robots thread a while back, is it actually good or what? It sounded intriguing.
X-Com
Jagged Alliance
Silent Storm
Disciples 2
HoMM V
But it moved SLOW.
You control every battle between 2 robots. So instead of just attacking each other, a la Front Mission, you have 60 seconds to launch cannon blasts, and use abilities like grenades and stuff.
I really enjoyed it though. Something about WWII style giant robots was completely awesome.
Well, I may be misremembering... although, I do think the one copy I tried to use kept glitching out on me, which probably affected things. I usually have no problem with games from when I was a kid, so I am a bit ashamed.
Also. Front Mission 5? Did we not get it because it's an import, or because the studio went under, or what?
And the original is on Gametap.
Very very easily modifyable and it has RPG elements
I remember playing this in a home made mode called terminator... Basically we'd give one guy very good armor and weapons (So he was nearly invincible) and then we had him outnumbered and tried to kill him.
It's very awesome, very free and very much worth a try if you got a friend to play with or time to waste
Actually, it also reminds me of Laser Squad Nemisis. That was one that seemed like it was a pretty solidly put together game, the demo just didn't convince me it was worth subscribing. It had areas that were too big, sparse, and reasonably difficult to move around in, and pretty standard combat. I'm sure it improves greatly with human players, but they don't let you test that.
choose which house to fight for and start conquering planets against other players. Its a good time.
I love the Ogre Battle series (not the Tactics Ogre versions) as it requires a great deal of strategy with how you set up groups for travel speed on different terrains (flyers or snow or trees or so on versus the mixed groups only good on roads / plains) and the alignments of units when capturing towns. I think the lack of direct control over battles makes for great strategy as you must choose when to fight with certain units and when to retreat if you feel you cant handle it with that group composition (you can pick attack strongest, most hp, least hp, etc, but they can only attack people in range, so if weakest is back row, you cant reach him with a melee character, etc and they attack next weakest). Add in multiple hero characters, lots of job classes and multiple endings and its the making of a great replayable strategy game (now I dont know if its tactical or not by the OPs definition as it come sfrom Japan). I still feel March of the Black Queen is the pinnacle of the series while Person of Lordly Calibur was still excellent in its own right.
For recent stuff, Fire Emblem has started making its way over to the US with Game Boy versions and a GC one (I think a Wii one is on the way as well). Again, I dont know if they are what they OP was looking for or not though.
Nah, Front Mission is developed in-house by Square Enix (at least, I'm fairly sure it's in-house)...either way, I think that perhaps FM3/4 didn't sell well, so they didn't bother localizing it, which really sucks.
They are bringing FM1 DS out over here though, so maybe if sales are good we'll still see FM5 one of these days.
You focus on postioning and specific unit abilities to win encounters that are usually (if against a human) equal from the get go or (if against a computer) hard but able to be tackled using skillful manuevering, not by leveling your characters until they rock awesome.
Agreed. As much as I love Japanese SRPGs, I would love to see more strategy and less highest level wins gameplay. But then, this is true of every kind of RPG. We need less "spend time making numbers bigger" and more real strategy. Less filler and more unique and kickass fights.
Sounds like turn-based strategy as opposed to strategy RPG would be right up your alley. X-COM, Band of Bugs, stuff like that. Your squad is predefined; you just have to figure out how to win. None of that "go level for a while and learn some new skills" mentality from FFT and Disgaea.
However, I do think there's more than room to make the two genres merge a bit. Something in the vein of a Battletech game where you "level up" in terms of how much Clanner tech you have access to from your captured foes, or whether Command thinks you're worth committing an Atlas to. You could make something based around the point-buy system that meant you could try to go for the fewest resources wasted in the pursuit of the enemy, so while there was a "standard loadout", doing it with fewer mechs or less expensive hardware would be rewarded, and doing it with more would be an option for people who wanted to steamroll.
I think I may have just described X-Com. I really need to pick that up from Steam.
Alternately, the SRPGs would be more intriguing to me if leveling was handled more as a way to differentiate characters, not leapfrog foes.
Nope, although the whole game aside from story was in English on the original cart (at least, IIRC), so it was pretty import friendly. I'm looking forward to playing through it again.
Last weekend Steam had a sweet sale where they were selling Disciples II with all of its expansions for $5. That was the easiest game purchase I've ever made. I'm not sure if I'm entirely comfortable calling it a "tactical strategy" game, though...
I also enjoyed it. Setting up the battles required a decent amount of strategificating. The pace didn't bother me at all. I'm thinking this can be found cheap, to boot.
Sadly, no... But here's a list of what you will get out of Rock Band:
[too much to fit in a sig, thats what]