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Having started my computer strategy gaming on a Sega Genesis with Westwood's Dune 2, working on a realistic computer war-game, or a Real-Time Strategy Game (RTS), as it is more commonly called, became for me an item of particular interest.

In graduate school @ USC's Interactive Media Division I had the pleasure of working with the Westwood team at EALA on The Battle for Middle Earth II. Not long there after we even had a course under Professor Chris Swain which focused on RTS game design. It was a blast, and really provided a deeper insight into the process and history associated with the design and production of the genre. By the time I got to writing and doing narrative design with the award winning team working on Company of Heroes it was the fulfillment of a life long dream for me.

Working on the war-game franchise made me ask questions. Deeper questions than I asked in grad school, about where my fascination began, and when this form, RTS, came to be. The roots of RTS, are war-games. Even if the setting has fantasy influences, the core combat systems of all RTS is that of a war-game: Multiple Player Units, Resource Management, Building, and Command level strategy.

In investigating the roots of war-gaming in my family I found, to my surprise, that my family began war-gaming as a result of involvement with the military in WWII and the Korean War.  They played 'war' as students, soldiers, and officers, to study military strategy. Asking my retired Air-Force officer of an uncle, he mentioned it rising into a hobby status in the 1950s. Just about the time Charles Roberts was getting started designing what would prove to be a ground breaking  game system.

His 1954 game Tactics, and the follow-up Tactics II are generally credited as the first board war-game. Tactics pioneered many game mechanics which became standard in the board wargame industry, including cardboard counters representing individual military units with separate values for movement and combat; the odds-ratio combat results table; and variable movement costs for entering squares (later hexes) containing different types of terrain.[1] Roberts knew the game had tremendous educational value. [2] It was serious, serious war-gaming. But I knew it had to go deeper, even those table-top games had to owe what they are to the ideas of their predecessors. Where did it come from? My uncle was wasn't sure.

War-games are most certainly serious in the current age, some of the best strategy game makers alive work for Uncle Sam creating war simulations.  While at first the notion may seem odd, the reality is war-games have become tools for military training and strategists.  Serious war-games are teaching tools, practical for professionals in the field and students of military strategy. With the models created by war-game systems the military argues it saves lives.  Any training we can have in lessening the taxes of war is most certainly a worthy endeavor. Game makers have been driving for realism in war-games for a long time, even the original Tactics box claims "The Original Realistic Land Army Wargame". At some point hobby games became tools of learning for military strategists. Where did this fascination come from, and where is the line where hobby crosses into serious war-gaming? When did military individuals start expecting the playing of strategic game systems, specifically war-games, to create narratives which can be used in real life?  As a narrative designer and game maker I can't help but wonder.

    In 1992 a game was released by a developer started by Louis Castle and Brett Sperry, then called "Westwood Studios" their game was titled "Dune II: the Battle for Arrakis."  (see North American box art and gameplay video clip below) Taken from the epic styles of traditional war-games past like those of publisher Avalon Hill, specifically their game Dune. The game has up to six players, select a race, build a stronghold and attack your opponents for resources and power. The object of the game is to seize opponents strongholds. This is done with a player driven strategy of economics, military, religion, and treacherous diplomacy. The Dune video game had one primary difference. Rather than turn-based systems of the Avalon Hill games, the video game is meant to be occurring in "real-time", that is, without turns. The core gameplay of Westwood's Dune II involved picking a race, building a stronghold, and taking over opponents strongholds. The real-time elements centered around three major activities, building and upgrading units and strongholds, managing and gathering resources for military and industrial needs, and finally, combat with opponents and sand-worms.

    Let that not diminish the sheer genius of the collective iterative innovation of the RTS game type itself. Unlike other styles of videogames RTS puts the player in charge of an army of his/her own creation and sets them free in a virtual sandbox to play. Though "Dune II" did have one predecessor, a little known title called "Herzog Zwei" in which the player commanded individual units in an effort to destroy their opponent's base. What is most interesting from a storytelling standpoint was the perspective, or seeming lack there of, the games seemed to have little to do with the stories of individual characters, they exist somewhere between 2nd person omnipotent and 3rd person and allowed the player to 'command vast armies'. From it's inception the stories for RTS where all seemingly war-based, even 1st generation RTS titles like Blizzard entetertainment's groundbreaking 1994 fantasy game "Warcraft: Orcs and Humans" was nevertheless about war.