Assignment

 Assignment

(Munoz-Avilla)Turn based strategy is the early strategy of game where players takes turn to play; examples are the chess, the battle for Normandy (1982), Nato Division Commander (1985), etc. Turn based strategy is now known as the real time strategy which requires no turn between players but often refer to as harvest, build, destroy during game play in real time. The real time strategy genre has become so large and diverse; first began to run on computers with the use of the mouse and the keyboard during game play. The real time strategy in the 1989 began to run on the Sega Genesis and computers with the introduction of Apple and Microsoft computers but nowadays this genre can be run on most consoles. The Real Time Strategy genre initially evolved separately in the United Kingdom, Japan and North America, afterward generally merging into the worldwide tradition.

Stonker, Mega-Lo-Mania and Hersog Zwerei were fuel for the imagination of the early real time strategy developer. Dune 2 was the spark that ignited them; developers of the real time strategy took the idea of Dune 2 blueprint and greatly expanded it by adding much new concepts to the real time strategy genre. The real time strategy genre underwent a series of rapid innovators and improvements to the original formula that really took the simplistic of Dune 2 template and redevelop to accommodate more advance and more realistic games; example War craft with the beginning of the real time strategy genre emphasis on making combat. Command and conquer treated fans with a taste of modern war craft to a style of cinematic and engrossing game play. Age of Empire took players on a journey through time and allowed them to wage war throughout human and many more are some greatest real time strategy genre released and some of the old ones real time strategy games are still played today.

The gameplay for all the games mentioned above generally consist of a player being positioned somewhere on or off the map with a few units, buildings and also the capability of building other units or buildings often but specific structures to unlock or request the player to build army to eliminate enemies who posses the building or unit. The task of a player must perform to succeed at a real time strategy can be very demanding and complex, user interfaces have evolved to cope with the challenges. Some features have been borrowed from desktop environments for example the technique of clicking and dragging to select all units under a given area.

            (Crash, 1984) Stonker was one on the first real time strategy games developed by Imagine Software, published by Imagine Software and released in 1993. Stonker is a very old game, which was released for a platform known as 48K ZX spectrum, 48K, which simply means 48 kilobytes the amount of memory in the version of the ZX spectrum. Spectrum is a small keyword unit that can be hooked to a television. The game uses tapes, which become the most dominant storage medium for games until Nintendo Entertainment system. The game incorporate real time strategy element and the most important was the introduction of a very basic counter system. The game play of stonker is that Armor beats Artillery, which beat infantry, which in turn beat Armor and then forms a combat system. The game doesn’t require a player to position unit on a map or spend time purchasing unit or assets, in stonker all the unit are set up at the beginning of the game an also contains one map to play. First, each play begins with a delivery of port and secondly, there is a river with a bridge spanning it the divides the map into two. During game play the ship docks at the port at regular intervals to deposit resources. Player are given four supply trucks each to transport these supplies to their twelve combat units, if supplies is not received the player dies. The goal of his game is to capture enemy port. This is very simple but in reality during game play it is made difficult. Stonker game is highly flawed game and would not entertain many today’s real time strategy fans but it nonetheless set the precedent of a strategy game-taking place in real time.

(Moony, 2008) Age of Empire was one of the first real time strategy games developed by Ensemble studios, published by Microsoft, released on the October 26, 1997 and used the 2D game engine. The same engine was later used for Age of Empire 2 with the help of Big Hugh Games and Robot Entertainment developers. Age of Empire was the first game to introduce the idea of Age: in that players must advance in Age to further the military and economy. The game contains four Ages

1.      The stone age which only villagers and basic infantry are available

2.      The tool age, which unit such as arches and club men

3.      The Bronze Age, which chariots and basic siege unit are found.

4.      The Iron Age, where everything from war elephants to juggernaut warship and phalanxes can be found.

Age advancement cost more for resources to research, but also unlocks more powerful upgrades and units.  The basic gather unit in Age of Empire is the villager. The villager is a unit that can primarily gather resources but also build structure, resources namely food, wood, stones and gold.

Age of Empires was one of the first real time strategy games to use the concept of the Town Center. At the beginning of each game, player’s start with a handful of villagers and a Town Center, this produces more villagers and researches upgrades in Ages. The Town Center supports four populations, and in order to create more units, villagers must construct houses. Villagers can also construct military buildings, including the Barracks, Archery Range, Stable, and the Siege Workshop.  Walls and Towers can be constructed to fortify a player's base or create a defensive outpost. Economy buildings, such as farms, are also available to enhance economic production. Certain buildings, such as the government center allows for researching technologies.

Age of Empires was truly a pioneer in unit development, technology, and resource gathering. It brought a new level of complexity to the previously simple and predictable real time strategy genre. The game is considered one of the founding titles of real time strategy genre, along with other great games such as war craft and command and conquers. It simply was and still is one of the most complete and expansive real time strategy games ever created. 

(Nubbe, 1993)Mega-Lo-Mania developed by Sensible software, published by Virgin Interactive and released in 1991. Mega-Lo-Mania (MLM) was originally released as a "god simulation". Mega-Lo-Mania was released on different platforms; the original Amiga version was published by Image Works in 1991, in the United Kingdom, Germany and Italy. The Atari ST version released the same year in the United Kingdom and Australia. A MS-DOS version was ported by Audio Visual Magic Ltd. and published by Ubisoft in 1992 in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and France. Virgin Interactive published the Sega Genesis in the United States in 1992. Imagineer published the Sharp X68000 version in Japan and the SNES version in 1993 in France, Germany, United Kingdom and Japan. This game was also known for the Sega Genesis as Tyrants: Fight through time in the United States.

Mega-Lo-Mania has a pretty simple storyline a new world is formed, and four rival gods fight for power over it. These gods are Scarlet (Red), Oberon (Yellow), Caesar (Green) and Madcap (Blue). They are not different factions, but share the same technologies called designs, structures, and units. One unique feature in Mega-Lo-Mania is that each map called islands and divided into different sectors. An island can have a maximum of sixteen sectors, but most only have a few. On each sector a player can build a castle, which is the main building. It is necessary to build a castle before you can build anything else or discover designs in that sector. The castle is automatically built by moving units to an empty sector. The time required to build the castle depends on the number of units that are working on it. You can move units between sectors, but you can't micromanage them within a sector.

The Mega –Lo-Mania world consists of 28 islands, and your goal is to conquer all of them during ten epochs’ three islands in each of the nine first epochs, and one in the final epoch. The epoch determines the starting technology level for a castle, and the highest possible tech level. When a castle discovers a certain number of designs it will reach a new tech level. This means that all the buildings in the sector get increased armor, designs get discovered faster and, for certain epochs, more buildings become available. These buildings are the factory, which is used to build the more complex weapons and the laboratory.

Bibliography

Crash. (1984). Crash Readers Awards, 143.

Moony. (2008). Age of Empire.

Munoz-Avilla, H. (n.d.). gamespot. Retrieved 09 10, 2013, from www.gamepot.com.

Nubbe. (1993). Mega-Lo-Mania.