Imagine if CA licensed out the RTW engine....

**Excalibur Bane** · 10-12-2004, 03:32

If CA would license out the engine, it would be really wicked for strategy games in other genres. Most especially space strategy games. If you think about it, the tactical battle could be adapted to just about any game without too much trouble.

For example: Take the Star Wars universe, replace the siege engines with capital ships, troops with Tie Fighters and X-wings, insert a space background. Poof! You have a game ten times as good as the poorly designed Star Wars Rebellion. The graphical effects would be outstanding, we could watch fighters dive and strafe the capital ships, capital ships exchange bombardments of lasers. That's truly my type of game. I would love to see something like that, ever since the fiasco that was Master Of Orion 3. Any of you guys think the same?

That's just an example. It could be applied to virtually any of the popular licenses: Star Trek, Battletech (Mechwarrior), etc, etc, etc. Converting the strategy portion of the map would be just as easy. Follow the same general mechanics, just change the background and terrain to adjust for the game.

Or we could have brand new games like a Modern: Total War. Infantry, Tanks, Heavy weapons squads, etc going at it on a modern map of the world. That would require even less adjustment then any of the above. Probably something CA is going to do themselves eventually. After we get through Napoleon: Total War, American: Total War, Vietnam: Total War, and Iraq: Total War.

Anyway, I thought it would be cool idea. The possibilities are pretty endless. I suppose most of it could be done via modding but then I'm not that good at it and don't know how much the game can be modded.

My thought for the day!

All hail Space: Total War!

**Colovion** · 10-12-2004, 04:12

Battle of the Bulge would be sweet with this engine.

One step at a time though, I'd rather have a Chinese and Medieval game in this engine first.

**Excalibur Bane** · 10-12-2004, 04:33

I'm serious! It would really kick ass. Though, I always liked the idea of being able to watch one of these battles, see that a unit is doing a stupid job, take control of the unit commander, FPS style, whip out your sword and charge into a formation of spearmen, hacking and slashing your way through them!

Men! Follow me!

**metatron** · 10-12-2004, 05:57

IIRC, Star Wars: Rebellion fought in 3D space.

**Excalibur Bane** · 10-12-2004, 06:00

True but it wasn't exactly totally 3D. You could only go so far up and down. It was kinda psedu 3D sorta thing. I think anyway. The textures were pretty rotten. Well, they are now at any rate

**Colovion** · 10-12-2004, 08:26

Me and my friend - way back in 1999 basically created Rome: Total War in our heads after playing Ground Control and Age of Empires - we wanted to combine them but on a massive scale. Very interestly Rome lives up to our depiction of how the game should be in our minds at the time. Of course there were differences but they were ones which had more to do with scale and the future of the engine the game ran on (exactly what you're talking about here).

**HicRic** · 10-12-2004, 09:48

If you want a Star Wars game that involved fighters and capital ships and stuff blowing up in space then play the flight sim games on the PC (X-wing, TIE fighter, X-wing Alliance and the like). You can watch and indeed take part in all the capital ship strafing you want, as well as inter-capital-ship firing and hundreds (I'm not kidding) of extra missions made by fans. They were SUPERB games (even though they're old!) and frankly, I think they do a much better version of a SW battle than the total war engine would. (*cough* I'll stop going on about those games and get back to the point!) Total War would be good for, say, a battle on the ground like the one in episode one, but isn't really suited for full 3D space battle.

However, the idea of licensing out the RTW engine may well be a good one. I'm sure there are games developers that would come up with some great games that used it. I could easily see someone like EA picking it up and using it for, say, a large-scale Medal of Honour game (how about YOU become the supreme commander of the D-day landings, instead of having to run up the beach yourself.

) and then you could carry on from there to try and take Europe (a now classic Total War objective). Obviously the idea of taking Europe would work best if you were playing as the Germans but I'm sure taking control of any faction would work just as well.

**Despot of the English** · 10-12-2004, 09:48

MTW with the Rome engine would be most welcome

.

**Shoraro** · 10-12-2004, 10:01

If you're wanting Star Wars as a 3D RTS I believe somone is doing a mod for Homeworld 2.

Regarding the licencing of the Total War engine, Warhammer from Games Workshop would be a perfect fantasy battle game with it. It'd work perfectly with the campaign map too.

**Excalibur Bane** · 10-12-2004, 10:06

Originally Posted by HicRic

If you want a Star Wars game that involved fighters and capital ships and stuff blowing up in space then play the flight sim games on the PC (X-wing, TIE fighter, X-wing Alliance and the like). You can watch and indeed take part in all the capital ship strafing you want, as well as inter-capital-ship firing and hundreds (I'm not kidding) of extra missions made by fans. They were SUPERB games (even though they're old!) and frankly, I think they do a much better version of a SW battle than the total war engine would. (*cough* I'll stop going on about those games and get back to the point!) Total War would be good for, say, a battle on the ground like the one in episode one, but isn't really suited for full 3D space battle.

However, the idea of licensing out the RTW engine may well be a good one. I'm sure there are games developers that would come up with some great games that used it. I could easily see someone like EA picking it up and using it for, say, a large-scale Medal of Honour game (how about YOU become the supreme commander of the D-day landings, instead of having to run up the beach yourself.

) and then you could carry on from there to try and take Europe (a now classic Total War objective). Obviously the idea of taking Europe would work best if you were playing as the Germans but I'm sure taking control of any faction would work just as well.

No, no, no. I want to be able to command the capital ships. Direct their fire, ram them into the enemy, launch fighters. It would work fine as far as the strategy map goes. Just use a spatial grid for territory and what not. Cities become planets.

Oh, nevermind.

**Shoraro** · 10-12-2004, 10:16

Excalibur, read my post above yours

**Excalibur Bane** · 10-12-2004, 10:26

I did, I did! But I want the strategy to go with it. Mmmm. Well, it was a nice idea. And it's not like CA would give out their fancy engine anyway.

**doc_bean** · 10-12-2004, 11:22

A few years ago licensing was all the hype in the FPS genre, how many games weren't developed using the Quake/Quake2 engine ? But now every company seems to be building their own engine again (sometimes starting from the license obtained all those years ago, granted). It would seems that having an own engine is seen as a benefit, maybe because it adds an own unique look and feel to the game ?
Anyway, I don't think CA is willing to give up their beauty, especially since they are (probably) making another game based on the engine.

That said, Imperial Glory and The Battle for Middle Earth already LOOK like TW games (with less units on screen), and I wouldn't mind a Warhammer 40K: Total War.