OK so the AI is bad; any good alternatives?

[Slyspy]

Very few AIs can challenge a player of any ability, because what we call AIs really are nothing of the sort. They cannot, after all, learn. However a game AI should be able to do two things to improve the challenge: It should be able to cheat to some extent to help itself, but this should not be so obvious as to annoy the player. This seems ok in RTW. Secondly the AI should be able to use the game's own internal mechanics. On this requirement RTW falls short. The AI is unable to build useful armies, unable to move those armies purposely around the map, it is unable to utilise the game's diplomacy system, it is unable to employ units in a tactical fashion and it is unable to respond usefully to events on the tactical battlefield. We are left with an AI that cannot even play its own game. Coupled with the bugs this is why RTW provides so little challenge and entertainment.

[Marcus Maxentius]

With games with "good" AI it that knows your moves too quickly and counters them too easily or efficiently(read robotically). Usually, these games give the AI cheats galore such as being able to build up faster than humanly possible. That's what turns me off to RTS's in general.

Rome Total War with it's faults is a step towards what I think is good AI. I'm not saying Rome has good AI, in fact it's moronic at times. What I liked when I started playing, was how the AI is beginning to play to the same rules as the human. It still gets some cheats. But I liked how fallible, or human, it seemed to be. In battle it makes tactical mistakes, but it is also capable of pulling off brillant manouvers. And in campaign each faction is not some kind of generic Napoleon or Sauron with different units. Each his different goals for bettering their nation-states. Spain for example is Isolationist and in my game Allies with other factions surrounding my own in self-defense. It's intent is to protect not expand its borders.

Now obviously these features are implemented poorly in the game. Spain doesn't build up much of a self-defense force and is crushed. But they're there for future games/expansion packs to build upon.

I'd pick this game over RTS's because I don't feel like this is The Matrix and Agent Smith is controlling the enemy. I don't want to have to be Neo.

[Red Harvest]

Civil War Bull Run has very strong AI. SM's Antietam and Gettysburg were also good.

It's not that good AI can't be written. It is that most companies don't have a strong interest in it.

[Spino]

Activision Value has a great little title called "Civil War - The Battle of Bull Run: Take Command 1861" (the full title is even longer!) that was created by a tiny (as in 2 guys and some helpers working for free) developer called Madminutegames. Now CWBBR won't win any awards for graphics and at first glance it looks like a souped up version of Sid Meier's Gettysburg but it is far more complex and challenging than most tactical strategy games you'll ever play. Forget about the point and click RTS style combat of Gettysburg or the TW games because CWBBR simulates (in an abstract fashion) the challenges and limitations confronting a 19th century commander at various organizational levels; army, division, brigade, etc. This includes leadership ratings, realistic fatigue and morale and above all, delayed execution of orders. For example, let's say you're commanding a division and want that brigade held in reserve to double time it to the front. You tell it where you want it to go and what formation and posture to assume when it arrives and then a mounted courier gallops from your general to its commander with the orders. To add to the suspense there's no guarantee that the commander will get the orders because couriers can be killed or captured by enemy units in the vicinity!

Best of all the AI in CWBBR seems to conduct itself with greater intelligence and ability than that found in the TW series. It's not brilliant but it rarely self destructs and massacres its troops like the AI in RTW does with alarming regularity.

The game is full of little moments that make it all worthwhile. My pet favorite is taking command of an entire division or army and sending the entire formation down a given road and deploying once they reach their destination. I also love those nail biting moments when you think you've gotten the best of an enemy brigade only to see fresh enemy troops arrive out of nowhere from a nearby treeline. You immediately request reinforcments and pray that your commander grants your request and sends those troops in time to save your bacon from the fire! CWBBR just feels right and it sucks you into the action in a way that no shallow game loaded with eye candy and little else can do. Excellent stuff.

Much like the Combat Mission series CWBBR has given computer wargames a serious kick into the modern age. It's a steal at $20 and is worth every penny.

http://www.madminutegames.com

[Navaros]

i don't know of any alternatives but i will throw in my 2 cents on the AI issue:

it always bewilders me that mankind can send rovers to Mars yet can not even program semi-decent AI into PC games. what the heck is up with that?!

i also do not think that the devs beefing up the AI's stats to godly levels is a suitable reason to consider a game as having "good AI". yet that seems to be what most games i've played (in which the AI can put up any sort a fight) do. they don't make it challenging because of good AI, but rather it's challenging because the AI cheats. that is a sorry state of AI, i say. mankind should be ashamed of itself for not yet evolving beyond the incredibly primitive state of PC game AI even in 2005.

[Crazed Rabbit]

Civ 3 has some good AI.

Rise of Nations, though a pure click fest RTS with some very abitrary limits (like the limits on the economy, and making every new unit of the same type cost more, as if you got worse at training units the more you trained), has good AI too.

Crazed Rabbit

[Uesugi Kenshin]

RON has good AI at times, but my favorite AI is Operation FLashpoint. So far I have not found squad or platoon level tactics simulated better in any game, it is an FPS, but remains hyper-realistic. I have been replaying it after my upgrade, the sad thing is even with its bad graphics no rig I have ever seen is able to deal with max settings and the largest draw distance, 5km.