Writing for Real-Time Strategy Games
Stephen Dinehart
7.1 Genesis In 1992, a company started by Louis Castle and Brett Sperry, then called Westwood Studios, released a game titled DuneII: TheBuilding ofa Dynasty. Thegameplaywas in theepic styleof traditionalwargamespastlike those frompublisherAvalonHill— specifically their game Dune. Dune allows up to six players to select a race, build a stronghold, and attack their opponents for resources and power. The object of the game is to seize opponents’ strongholds. This is only possible with a player-driven strategy of economics, military, religion, and treacherous diplomacy. The Dune II video game also had one primary innovation. Rather than the turn-based systems of the Avalon Hill games, Dune II is meant to be occurring in “real time,” that is, without turns. The real-time elements centered around three major activities: building and up- grading units and strongholds, managing and gathering resources for military and industrial needs,and,finally,combat with opponents. DuneII isunofficiallythefirst real-time strategy (RTS) game, though it did have one predecessor, a little-known ti- tle called Herzog Zwei in which the player commanded individual units in an effort to destroy his opponent’s base. Wargames give the player vast agency in the direction of armies on battle maps. The game type arguably has its roots in the ancient Indian board game of chatu- ranga, but the rebirth of wargaming came when it was first defined as a pastime by the infamous H. G. Wells in his book Little Wars. Published in 1913, the book contains the description of a basic rule set for wargames waged with miniature sol- diers on a parlor floor (it is available for free on the Web). In RTS games, such as Dune II, it is as if H. G. Wells’Little Wars had come to life for players, not in the parlor but on the screen. This perspective is neither third person nor om-
