Warcraft 2 was one of my favorites and one of the first online games I played. The simplicity is what made it awesome, there were so many workable strategies, and like the other guy said easy to learn hard to master. Cheating ruined competitive play a lot, but I think it survived because most players wanted to hide it so they could have a believable advantage, and by doing so it still made it possible for them to lose. Another great part about the game is that we all had our own period of time where we dominated the best of the best, that elite level of play that was unstoppable.
I tried to code a Warcraft 2 clone with the bugs and balance issues worked out back in the late 90s but never got far enough with it. It still intrigues me from time to time to have this kind of project again now that we have so many programming community tools like GitHub to collaborate with
That's pretty amazing. I played so much warcraft 2 over lan back in the day, but having played broodwar, warcraft 3, and starcraft 2 the game did seems a bit flat? I am assuming you're reasonably good or you wouldn't have stuck with it as long. What are some of the things that warcraft 2 does better than the newer games in the genre by the same company? I know how to explain that mapping for BW -> SC2 or WC3, but not for WC2 -> Other games.
Warcraft 2 just had an addictiveness for me that Starcraft and even Warcraft 3 never had, for different reasons.
I am a fan of things that are "easy to learn and hard to master". With Warcraft 2, it was like realtime chess. There were two races, the graphics and sounds were satisfyingly simple. It was about the actual strategy and not just crazy "oh look at this" glitzy features. Warcraft 3 did away with the strategy in favor of 3d glitz. Starcraft seemed too complex and I didn't like the diagonal movement instead of the vertical-horizontal. I liked knowing where the units will pop out of the building, and other stuff like that. It was really about strategy.
Keep in mind I also liked chess.
Another game I liked a lot was MYTH - TFL. I wish I could still play it. Also because of the realtime strategy!
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Designed and operated by passionate PvM and PvP experienced staff, that do not play here, this recreation aims to perfect what we all loved about Ultima Online before its decline. A highly immersive game with seemingly limitless possibilities coupled with risk vs reward, this world is what the players make of it. Offering an extensive crafting system with the best free shard economy, PvP mechanics with more templates than you'll have the time for and PvM with more challenge and data than ever before. This is the shard to play on if you want to truly enjoy Ultima Online."
Adding to what EGreg said, I preferred the simplicity of WC2 and played for years after SC and other games arrived. The gameplay has a certain precision, with units being on a grid, and the limited number of units in play.
The game is definitely "flat", although you can go back to WC1 and see how things could be worse. :) If you're speaking about graphics, I also like 2D games for some reason.
And of course there is appeal in the game environment/story too and not just gameplay. I tend to prefer fantasy over sci-fi, so that gives WC2 some extra appeal vs SC. WC2 is unique in that it is both fantasy and 2D, unlike SC and WC3.
