I played hundreds of hours of WC2 and WC3 over LAN in college, awesome games. Starcraft too. I mean quotes and terms from WC RTS games haven't entered the modern lexicon the way that "zerg" has but they're part of the same cultural continuum and are important to understanding how we got here.

Edit: also, WoW was huge but it's where Blizzard lost their way and will always be tainted in my mind. RTS is more my scene than those sleazy MMOs

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Yeah, I never got into MMOs (probably because WoW got big before I had a disposable income lol), so RTS was also my scene back then. I dabbled in SC, and played WC2 at a friend's house, but WC3 is where I really cut my teeth.

That game was so much goddamn fun to play online (dial-up, don't pick up the phone mom!). I remember getting caught every now and then in some kind of surprise rush that I had never seen, so I'd save the replay of the game and watch back to see how they did it, and then try it out against other people... I think I learned some kind of wyvyrn rush with Night Elves that way, if I recall correctly. Shit was tight. My memory is shit, I can't believe I can recall that. There were so many crazy strategies I picked up that way.

That was the golden age of RTS gaming. For me at least. Good times.

[–] AustralianSimon@lemmy.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

100% the explosion of custom maps from WC3 set the stage for the next generation of RTS.

HoN, HOTS, DOTA, League, etc relied upon these foundations.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 2 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

WC3 was the pinnacle of the PC RTS gaming era imo

I've heard a lot of mixed opinions on the WC3 Leaders mechanic, as it focuses gameplay around farming and single points of failure (losing a leader at the wrong moment often meant losing the game)

In that light, Starcraft was the pinnacle of PC RTS gaming and WC3 was an experimental variation that branched off into an RTS variant that would eventually congeal into DOTA, the pinnacle of PC MOBA gaming.

[–] PraiseTheSoup@lemm.ee 4 points 3 weeks ago

I played DotA for 14 years, but WC3 was home to so many more incredible custom maps. Element TD is an example of another that became a standalone game. But there was also Footman Frenzy, Uther Party, Wintermaul Wars, Hero Line Wars, X Hero Siege, and countless others that made WC3 the greatest RTS platform ever conceived. I hope the suits that pushed out the piece of garbage that is "warcraft reforged" rot in hell forever

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 3 weeks ago

I loved WC3 because of the Hero mechanic. It made it added just enough RPG to it... You could usually resurrect your Hero, and if I recall, you can upgrade to make the cooldown faster. Been so long though and I didn't play the unfortunate remake.