here is the reason you dont see many RTS from side view.
It makes the game almost one dimensional. I mean yea you might have airplanes that fly up in the air, but almost all your units will be walking on the ground. Not higher or lower on the screen then each other but at the same level. The only difference is their x position on the screen, which makes it almost entirely one dimensional.
And try to imagine this as your playing field

-------------------------------------------------------------
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
-------------------------------------------------------------

and say your screen can only show 1/5 th of the field at one time. I guess you would start the players on opposite sides of the field. They are thinking......"Hmmmmmmmmm, where could he possibly be attacking from?".....You KNOW where the other person is comming from. There wont be any sneaking in from the back. Or flanking them from two different sides. It is straight on. It is more of a whos got more troops as opposed to strategy.
Like in AOE2 if you can sneak a single peasant behind his town and he doesnt know it. Then you build you a bartracks with that peasant. Let him build up a bunch of troops, then as sson as he sends his troops off, you rush into his town with the troops from that barracks and destroy his town, game over. That is strategy.


"Now go away or I shall taunt you a second time"
- Monty Python and the Holy Grail
themGames Productions

ncsu121978 , one,two or three dimensional dosn''t really matter becuase it dosn''t neccessarily mean good or bad. Lets look at the benefits of the game being play (as you said) from one dimension. First, one dimensional rts will greatly improve micromanagment tasks like troop control. You said that it will also make the game more a case of who''s got the largest army. Maybe so if you''re going to implement typical boring units like they have in games like starcraft, c&c and the like. and using the pathetic combat engine that these types of games use. But, the units that i''ve planned for this game is where the strategy comes in. In other words, "unit differences". The art of designing units for this game would be creating unit versatility. Here''s a cut a paste job from another thread where i''ve talked about the combat engine that i''ve designed for this game: (from the thread "random calculations in combat"

quote:

There was 5 technologies:
1. Photon
2. Hydrogen
3. Electon
4. Carbon
5. Silicon

They created a ring of power, each one balanced against each other. If you want me to fill in the blanks here i shall. But there was a catch to the combat system that made it work so well. Which goes as follows:

Each player has (starts with) in the game 100,000 credits to make units with. But before the game starts they have to by one or more of the technologies mentioned above (Photon etc). Each technology cost 20,000 just to have use of it in-game. So here''s how this catch worked with the game logic... The more technologies you wanted to have use of in the game then the less units you would be able to construct. So you could go for brute power or versitility or a little of both. Completely rock, paper, scissor all over again but as i said it''s just a skeleton.

I''ve haven''t test played the combat engine yet but i think it would be reasonably balanced?!

Photon = Laser, Holographic technology
Electron = Automated, Energy technology
Hydrogen = Chemical, Propellent technology
Carbon = Gyro, Motion technology
Silicon = Speed, Corrosive technology

The player can build 3 different types of units:
1. Underground
2. On land
3. Aerial

From here there can be multitudes of each:
Photon Underground
Photon/Electron Underground
Photon/Carbon Underground
Carbon/Photon/Electron/Silicon Underground
Heaps of variations of each and each with different abilities. It all comes down to how many technologies you start the game with.

With such a combat system players would not be going with units that are "more powerful" but with units that can "accomplish this" task. Which brings in a lot of strategy i believe.

The bit about tunnels, these would be implaced by you just by point and click means at a cost $. Enterences would have automatic doors which work for your units only. If an enemy wanted to go in then they''d have to blow them up.

Moving around the map would also be a lot easier becuase you would just use a bar control. The map could be wrap around allowing you to attack from both sides. The game would be very different from the norm

Blackstream, i love that idea for a space (side view) rts, great idea!! there''s another one for me to think about





I love Game Design and it loves me back.

Our Goal is "Fun"!

ncsu121978 is right about gravity almost eliminating one dimension. Even the best current 2D-rts''s lack in strategy a lot. So how you''re gonna get that strategy element in a 1.5D game then?

Worms avoids the 1D problem by giving you ropes and teleports. But then in a RTS all your units would be using ropes and teleports to get from one point to another. Chaotic!

Maybe if most of the units would be airplanes/spacecrafts and only some powerful units would be troopers/marines (i.e gravity units), it could work. But then it''d be much like any other 2D rts.

Here''s a tries-to-be-sideview-rts for you:
Fuse.
Click to view a review on it/download it.

Clonk Planet is another sideview-rts (really cool game for a while).

But in both of the games above, you''ll have to control all your units by hand (harvesting, attacking, exploring etc.) and it gets really boring after a while.

-Hans

There are other elements that give rise in a side view rts that you would have problems implementing in a top view. One such element is how a unit shoots:
1. Directly in a straigt line
2. lobbed over
3. rolled

Then there is many things that haven''t been implemented in top view rts that still could be:
1. terrain hardness, softness
2. navys
3. caves
4. terrain height differentials

Plus planes can be used for dropping troops into enemy territory. Actually, i havent even considered the use of teleports. Ropes could be used but that would be more automated. Most of the battle would actually be won with the longer ranged weapons but you will still need ground troops to take territory and setting up (underground) outposts closer to you enemy. Not being seen doing this would be a major benefit for later counterstikes and suprise attacks.

I love Game Design and it loves me back.

Our Goal is "Fun"!