The most popular real-time strategy games

By the time Lords of Midnight: The Citadel arrived in 1995, it carried the weight of a classic on its shoulders. Rather than reinventing the original, it refines and reinterprets i...

Command & Conquer: Red Alert is a real-time strategy (RTS) video game developed by Westwood Studios and published by Virgin Interactive in 1996. It is part of the Command &...

Dune 2000 is an abandoned science fiction classic real-time strategy game based on the popular Dune franchise. The Dune "universe" took form in the books of science ficti...

Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings is a landmark real-time strategy (RTS) game developed by Ensemble Studios and published by Microsoft. Released in 1999, it is the second install...

The Settlers (also known as Serf City: Life is Feudal) is the kind of game that turns you into a benevolent yet slightly obsessive medieval manager. You don’t just build...

Released in 1997, Age of Empires is what happens when ancient history gets drunk and decides to party. You start in the Stone Age, bashing wild boars and clubbing trees, and before...

Populous is an abandoned strategy game designed by the video game celebrity Peter Molyneux, developed by Bullfrog. Populous was released by Electronic Arts in 1989 for DOS and for ...

Dune II, released in 1992, is a pioneering real-time strategy game developed by Westwood Studios. Set in the world of Frank Herbert's Dune, players command noble houses in a battle...

Dune, released in 1992, is a game developed by Cryo Interactive and published by Virgin Games. It's based on the iconic science fiction novel of the same name by Frank Herbert. In ...

The original Command & Conquer (1995, DOS) is the game that launched a thousand LAN parties. It’s gritty, fast-paced RTS warfare with full-motion video cutscenes so chees...

Mega lo Mania, also known as Mega-Lo-Mania: The Battle for Elysium in some regions, is a real-time strategy (RTS) video game developed by Sensible Software and published by Image W...

Powermonger takes the god-game formula of Populous and gives it teeth. Instead of playing benevolent deity, you’re more like a slightly cranky warlord, sending little soldier...

Welcome to Z, the real-time strategy game where psychotic robots with British accents duke it out over territory in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Think Command & Conquer if the...

The Ancient Art of War is a classic video game that was released in the late 1980s. Developed by Evryware and published by Broderbund, it was available on various platforms, includ...

Supremacy: You Will Be Done (also known simply as Overlord) is a rare example of mix between real-time strategy and science fiction themed 4X game (eXplore, eXpand, eXploid, eXterm...

Castles 2 took everything the first game did and cranked it up with actual diplomacy, espionage, and conquest mechanics. Now you’re not just stacking bricks—you’r...

From the people who brought you Dungeons & Dragons, here's Blood & Magic (1996), the RTS that nobody remembers but definitely deserves a second glance. You summon golems fr...

Populous 2: Trials of the Olympian Gods is a classic sandbox strategy god game. As the title suggests, its setting is loosely based on ancient Greek mythology, and you play as a de...

Warcraft: Orcs and Humans is where Blizzard’s legendary fantasy saga began. This real-time strategy classic pits humans against orcs in a battle for control of a war-torn wor...

StarCraft is a classic RTS (Real-Time Strategy) game developed by Blizzard Entertainment and released in 1998 for Windows and Macintosh. StarCraft takes the Warcraft experience to ...

Dungeon Keeper 3: War for the Overworld is the ghost of a game that never was. Announced, teased, and then buried alive by shifting studio priorities, it exists only in the fever d...

Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds is a science fiction real-time strategy game set in the Star Wars universe, focused both on the first and the second Star Wars trilogy. Star Wars:...

Empire Earth asks a bold question: what if we took all of human history and turned it into one very long real-time strategy match? From cavemen to mech-wielding future armies, this...

Stronghold, released in 1993, is a strategy simulation game developed by Stormfront Studios and published by Strategic Simulations, Inc. (SSI). Players assume the role of a lo...

Before Command & Conquer, there was Command HQ (1990, DOS/Mac)—an early RTS that said “what if we made World War III playable?” It’s global domination m...

Ah, Dungeon Keeper, where you’re not the hero—you’re the evil overlord. And it feels so good. Released in 1997, this Bullfrog classic flipped the script on fantas...