If the word "hardcore" is mentioned, the first thing I think of in FPS games is to escape from Tarkov, armed raids, 0 strikebacks, no guidance, no HUD, and even bullets to be filled one shot at a time; RPG games, the recent Eldon Ring, as well as Dark Souls, Bode's Gate, Neverwinter Night, Dark... The difficulty of the game and the anti-human operation often make the player of the week wear the mask of pain indefinitely.
When it comes to hardcore RTS games, there is such a real-time strategy game that was launched more than twenty years ago, which is SuddenStrike, the Raid series.
Today, along with The Explosive Brother, we reminisce about this hardcore RTS game that we seriously underestimated in childhood, Raid.
First, the victims of the DB era
In 1999, raiding production team set up FireGlowGames Studios in Moscow, a studio that is passionate about RTS and war themes, and began a legendary and lamentable life.
In an era when the keyboard cable was still ps/2 large round head, the mouse or the big ball ball needed to be occasionally cut down to clean the ashes, piracy was naturally commonplace. The quality of the first raid on this work is extremely good, but for the FireGlowGames who want to "blow up" at the beginning, it is obvious that they underestimated the devastating blow of piracy to them.
At that time, the genuine sales of the first generation of raids were about 900,000 sets. However, the download volume of DB is conservatively estimated to be more than 3 times its genuine sales, but you can make up for how big the loss is... Similarly, I was also in the DB disc store, and bought a generation of RAID DB discs...
When playing the game to read the picture and load it, cut it down and clean the ashes
Second, it seems simple, but it is not very simple
Raids, compared to other RTS games set in the alternate world, are particularly realistic.
The raid was set against the backdrop of World War II, operating german, British, American, Soviet, and French armies to do an overall offensive and defensive battle to complete related tasks. His sense of substitution is so high that he feels like a commander who commands thousands of troops and horses to the front.
Unlike RTS games such as Age of Empires, Red Alert, and Warcraft, when the major RTS developers are still thinking about how to design the production system of units and buildings, Raid has already deployed units in advance for you in the game, and there is no need for players to build stables, arsenals, tank factories, and production buildings, and there is no need to painstakingly mine resources in order to produce these units.
Therefore, how to win the battle with a limited number of units has become the key.
There will be initial resources at the beginning, and some mission levels will give several waves of resources. In addition to infantry, armored vehicles, tanks, large artillery, transport aircraft and bombers on the ground are readily available
On the surface, it seems that there is no need for production units, no need to build complicated bases, and buildings such as ground-to-air and defensive walls, which will make the player turn their attention to the battlefield, but in fact, it is as simple as we think to win the next round...
Third, there is no sense of "cool"
The number of units is limited, and they have to take it step by step.
If you pull away the right line like other RTS games, it will often end up with a squad being wiped out. Even if the team is not completely destroyed and only a small force is left, it is completely impossible to turn over against the wind.
The game is difficult, so it has become one of the main labels of raids.
Before the fight, try to use the reconnaissance plane to find out the truth
Before firing the first shot of the war, it is necessary to let the infantry unit pull the mount to open the artillery support position in advance, and when the armored mechanical unit opens the way in front, it is also necessary to reconnoiter the reconnaissance plane to explore whether the enemy will have an anti-armor unit ambush, and when necessary, the bomber group will be pulled out of the carpet bombing at the first time...
The word "cool" does not seem to exist in the raid, when the infantry pulls the cannon, the turtle speed forward, the tank movement speed is not as fast as the speed of my shared bicycle, and the most that can be faster is the air unit.
It is precisely because the pace is "slow", it is very annoying to see some scenes in the game: the front position is about to be lost and the howitzer support is urgently needed. It may be that the angle is not right, the soldiers will slowly adjust the angle of the gun port, pull the bolt, put the gun...
At this scene, I was a little anxious, and I couldn't cry and laugh
Fourth, the details are crazy
As far as RTS games are concerned more than 20 years ago, RTS games that can achieve such fine variety on individual units can be said to be almost non-existent, and it is not an exaggeration to say that the FireGlowGames raid is unique.
The green ones are health bars, and the yellow ones are the remaining ammunition
Purple is the experience bar
In RTS games, whether it is a building unit or a class unit, there is basically only a health bar, which is a kind of "vital sign display window". However, in the raid, in addition to the health in the regular RTS game, there is also the display of ammo remaining and experience points.
If your unit blindly shoots and shoots to empty the ammunition, your unit will become a "lamb" to be slaughtered, and the enemy will not be able to resist riding on the face. It is not impossible for them to stop swinging, and it is ok to let the truck pulling ammunition replenish them. In the process of childhood games, I often fell into meditation: how come my troops don't hit people anymore...
In terms of experience points, it is very similar to the high-level soldiers in the Red Alert, with high dodging and more resistance to fighting. However, due to the fact that the raid is too hardcore, it is not an easy task to obtain high-level units, and often only one wave of lines is needed, and the infantry class is already killed.
Fifth, it starts at the hard core, and finally the hard core
"Hardcore games are good, they're not fun." Some players commented on the raid.
Since the beginning of FireglowGames' founding and development raid 1 generation in 1999, FireglowGames has been in deficit on its books. Fortunately, there is a capital injection, so that the 1st generation raid fell in a precarious state and stumbled into the listing. The good news is that the quality of the first generation is good, and under the impact of piracy, the second generation also came out smoothly in 2002.
The quality of the second generation is also excellent, but because Fireglowgames has been controversial in the choice of specific historical battles, this does not affect the second raid as a good work.
Raid 2, still continuing the inner flavor of Raid 1
Later, Raid 3 Raid 4 was released. Only the 4th generation began, the raided IP was bought by other companies, and the legendary life of FireglowGames ended.
Raid 4, there seems to be some "cartoony grease"
The raid of the 4th generation seems to be less fun than the slow-paced RTS of the 1st and 2nd generation versions, and has become an ordinary World War II-themed real-time strategy game, which may be more in line with the tastes of the public...
Speaking of which, the story of the Raid series ends here. I seem to be able to instantly recall the scene when I adjusted the angle of the gun muzzle as a child, which made me scratch my cheeks, and I seemed to be able to recall the moment when an army that operated many times more than the enemy failed to win the battle... Raid is definitely a good game in my mind, and even now, he is still very good, on par with Red Alert and Warcraft.
Probably, or that sentence: start with hardcore, end at hardcore...
So, I wonder what kind of story you have with the Raid series? You may wish to share it with you in the comment area