Top 10 8/16-bit Strategy Games

[timewarpgamer]

I wrapped up the list pretty recently...

http://timewarpgamer.com/top10s/strategy.html

...and I was wondering if y'all had any other recommendations, or comments. In general, I find lots of the resource management heavy games from back in the day to be too cumbersome to enjoy today — haven't aged very well. Thanks for reading.

Please note that Tactical RPGs are not included in this list—they got their own entire list to themselves already

[MrNelson]

No Ogre Battle or Fire Emblem?

[timewarpgamer]

No Ogre Battle or Fire Emblem?

Doh! Should have mentioned that I already covered Tactical RPGs in their own list—too many good ones. And that list definitely contains the two you mentioned.

[staxx]

Amiga
Populous 2
Deuteros
Supremacy
Defender of the Crown
Powermonger

NES
Overlords

Genesis
Tyrant
Powermonger

To name a few

[-dustburn-]

Very nice. I haven't played some of these. Herzog and Actraiser...HELL YEAH.

[The_Chosen_One]

Doh! Should have mentioned that I already covered Tactical RPGs in their own list—too many good ones. And that list definitely contains the two you mentioned.

That makes the list a lot harder for me but General Chaos would be #1 for sure, I absolutely love the game it's a ton of fun.

[Leo_A]

I'm rather puzzled why Jungle Strike is in this list.

Sure, there's a fair bit of strategy involved. But that can be said for many games. I certainly don't see it as being a full fledged member of this genre. It's much more of an action or aerial combat game than it is a strategy game.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

I'm happy to see Famicom Wars (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9JMea04E4I) made your list. I love me some Famicom Wars.

[Rev. Link]

Actraiser, but no Sim City???? And Jungle Strike? Really?

[swlovinist]

Jungle Strike should not be on this list. Also, it is preceded by Desert Strike which came our earlier and was pretty much the thing in a different setting. Just my two cents.

Nice to see Herzog Zwei get on the list.

[Natty Bumppo]

There were several Daisenryaku games from that era that might be worth considering - I have them but haven't gotten around to trying them yet - but Iron Storm, (which was a translation from the same series for the Saturn) was certainly an enjoyable game.

The SNES Civilization is also worth consideration.

[timewarpgamer]

...I had a feeling that Jungle Strike was going to raise some eyebrows. When I play Jungle Strike, I'm constantly flipping back and forth between the regular action screen and the map, checking my fuel and ammo, making sure I'm flying the best way to achieve the next mission, picking up additional armor and fuel as necessary. Unless you've memorized the locations of everything, it's rare that you go on an extended action rampage. Rather, you're constantly managing your resources and trying to select the best tactics to achieve each mission.

To put the argument another way, would Jungle Strike look more correct in my shoot 'em up list?

[timewarpgamer]

Actraiser, but no Sim City???? And Jungle Strike? Really?

If Sim City on the SNES was compatible with the mouse, it would definitely be in the top 10.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNES_Mouse

[Gavica]

Warsong, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, etc

[Leo_A]

Jungle Strike should not be on this list. Also, it is preceded by Desert Strike which came our earlier and was pretty much the thing in a different setting. Just my two cents.

Jungle Strike took everything that made Desert Strike great, and greatly expanded upon it. Sadly they didn't continue with that with Urban Strike (Those on foot missions EA forced the developers to include against their best judgement were horrible and dragged down what was otherwise a solid sequel).

But if a 16 bit Strike game belongs on this misplaced list, it might as well be the greatest one. Jungle Strike was everything Desert Strike was and much more.


If Sim City on the SNES was compatible with the mouse, it would definitely be in the top 10.

Beyond being cool if it had supported that future accessory, I don't think it's hurt in the slightest. In fact it's easier to do things like construct roads without it and quicker to access the various options and menus integrated to the gamepad's buttons than it would've been using a mouse.

[retroman]

Desert commander for the Nes, was a good one

[timewarpgamer]

Desert commander for the Nes, was a good one

I played this one recently, and at first I was totally pumped, since it reminded me a lot of Famicom Wars. But two elements of gameplay really got me. Moving each unit was really mysterious in a bad way (you couldn't tell it's maximum movement, and simply moving the cursor back and forth between the two spaces expends the unit's moves). Also, waiting through the computer's turn took forever. Slowest AI calculations ever.

[cynicalhat]

North and South on the NES lol

[timewarpgamer]

Beyond being cool if it had supported that future accessory, I don't think it's hurt [Sim City] the slightest. In fact it's easier to do things like construct roads without it and quicker to access the various options and menus integrated to the gamepad's buttons than it would've been using a mouse.

Fair enough, I'll have to give the SNES Sim City another try. Thanks for the recommendation.

[maxlords]

Surprised X-Com UFO Defense isn't on there....or is it console only?

[timewarpgamer]

Surprised X-Com UFO Defense isn't on there....or is it console only?

I've heard that's a great one, but my site only covers 8-bit and 16-bit consoles. Gotta keep the game library limited to something of reasonable size. Even then, I'm constantly discovering new great games.

[Wraith Storm]

This looks like a good solid list, especially with titles like Military Madness and New Horizons.

However, I am amazed to see to see that Dark Wizard is absent from the list. Naturally I checked your other similar lists (RPG and Tactics) thinking it might have been on one of those... but nothing.

I am also amazed that Natty Bumppo didn't use this time to promote Dark Wizard as a glaring omission. He's a one man ad-campaign for that game! ;)

It's easily one of the best strategy/tactics/RPG hybrid games of the 16 bit era. If you haven't played it I suggest checking it out if you have a Sega CD.

[Natty Bumppo]

I am also amazed that Natty Bumppo didn't use this time to promote Dark Wizard as a glaring omission. He's a one man ad-campaign for that game! ;)

It's easily one of the best strategy/tactics/RPG hybrid games of the 16 bit era. If you haven't played it I suggest checking it out if you have a Sega CD. Since he excluded rpgs from this list I didn't bring it up. (May Arliman and/or Sabrina forgive me!) For the same reason I didn't mention Master of Monsters for the Genesis - another very good one. Dark Wizard is one of those games that just cried out for sequels on later platforms.

Another strategy game (which is not quite an RPG) from that era that I really like is Gemfire - it is extremely simplistic and easy to win - but that is one of its main strengths - you can knock off a game in a night or two - the perfect filler when you want to play something but don't want (or have) the time to commit to a long campaign.

[timewarpgamer]

This looks like a good solid list, especially with titles like Military Madness and New Horizons.

However, I am amazed to see to see that Dark Wizard is absent from the list. Naturally I checked your other similar lists (RPG and Tactics) thinking it might have been on one of those... but nothing.

I am also amazed that Natty Bumppo didn't use this time to promote Dark Wizard as a glaring omission. He's a one man ad-campaign for that game! ;)

It's easily one of the best strategy/tactics/RPG hybrid games of the 16 bit era. If you haven't played it I suggest checking it out if you have a Sega CD.

I gotta admit, I tried it a while back and had a hard time getting into it, given the the very average graphics and what seemed like cumbersome menus. Maybe I didn't give it enough of a chance, though. I'll give it another play soon. Thanks!

[Natty Bumppo]

I gotta admit, I tried it a while back and had a hard time getting into it, given the the very average graphics and what seemed like cumbersome menus. Maybe I didn't give it enough of a chance, though. I'll give it another play soon. Thanks!

Be sure to turn the battle animations off - that slows the game play to a snail's pace. And the game is slower during the first few battles - it picks up as your troops get more experienced and you can start promoting them - also you will run into some of the special quests/events which liven up the game play.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

I also think that Super Famicom Wars, the 1998 remake of the original Famicom Wars, is among the best. It's VERY similar to modern day Advance Wars, but still has enough key differences to make it a fresh experience for fans of the Intelligent System's TBS gems.

[timewarpgamer]

Just made some edits to the list. Added two new titles (Harvest Moon, SimCity) and moved the bottom of the list around a little bit. Thanks for all the feedback, everyone. Next up, I gotta check out the SNES Civilization.

[schnuth]

If your a fan of Military Madness/Nectaris, you should check out Earth Light for the Super Famicom. It's a really fantastic but often overlooked strategy game.

[timewarpgamer]

Be sure to turn the battle animations off - that slows the game play to a snail's pace. And the game is slower during the first few battles - it picks up as your troops get more experienced and you can start promoting them - also you will run into some of the special quests/events which liven up the game play.

Finally got some time to sit down and give Dark Wizard a good play. You're right, the gameplay is quite deep and impressive. For kicks, I tried turning the battle animations on. Gosh, they looked terrible and slowed things down tremendously. Went back to text immediately. But the game is definitely a hell of a tactical RPG. Just added it to my top 10:

http://timewarpgamer.com/top10s/tactical_rpgs.html

[Natty Bumppo]

If you have a problem with anything feel free to message me - I have the game down pretty well - there are lots of secrets which you likely won't get on the first (or for more than a few subsequent playthroughs). Money tends to be huge problem until you learn where to get it.

Which ruler are you using? (My favorite is Krystal - Amon has a better storyline though.)

ALso you should give Master of Monsters a try for the Genesis if you haven't yet.

[NerdXCrewWill]

When playing through Dark Wizard, you may find that you enjoy the game more by handicapping yourself to raise the difficulty a bit. Other than the low difficulty level, it's an amazing game.

[Natty Bumppo]

If your a fan of Military Madness/Nectaris, you should check out Earth Light for the Super Famicom. It's a really fantastic but often overlooked strategy game.

Neo Nectaris is very good also. Well not fitting into this thread's coverage, Nectaris for the PS1 is a heckuva bargain for the amount of gameplay you get out of it.

[cyberfluxor]

I wrapped up the list pretty recently...

http://timewarpgamer.com/top10s/strategy.html

...and I was wondering if y'all had any other recommendations, or comments. In general, I find lots of the resource management heavy games from back in the day to be too cumbersome to enjoy today — haven't aged very well. Thanks for reading.

Please note that Tactical RPGs are not included in this list—they got their own entire list to themselves already
Nice article covering and representing the genre for the 8 and 16-bits era. The title that stuck out in the list for me was Military Madness, with an unfamiliar name and screen. It intrigued me to look more into this game and watch a few "playing of" videos. I read your write-up this morning while drinking coffee and while exploring a local game shop in the afternoon they happened to have the Playstation release up front and center in the case. Without hesitation I requested to inspect and everything appeared fine so now I have the Nactaris - Military Madness on hand. I do not recall spotting this gem in the past anywhere let alone the original Turbografx-16 but I will continue keep my eyes open for it.

[Black_Tiger]

Neo Nectaris is very good also. Well not fitting into this thread's coverage, Nectaris for the PS1 is a heckuva bargain for the amount of gameplay you get out of it.

Yeah, Neo Nectaris is the pinnacle of the series and it includes Nectaris/Military Madness on the same disc.

I'm guessing that you're only looking at North American games though. You should try Vasteel and Lords of the Rising Sun.

[Natty Bumppo]

Another game that might be included somewhere is King's Bounty for the genesis - certainly a strategy game but really different from any other strategy game I have played.

Another strategy game worth checking out is the GBA game "Rebelstar Tactical Command" - certainly is one of the more challenging strategy games I have played.

[Colorado Rockies]

My favorites are:

Shining Force
Shining Force II
Warsong
Uncharted Waters
New Horizons