Hey, why doesn't the RTS Part 3 article link work - is this article actually up?

It's still in the moderation queue.

If you take just the resource and building part, you’ve basically got a city builder

I feel like we can reduce it even further. Isn't a time-management game like Diner Dash the ultimate expression of Starcraft build orders in isolation?

I only ever played RTS games as a fairly casual player, usually on a LAN with friends against AI.
That includes every C&C game from the original up until a few years ago, starcraft, warcraft, TA/SupCom, dawn of war, company of heros, ground control, sudden strike, total war...

Then I played Starcraft 2 and the whole idea of RTS PVP finally clicked for me.
The strategy, tactics, micro, macro, and metagame were all impeccably polished.
From never liking PVP, I quickly rose from Bronze to Diamond league... And I wasn't the only convert!

The kind of following / community that SC2 has behind it is insane. It's one thing to say that it's shrunk since launch, but it's still gargantuan compared to any 90's game.

I think RTS's might seem smaller now simply because gaming has gotten so much bigger.

When Starcraft 1 came out, there was no Xbox, no Halo, no Call of Duty. Nintendo was a leading console brand. The Gameboy COLOR was high tech! Gamers were not common - it was still a nerds pastime. No TV shows depicted the POTUS playing FPS games, let alone depicted such things as a normal adult activity.

Now, gaming is massive. EVERYONE is a gamer. You have old ladies playing WW2 tank MMOs on their handheld computers FFS -- such visions would have been fantasy in the 90's!
The percentage of total gamers who like to sit at a PC and play strategy games may have massively shrunk, due to the fact that gaming itself has exploded into so many new demographics, but in absolute terms the raw butts on seats in front of RTS games may have actually increased.

I only ever played RTS games as a fairly casual player, usually on a LAN with friends against AI.
That includes every C&C game from the original up until a few years ago, starcraft, warcraft, TA/SupCom, dawn of war, company of heros, ground control, sudden strike, total war...

Then I played Starcraft 2 and the whole idea of RTS PVP finally clicked for me.
The strategy, tactics, micro, macro, and metagame were all impeccably polished.
From never liking PVP, I quickly rose from Bronze to Diamond league... And I wasn't the only convert!

The kind of following / community that SC2 has behind it is insane. It's one thing to say that it's shrunk since launch, but it's still gargantuan compared to any 90's game.

I think RTS's might seem smaller now simply because gaming has gotten so much bigger.

When Starcraft 1 came out, there was no Xbox, no Halo, no Call of Duty. Nintendo was a leading console brand. The Gameboy COLOR was high tech! Gamers were not common - it was still a nerds pastime. No TV shows depicted the POTUS playing FPS games, let alone depicted such things as a normal adult activity.

Now, gaming is massive. EVERYONE is a gamer. You have old ladies playing WW2 tank MMOs on their handheld computers FFS -- such visions would have been fantasy in the 90's!
The percentage of total gamers who like to sit at a PC and play strategy games may have massively shrunk, due to the fact that gaming itself has exploded into so many new demographics, but in absolute terms the raw butts on seats in front of RTS games may have actually increased.

Mainly it's just that FPS games are more popular. It's easier to get a larger market share by making an FPS or something similar. And it's true that RTS games never were as popular: we only saw more because in the early days of gaming there were fewer gamers in general.

That being said, I do still believe that there are fewer RTS games being made these days as compared to say 10-15 years ago.

That being said, I do still believe that there are fewer RTS games being made these days as compared to say 10-15 years ago.

Let's go look at some actual data (with the caveat that I don't entirely trust the accuracy of their recent data collection).

According to that page, 74 real-time strategy games were released between 1995 and 2000. Similarly, 119 games were released between 2000-2005, and 86 were released between 2005-2010. From 2010-2015, only 26 games made the list.

By that metric I would have say that the bottom fell out of the real-time strategy market. However, I'll reiterate the above caveat, especially given the lack of any games listed for 2014.