The Best Strategy Games on PC

[QuantumPhysics]

The absolute best strategy game on the PC is CHESS.com which is 100% free to register for and to play. There's plenty of content and anyone can learn from it. It runs on ANY Windows 10 PC with virtually ANY hardware you can imagine.


My favorite strategy pass time is Command & Conquer Red Alert 2 or Command & Conquer 3. The games are so old that they'll run on any hardware, but the problem is that you need hacks to make them run on Windows 10. I heard the series was being remastered so I can't wait for that. I never played Red Alert 3.

 

[Squid Surprise]

Civ V is the best game ever... doesn’t matter what genre

And I don’t really classify any “real time strategy” games as “strategy” games (just because the word “strategy” is used in the genre does NOT make it a strategy game!).

That’s not to say that RTS games aren’t fun to play or are bad games - they are just completely different genres...

Heroes of Might and Magic 3 is a close second - but while I would have given it the nod 10 years ago, it has been surpassed by Civ V.

 

[Raytrace3D]

Lords of the Realm, Hero's of Might and Magic, Command & Conquer, StarCraft, WarCraft.

 

[Markoni35]

Massive Assault not even mentioned? Yes, it's from 2004 but it's definitely the best turn-based strategy out there, without stupid "resource collection" and all that boring stuff. You need to occupy a country and it immediately starts generating money for you. No need to build anything, except of course, your military units, which is fun. No frenetic clicking.

 

[Hellbishop]

I Played TA since the first Demo in good ole 97' and still playing or more Spectating to this day via SpringRTS until the Day I die.

The Box on my Wall states:- Total Annihaltion will quite simply, erase Red Elert from your memory.

Yes it is so good I put it on the wall

Amen.

Awesome game. I remember playing it back in the 1990's and it looked so unusual like some monolithic robotic army from some 1950's science fiction movie. The music was also fantastic making me realize how relaxing and focusing classical music can be.

As for me one of my all time favorites was MISSION FORCE: CYBERSTORM with the Dev's cheat codes enabled it felt like I was playing tabletop BATTLETECH with all the indepth combat and visual flair that was yet to be seen in a turn based mechwarrior game.

 

[crhylove]

"What more can I say? A titan in the field, it stands as not just the best Civilization game, but one of the best games ever released on the PC. Whatever your strategic cup of tea, be it war, diplomacy or exploration, Civilization V has you covered."

Wow. So false. The mechanics of Civilization have all been inferior in every version since Civ 2. Civ 2 was the most fun that can be had on a computer, and still is. Now, I'd *LOVE* to see an updated version (same gameplay!! new graphics), and it would be even better if I could play it on my android phone, and maybe queue future projects for cities as well rather than having to click on 300 cities one at a time to build a granary, but despite it's flaws (and the fact that mouse scroll wasn't invented when it came out!), it's still arguably the best game ever made for any platform.

And yes, I played Civ 3. And Civ 4 (love the graphics, narration, music), and Civ 5, and even Civ 6 (a little, not much). They are all inferior in the gameplay/fun department. Some of them, vastly so. Like who cares about religion or culture? How does that add to the game? It's just more bullshit you have to click on while you're waiting for Gandhi to nuke you again, and frantically trying to buy his cities with spies.

In short: If you want to completely destroy the productivity of Western Civilization, invent a version of Civ 2 with Civ 4 graphics and audio that is easy to join multiplayer from your Android phone, and that easily casts to a computer / TV if you happen to be near one. Oh, and be able to queue production in cities. And I'd love to be able to play in Samsung Gear VR too. I mean, while I'm dreaming that some developer actually makes something fun to play.

 

[GeforcerFX]

I grew up on command and conquer also loved the heck out of the battle for middle earth series, started playing supreme commander and continued onto supreme commander 2, also threw in a lot of total war games, mainly rome though was my favorite. Lots of time playing Sim City games both 3000 unlimited and 4 were heavy time sinks for me, in more recent times I have gotten into the wargame franchise and spent a good amount of time on wargame red dragon. I have a lot more I need to spend time on and seem to buy far more than I will prob every get through and play.

 

[m3tavision]

Lords of Conquest...?

Total War: Three Kingdoms is better than Total War2. Not sure about what this article is getting at..?

 

[oenghus]

No Sudden Strike?

 

[Zendo911]

A list of best strategy games you can play that doesn't mention the most popular, the most played, and the most watched e-sport strategy game and one of the early games that made e-sport a thing!!!

That's what happens when Super Mario players comment on PC strategy games ..

 

[Squid Surprise]

A list of best strategy games you can play that doesn't mention the most popular, the most played, and the most watched e-sport strategy game and one of the early games that made e-sport a thing!!!

That's what happens when Super Mario players comment on PC strategy games ..

Super Mario is a platformer, not a strategy game... nice try though...

 

[Digitalzone]

Company of Heroes and " its slower pace" I disagree with this, it was all about micromanagement thus clicks per minute were very important. I liked that game but never tamed it.

Also, it wasn't master of genre but playing Battle for Middle Earth, both, was overwhelming experience when LOTR hype was strong with me.

 

[NightWlkr]

Conquest: Frontier Wars...played again not long ago and I still fully enjoyed it over a lot of recent games.
Wish there was a sequel to it with a modern graphic engine.

 

[gamerk2]

Company of Heroes and " its slower pace" I disagree with this, it was all about micromanagement thus clicks per minute were very important. I liked that game but never tamed it.

Also, it wasn't master of genre but playing Battle for Middle Earth, both, was overwhelming experience when LOTR hype was strong with me.

CoH was not about CPM; it's about as slow as a RTS can possibly be. Unit counts are artificially low, which forces you to use a wide array of units to overcome whatever your opponent(s) are throwing at you. It's a *very* tactical RTS, and not a CPM like Starcraft is.

 

[gamerk2]

No Total Annihilation or Command and Conquer....think Luke needs smacked on the head to remind him to not be retarded.

To be fair, the early C&C games (everything pre-Red Alert 2) have *not* aged well at all. The game basically comes down to building a large enough force to deny Ore/Tiberium mining to your opponent. Red Alert 2 was the first C&C game to try and address this (Allies miner could warp back to base, Soviets had a minigun), but this was never really solved until Generals, which took the Starcraft route of putting most of the resources right at each players base.

 

[Adi6293]

No 1: StarCraft II ... only gets an honorable mention, whaaaat!

In my opinion Company of Heroes is good but SC2 is worlds better, anyway just my 2c.

Are you crazy? SCII better than Company of Heroes?..........

 

[Capsaicin]

That star wars...age of empires 2-like game Galactic Battlegrounds was fun. Creating an army of death stars with "thats no moon" cheat was fun.

 

[warzey]

That star wars...age of empires 2-like game Galactic Battlegrounds was fun. Creating an army of death stars with "thats no moon" cheat was fun.

AOE2 definitely was the best game ever for me, but it took way too many hours of active playing, which I don't have anymore. So, I switched to strategy idle games now, playing games like War Clicks and similar, as they just don't require so many times and I can still progress nicely because of its idle time mechanics. Surely a strong recommendation from me to all those who have limited time available to play actively.

 

[MrPayne77]

For me, I have to say Company of Heores is it. Previously, my only other experience with the genre, was with C&C: Red Alert 2/Yuri's Revenge and Star Trek: Armada (1 and 2).

As a player though, I'm more into tactics than base building - figuring out what units to use, where to position them etc etc, so that's why.