In this type of sim a player is given control over a range of resources and units to manipulate and deploy within an evolving scenario. The player is typically a given a top-down view of the world which could, for example, be a map that has units of resources displayed upon it. The action occurs in real-time, which distinguishes it from its popular cousin – turn based strategy – in which a player assesses a situation, submits the actions and then observes the consequences.
Bruce Geryk describes this difference:
“Real-time strategy changed all of that so that games would begin to more closely resemble reality: Time was limited, and if you wasted yours, your opponents would probably be taking advantage of theirs”
In contrast to Egocentric Performance Sims, users do not normally assume the role of a character in an RTS sim – they are usually the overseer or ‘god’.
