With the not so distant release of Endwar coming, I have begun to wonder... Will Endwars voice controlled, watershed gameplay alter the future of RTS gaming?

My friend has been playing a beta build and says it is so kick ass. If coupled with PC RTS games it could be beast. Imagine, managing your base with the mouse while telling your troops what to do in battle. I think that'd be great.

Blizzard, are you listening?

Having played the Endwar beta (but not the demo actually) I can say that the voice control thing isn't really that great. Yeah, its cool, both in how it sounds and feels, but I (and my friend) found that it's actually harder to use voice control than just clicking. I think its because it's harder and more complex to figure out what you want to do, think of the correct wording for which units to do what, put it all together, and then say it. We both found ourselves being more on edge and concentrated in what we were doing, and it became a lot less comfortable than relaxing and mindlessly clicking on a unit and then on a point of the map. I often found myself wanting to simply click a damn button instead of forming the verbal orders.

I'm not saying it isn't/won't be fun, but there's still a place for conventional clicking in RTS games.

I think/hope so. I love the gameplay of Endwar! It's fast paced, exciting, and easy to control (Something I didn't think I'd say about an RTS on a console). You don't have to worry about micro managing your base (Placing buildings, managing workers, clicking on your different buildings to get units into the game, etc), there are only 7 types of units (And no 'super units' so you don't have to worry about being way behind in 'reasearch' or whatever, and there is still a great strategic depth to the game.

I'm a fan. Sign me up for more like this.

It gives me a mental image of starcraft pro players who can do 300+ actions per minute while microing trying to give 300+ voice commands per minute, which is amusing.

It's a step forward but nothing special. Instead of memorizing hotkeys we're just memorizing voice commands.

-BUT it still recognizes voice commands which is ****ing cool.

Meh. It was fun in my opinion, but I'm not the biggest RTS fan... I honestly loved being able to control everything with my voice, and it was much easier to grasp than other RTS titles, but I don't know how many hours I can spend online yelling at my troops... Especially when the game starts becoming increasingly harder, my volume will become increasingly louder and more impatient...

CmdrGoob:
It gives me a mental image of starcraft pro players who can do 300+ actions per minute while microing trying to give 300+ voice commands per minute, which is amusing.

This would be fun to see... I see a number of people unable to speak for a couple of days after a tournament... :D

Endwar is a tactical fps with the camera strapped to a helicopter instead of a soldier. And you can't even tell your units to stand somewhere when there isn't something they can either attack or capture over there. It sucks just as much as any other console rts attempt and unlike the general population, i don't turn a 1.5/10 into a 9.5/10 the moment somebody tacks on an arbirary new control system that adds absolutely nothing.

Endwar is in terms of Gameplay nothing too groundbreaking or innovating for the RTS Genre. But thanks to the Voice Controls it's the only console RTS that i could be bothered playing without screaming at my TV.

Instead of throwing contollers, you're gonna throw your headsets and scream at the TV...

I hope people won't suffocate because of too many verbal commands...
I can almost see the lawsuit.... and newspaper headlines.

Kudos to them for trying something different. I personally enjoy being able to verbally order my troops around, makes me feel like an actual commander even if the vocabulary of my troops is somewhat limited. Being able to use your voice is what gives the game its appeal and will be the defining factor whether or not someone gets this game since it's considered more simplistic than traditional rts's.

It's certainly possible, but I believe that most RTS games will remain on a controller for another few years, as making it voice controlled is a huge challenge.

Voice control sounds good on paper, but when I'm playing this game in a few months' time... I can imagine right now... "Squad 2 enter the building on the right, cover squad 1, fire at infantry only. Squad 1 charge at the tank, kill it!" ... Then squad 2 runs across to the other side of the map and gets slaughtered without ever returning fire, while squad 1 runs back to me tank and tries to repair it. The only way this is useful is it allows me to focus on the fighting and do the base building and reinforcement stuff by voice command...... but... wait a second, there are no base building or resource gathering in this game! lol, right, that was a good idea wasn't it?!

For all of you thinking this is a new concept, sorry to disappoint, 'Star Trek: Bridge commander' was a voice controlled RTS, and that was like 10 years ago. There are probably other examples too, but ST:BC was the only one I've played before.

Applaus for their courage to try something innovative though.

ElArabDeMagnifico:
It's a step forward but nothing special. Instead of memorizing hotkeys we're just memorizing voice commands.

-BUT it still recognizes voice commands which is ****ing cool.

QFT

um...not to be a fanboy or anything, but Starcraft is the end-all be-all of RTS games.

I finally played the demo this weekend, and in my opinion, this game has so much to offer. It takes a couple tries to get used to the voice commands, and yes you sometimes will get the orders or units mixed up, but in the end the voice control moves works smoothly with the gameplay. The game itself offers an in-depth campaign, as well as (thank god) single player skirmish, and online battles with over 40 wonderfully detailed maps. And with the new Theatre of War you can vie for control of the planet with a friend via Live.

Personaly, I belive EW is gonna be one of this years greats, next to Gears 2 and all of the other big titles.

matrix3509:
um...not to be a fanboy or anything, but Starcraft is the end-all be-all of RTS games.

So why are they making a part 2?

I'm not that keen on RTS games to begin with, but I thought the Endwar demo was terrible. Great presentation, and the voice recognition was surprisingly well executed, but overall I found it horrible to play, simply because of how it locks onto one unit and doesn't allow you to move freely around the map.

I managed to do the first story mission, but when I tried a skirmish I found that I couldn't concentrate, couldn't control things the way I wanted, and ended up just turning it off after 15 minutes. With so much else to play at the moment I can't be bothered with overcoming that frustration.

ElephantGuts:
Having played the Endwar beta (but not the demo actually) I can say that the voice control thing isn't really that great. Yeah, its cool, both in how it sounds and feels, but I (and my friend) found that it's actually harder to use voice control than just clicking. I think its because it's harder and more complex to figure out what you want to do, think of the correct wording for which units to do what, put it all together, and then say it. We both found ourselves being more on edge and concentrated in what we were doing, and it became a lot less comfortable than relaxing and mindlessly clicking on a unit and then on a point of the map. I often found myself wanting to simply click a damn button instead of forming the verbal orders.

I'm not saying it isn't/won't be fun, but there's still a place for conventional clicking in RTS games.

Isen't that the sort of whole point in it though? striving for realism rather than fun as is the Tom Clancy way.

Played the demo. The voice command is a little confusing at first, but it's like learning the basics of a new language (ie: subject-object-verb, subject-verb-object, etc).

EndWar's commands are all subject-verb-object (basically). "Unit 5-Attack-Hostile 3" "Unit 6-Secure-Sierra"

The commands are really great for general orders. Since there is no mouse and keyboard the function works well for large tactics. Whereas when you have a certain unit selected you simply click "A" to send them to the reticule.

If I feel like digging in then I might micro by switching to a high camera (or camera on helicopters), then select and move units around till I have a good defense.

For people new to the game REMEMBER that the unit with the camera on it ISN'T always the unit selected.

My one gripe from the demo is that artillery's range sucks. In various vids the artillery would hit things half way across the map, but the demo's has a range of 1/4 to 1/8.

As long as it can understand me roaring "KILL THEM ALL" into the mike, I'll be fine.

When amassing armies and telling them: build build build attack, that should be fun, however RTS is very often about special placement and careful movement. And will your squads easily tell the difference between a calm - "attack defenceless enemy" and a frantic "Get the hell out of there you morons". I really fail to see the point too, it should have a similar feeling as giving an rpg voice control: swing, swing, swing, swing, cast, swing, swing *deep breath* swing, loot, get on mount, run away. Multitasking will be hard as hell unless you talk with the speed of a hyperactive 5 year old on caffeine.

Tjebbe:

matrix3509:
um...not to be a fanboy or anything, but Starcraft is the end-all be-all of RTS games.

So why are they making a part 2?

Cos the first Starcraft graphics suck compared to Command and Conquer 3.

Jursa:
When amassing armies and telling them: build build build attack, that should be fun, however RTS is very often about special placement and careful movement. And will your squads easily tell the difference between a calm - "attack defenceless enemy" and a frantic "Get the hell out of there you morons". I really fail to see the point too, it should have a similar feeling as giving an rpg voice control: swing, swing, swing, swing, cast, swing, swing *deep breath* swing, loot, get on mount, run away. Multitasking will be hard as hell unless you talk with the speed of a hyperactive 5 year old on caffeine.

Its really not that hard actually. You get used to the voice controls usually after your first skirmish, which I recommend to get used to the interface. After that, it all comes second nature, like Unit 3 Attack Hostile 3, or Deploy Unit Riflemen. Also, in order to get the smoothest play possible, use the voice calibrator in the game so it will get used to your voice, and react with it well.

Thinking about it, I'm pretty sure this is more of a gimmick than actually useful. Firing up my last Company of Heroes game in CoH replay analyser, I play at 40-50 commands per minute (CPM not APM) for almost the entire 20 minute game, with a spike of up to 90 commands per minute. Trying to say a command every 1.2 to 1.5 seconds for the whole game would be incredibly tiring on the voice if not impossible to maintain and spiking to a command every 0.67 seconds is definitely impossible, and I'm not even that great and CoH isn't even that micro intensive.

Not to mention the speed (latency wise) of saying, say, "Unit 2, retreat" is way, way slower than hitting 2T.

Since even I am doing better with the mouse and keyboard than would be possible with voice commands alone, so I really don't think voice commands will ever replace the mouse and keyboard. Maybe they can enhance your control, say voice controlled macro while microing with mouse and keyboard would be nice, but as a primary source of control I don't think it's going to be that good and even combining mouse and keyboard with voice control isn't a huge improvement on mouse and keyboard alone.

It might be better than a gamepad for playing an RTS, but that's not a particularly high bar.

If they get the voice controls perfect then maybe, but there's always people who will prefer voice control-less games.

Asehujiko:
Endwar is a tactical fps with the camera strapped to a helicopter instead of a soldier. And you can't even tell your units to stand somewhere when there isn't something they can either attack or capture over there. It sucks just as much as any other console rts attempt and unlike the general population, i don't turn a 1.5/10 into a 9.5/10 the moment somebody tacks on an arbirary new control system that adds absolutely nothing.

well I found it quite fun and no, end war has NOTHING to do with an FPS just..no, and yeah it might be dammed useless but it makes it easier for the console RTSes and it's also quite fun...feel free to bitch at me..but I will probably not listen yo you^^(mainly because you said that an innovative RTS is just like a tactical fps)

-BUT it still recognizes voice commands which is ****ing cool.

Except it doesn't. On the demo, "Unit 1" consistently came out as "Unit 9" for me. Similarly "Unit 6" as "Unit 7" and "Unit 2" as "Unit 12". For something as important as unit selection, that's really not okay. It also refused to accept the way I pronounce the word "Whiskey" giving me repeated "Command not understood!" when I was ordering my troops to aforementioned point.

It's a cool idea, the execution I got from the demo left much to be desired however.

i played the demo (PS3 version), and it worked reasonably well, although keyboard and mouse would have been better. i got a big feeling that it would be much better with a headset, unfortunately mines out of charge and i can't find the charger :'(

My big problem was I couldn't see the letters on the minimap so I ended up telling them to attack random places.

I played the demo and I like it to say the least.

I spoke clearly and efficeintly and it understood what I was trying to say. However, my units sometimes didn't react to my commands even if I said it multiple times, but nonetheless it was a pretty cool game to play around with. Voice command would help me in RTSs since I suck at them.

Plus, it makes you feel like a badass.

Voice control in an RTS is not new. Go lookup a game called "Alliance: Future combat".

Welcome to 2007?