A interesting comparison I think is between Starcraft 1 (1998) and Stacraft 2 (2010). In the original Starcraft you were constantly fighting against the game engine. Unit pathing, spell casting and a several glitches which players could utilize (most notably mutalisk stacking) made the game incredibly challenging to do anything, let alone pull off complex strategies. The speed at which you could perform actions was crucial to being a top player. Stacraft 2 introduced several mechanics that made the game substantially easier. Multiple building selection allowing you to produce units from several buildings at once rather than selecting each individually. Increased unit selection from 12 to 255, the max you would realistically expect to hit. Better unit pathing so players need to focus less on army control and numerous other changes.
The down side of this is that many argue the mechanical difficulty of SC1 helped make the game so competitive and the sequel is inferior in that sense, which I agree with but think there are numerous other reasons for that as well.
If any of you want me to expand on or explain anything just let me know. Starcraft is really the only thing I talk about on the internet.
Edit* This is what I mean by mechanical difficulty [1]. RTS games, especially the Stacraft series, are extremely difficult just by the nature of the game.
The way to solve that is "just" to increase the skill ceiling in some other dimension. Warcraft 3 has easier macro mechanics than SC2 - five workers per gold mine, less expands, less unit-producing buildings, wood as a resource is often a non-issue - but makes up for it by having a higher skill-ceiling when it comes to micro mechanics.
You could for example make larvae inject optionally auto-cast, as long you add some other mechanic that the zerg have to (or should) worry about (like more complicated creep spreading, for instance).
The down side of this is that many argue the mechanical difficulty of SC1 helped make the game so competitive and the sequel is inferior in that sense, which I agree with but think there are numerous other reasons for that as well.
If any of you want me to expand on or explain anything just let me know. Starcraft is really the only thing I talk about on the internet.
Edit* This is what I mean by mechanical difficulty [1]. RTS games, especially the Stacraft series, are extremely difficult just by the nature of the game.
[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4UTDudShDY