Fundamentals of Strategy Game Design

The User Experience

Strategy games often have extremely complicated core mechanics. Consequently, the design of the user experience is critical, even more so if the game is in real time and the player is under time pressure. The interface must present complicated information in clear, well-organized ways so that the player can grasp it easily. If you don’t design the presentation well, the large amount of information available can make the game overwhelming, especially to inexperienced players.

Interaction Model

For strategy games, the interaction model tends to be on a large scale. Rarely do you find a strategy game with a single avatar, although the PC version of Battlezone (not to be confused with the original coin-op) is a notable exception. ...