Total Annihilation
"Total Annihilation" was one of the first RTS games to feature radar that showed enemy units within its radius on the minimap. This added an additional element of electronic warfare to the game: players could construct radar jammers that prevented units in a small radius around them from appearing on radar. Mobile radar jammers could be used to create surprise attacks, necessitating the deployment of scout units on a regular basis to reveal said units visually. In addition, radar jammers could disguise the presence of visually cloaked units, such as the commander or land mines. Radar fields rendered cloaked units detectable; a radar jammer could make said units undetectable until the radar jammer was destroyed. "Total Annihilation" was also one of the first RTS games to point the way towards battlefields with hundreds and thousands of units. Previous games could field a hundred units or so. However, Total Annihilation initially permitted 250 units per side which was later patched to 500. A third party patch allowed up to 5,000 units per side.
Rome: Total War
The game's main campaign is set during the mid and late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire (270 BC – AD 14), with the player assuming control of one of three Roman families; other factions are playable once they have been unlocked. Gameplay involves real-time tactical battles framed within a turn-based strategic campaign, taking place across Europe, North Africa and the Near East. At the strategic level, players manage diplomacy, develop infrastructure, move armies and manage the population's growth and public order through taxes and gladiatorial games. On the tactical scale, the player commands real-time battles against enemy armies within or between cities.