Best Horde Survival RTS Games

Horde survival is often a feature of RTS games, but it’s less often that games focus on horde defense. There have been plenty of interesting takes on the genre that do lean into horde survival as the central mechanic, though. Pitting players against endless waves of enemies or a constantly respawning threat can be a good way to keep tensions high as players progress through other objectives.

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It’s easy for these kinds of mechanics to become frustrating and stressful if handled poorly. But, if the player is given the strategic options they need to deal with the threat, horde survival can provide a compelling gameplay balance. There are multiple ways to approach even this niche of the RTS genre though, and there are some great examples of unique mechanics and structures among the games in this topic.

7

Warcana

Deckbuilding Horde Defense

• Released: August 29, 2024
• Developer: 1000 Orks

Combining deck building, horde defense, RTS mechanics, and even separate single-player and battle royale multiplayer modes, Warcana has a lot of different aspects to its design. Players assemble a deck of cards to build base structures, which can generate units and more cards for summoning buildings and units. Each card has a tech tree, so the cards a player plays early will determine their strategy as the game progresses.

As the player is building their base and forces, so are their opponents. In the battle royale multiplayer mode, massive armies clash across the map. In the single-player mode, the player must survive endless hordes of enemies as they build up their base and armies. Battles in Warcana involve hundreds of thousands of units at times, and the visuals of the chaotic battles are conveyed well by its vibrant pixel art style.

6

Deep Among The Swarm

Roguelike Horde Survival

• Released: September 25, 2024
• Developer: Pebble Mountain Games

Deep Among The Swarm may have a simplistic visual style, but its roguelike base-building and RTS horde defense gameplay loop are fun and engaging. Each run of this roguelike game sees players drilling into an infested alien planet. Where the drill stops, players must establish a base and gather the necessary resources to advance and let the drill move further. While that’s going on, the player is under constant threat from the swarm.

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As the player digs, collects resources, and clears out swarm nests, the aggression of the swarm increases. What starts as a slow trickle of enemies soon becomes a torrent of foes that players must establish defenses and use their squads to deal with. As it’s a roguelike game, players will inevitably fall to the swarm at some point, and the meta-progression elements allow for upgrades and improvements that help with subsequent runs. The horde survival keeps the resource-collecting gameplay tense and interesting, and Deep Among The Swarm nails the “one-more-run” roguelike feel.

5

Conan Unconquered

The Hordes Of Khotan

Released

May 29, 2019

ESRB

m

Developer(s)

Petroglyph

Conan Unconquered brings horde defense RTS gameplay to the Conan the Barbarian universe. The game has players building a desert stronghold while defending from endless waves of enemies. Since this is a Conan game, enemies and units go beyond regular soldiers – there are mages, necromancers, and mythical creatures to worry about too.

Conan Unconquered will especially appeal to cooperative RTS gamers, as the whole thing can be played in co-op with a friend. The game is designed to be replayable, with randomly generated maps to conquer, rather than a story-driven campaign. Players also get their own hero units to command against the hordes of the evil wizard Khotan, whether solo or co-op and the titular Barbarian himself is an option. The strategic gameplay and base-building options go deep enough to satisfy most RTS veterans, too.

4

Alien Marauder

Sci-Fi Survival RTS

• Released: November 18, 2021
• Developer: Vexan Studio

Alien Marauder takes a similar approach to its gameplay to the horde survival king, They Are Billions. Alien Marauder takes the gameplay to a sci-fi setting, though, with an aesthetic that’s more akin to Starcraft or Starship Troopers. The game tasks players with colonizing new planets to look for resources for an ailing futuristic human society that has spread out into space.

Players have to build these colonies while they’re under constant assault by alien hordes known as the Vexans. The hordes in Alien Marauder can get huge as the gameplay progresses, with enemies numbering in the tens of thousands once the combat ramps up. There’s an impressive amount of variety to the RTS gameplay with upgradeable structures, varied heroes with units to command, and talent skills for the player to unlock. Even though it’s still in early access, Alien Marauder is already a great horde survival RTS.

3

Age Of Darkness: Final Stand

Dark Fantasy RTS Survival

Real-Time Strategy

Survival

Released

January 15, 2025

Developer(s)

PlaySide Studios

Age of Darkness: Final Stand uses a dark fantasy aesthetic along with some interesting procedural map generation and roguelike mechanics to create a unique survival RTS. Players live in a perpetual nightmare of dynamic “Death Fog” that conceals terrain and enemies, expanding by lighting up the area and pushing back the darkness. The horde survival gameplay is intense, with tens of thousands of enemies able to swarm the player at a time.

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While there is a short-lived campaign, as well as PvP multiplayer, fans of horde defense will be most interested in the survival mode. This can be played single-player or co-op and features the aforementioned procedural maps and roguelike elements. This mode sees players building under pressure while preparing for a periodic “Death Night” where the largest horde descends. Death Nights come with a random debuff known as a Malice, but if players survive, they get to choose from three random Blessings to improve their abilities. This adds some much-needed variety to multiple runs.

2

Diplomacy Is Not An Option

Medieval Siege Mentality

Diplomacy Is Not An Option

Released

February 9, 2022

ESRB

t

For players who want a more light-hearted take on the horde survival RTS, there’s no better game than Diplomacy is Not an Option. Here, the peasantry is in revolt against the king, and it’s the players’ job to suppress the rabble. The amount of depth in the game is immense, and there are many simulated elements.

Base building and maintenance also tracks survival elements for the populace like hunger and disease, and combat physically simulates projectiles like boulders from catapults to create organized chaos. It’s medieval siege warfare dialed up to ten.

Diplomacy is Not an Option is also not afraid to swerve from tongue-in-cheek silliness to pure fantasy. Eventually, players will have to deal with hordes of the undead and magic powers that can be used both for and against them. It’s not the longest-lived strategy game, but it’s a unique and fun blend of survival, RTS, and tower defense.

1

They Are Billions

Zombie Apocalypse

They Are Billions

Real-Time Strategy

Survival

Management

Systems

Released

June 18, 2019

ESRB

t

Released in 2019, the post-apocalyptic zombie survival RTS They Are Billions is the quintessential example of a horde survival RTS. Players take the role of a colony manager for the last few thousand surviving humans on Earth in the middle of a global zombie infection. Hordes of the undead exist around the world with their own AI and will pose an ever-present and growing threat to the player as they hunt for resources to ensure the colony’s survival.

One of the key aspects of They Are Billions is how the infection influences gameplay. If an infected zombie gets into an area with colonists, they’ll become infected too, creating a potential cascade of the undead that means it’s vital that players keep civilian structures protected. The game also takes a lot of credit for being among the first to successfully combine the static horde survival of tower defense games with the dynamic base building and unit management of the RTS genre in this way.

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