BAR

https://www.beyondallreason.info/

But... While bar is good, very good. It is also very hard to compete with, so I see it sort of killing any funding for good commercial RTS's for the next few years.

It's non-competitive (I'm burnt out with SC2 ladder a bit), but I've been enjoying Cataclismo, Settlers 3 (THAT is a throwback), and I'm eyeing They are Billions.

Some SC2 youtubers are now covering Mechabellum, Tempest Rising, BAR, AoE4, and some in-dev titles: Battle Aces, Immortal: Gates of Pyre, Zerospace, and of course Stormgate.

These are all on my list but I'm busy enough playing Warframe ^^'

Sins of a solar empire 2. AI War 2. There haven’t been any really “big” ones like StarCraft but some very good smaller ones like those two.

AoE2, baby. Still going strong, decades after launch.

I found Iron Harvest, Last Train Home, Tempest Rising and Company of Heroes 3 to be pretty good.