Real-Time Strategy

Whether or not you consider Dune II to be the first RTS ever, it defines nicely what the RTS genre is all about:

• Two or more factions fight each other for the limited resources on the map.
• The factions will be slightly different, but well-balanced.
• You get to play a series of missions, once you have fulfilled one, you move on to the next. In the first mission you will have only a limited scope of structures and units which expands by and by.

Actually, that's it; you can describe any classical RTS in this way.

Forerunners

Before Dune II, there were a couple of games which can be considered to have helped form the genre.

Stonkers				83
Nether Earth				87
Herzog Zwei	SEGA Genesis			89

Dune II and its Successors

Dune II					92
Warcraft					94
Paranoia					95
Command & Conquer
Warcraft II
Legal Crime					96		Documentation
Age of Empires					97
Enemy Nations
Dune 2000					98
Knights and Merchants
Rise of Rome							Age of Empires expansion pack
Napalm: The Crimson Crisis
Alchemist					99
Street Wars/Mob Rule
Exodus: The Last War					00
Ground Control
Theocracy
The Legend					03