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Warcraft III had maps called "RP Maps", which were kindof like D&D placing things, except everyone had the same control over the map. So it became more about telling a story rather than one person leading a group's game for them.
When wc3 kindof died off that kindof game along with many others didn't leave it. SCII mapmakers tried but it had issues with the complexity, and with SCII not allowing traditional saving for long sessions.
A lot of sandbox games are cool, but built around FPS engines instead of anything third person.
Hey I made a roleplaying inspired Starcraft 1 map back in the day! Player 1 was the DM, I had different ways to spawn and send units to various parts of the map, or resources to players. So I would do things like spawn in a neutral and a hostile faction and be like 'there are bandits fucking with the locals' or whatever. Whoever went in and saved them I could pop another trigger to gift the neutral units to that player, or I could gift resources. It was clunky but a lot of fun.
I remember some of the roleplay maps with automated 'DMs' were really interesting. I was much more interested in playing with a live DM though so I built that map in the hopes that the style got enough traction for me to be a player. It did not take off though compared to the auto roleplay ones