Hell has not frozen over. Pigs are not flying. But, somehow, Battlefront game(S!) are on GOG. Battlefront has been vociferous in their opinion of third party storefronts like Steam or GOG. So much so that when it was pointed out that Combat Mission : Beyond Overlord was on GOG, they weren’t even aware. Then it disappeared…
But now CMBO is back, along with a few others.
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It’s June, 1944. A line of French battleships screens a motley collection of carriers, escort carriers, and destroyers. The sun is about to rise as flight crews prepare to attack a target in Sardinia. Our fighters are inferior to the Monarchist Italians, but our bombers are glorious. The signal is sent, and waves launch…
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Paradox’s Imperator : Rome tackles the Roman world circa 200 BCE. Carthage is ascendant, Alexander is still a recent memory, and Gaul has yet to be conquered. The world of antiquity is being replaced by what will be the Roman behemoth.
In a nutshell… it’s a good game. We’ll get more into it later, but I see a lot of reviews comparing it to EUIV or CK2, games with added DLC, patches, and a plethora of mods. They say the same thing, “Wait for a few patches and some DLC.” The game will be really good in a few patches, but I think you’ll miss out on a rewarding experience.
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Rome.
So many PC games have sought to encapsulate the mammoth history, culture, and growth. A few have hit the nail on the head, notably Total War : Rome, while others have failed miserably, Total War : Rome 2. How do you successfully make a game that spans the moments from when Rome went from a city-state all the way to when it was landing on the British Isles and peering into the mists?
I think I might have found a game that does a damned good job of it. And it’s just a mod. A very, very well done mod.
Imperium Universalis.
EDIT April 2019 : Link to my review of Imperator : Rome.
There is an unfortunately low amount of quality strategy games for mobile. This amount is about to get even smaller with the upcoming app store apocalypse where anything not 64 bit will be pulled from sale.
Yobogames is stepping in to fill the gap with a couple of titles. First up is Moscow 41, and they also have a Kursk game too. So how does it stack up in hex and counter land?
Rule the Waves stuck you into the role of an early 20th century Naval bureaucrat who helped steer the design and future of your nation. Land Doctrine is this, but with tanks. But how does it compare to the venerable WWI Naval Simulator?
Dan Carlin opens up one of his best Hardcore History Podcasts talking about the hatemail he gets whenever he covers a modern story. When he covers Nazi Germany there’s still people who can look down at the numbered tattoos on their arms and remember. It’s tough to speak when the memories are fresh, even 70 years later. You don’t get that from some ancient war. The cultures are too far gone.
So when I saw the game Syrian Warfare I kind of cringed a little bit. If 70 years isn’t long enough, how about something that’s still going on? What does it say about the conflict that there’s been enough time to come up with the idea, Steam Greenlight it, code it, and release it. And this war still continues.
This is a game I had to check out.
Edit : This has been getting lots of traffic and comments. Here’s my TL;DR version : If we took this out of the Syrian theater and instead stuck it in, I don’t know, Korea 1952, or Berlin 1945, it’d be a forgettable game. It fills a spot beyond what an average RTS player might want and not what a more hardcore strategy gamer likes. It’s not a bad game, it’s just not terribly good. Mechanically the game is lacking from what I desire in a strategy game and the context isn’t done in a tactful manner. Even if it was I’m not sure I’d have any interest in it. It’s just not my thing. But it still makes you think, and for that I have to give it some credit. Continue reading…
Stars in Shadow has exited Early Access and is on sale for 25% off right now. (~$18) This 4X-MOO2 Like-Spaceship Dictator game is the newest in a rather crowded playing field of space games. One bummer about Early Access is the ratio good to bad is pretty low, so how does Stars in Shadow compare?
Roguelike and ASCII plus game Cogmind just got a very major update. What was already a very interesting game just got even more so with new plot points, items, opponents, and tons of other goodness. Haven’t played Cogmind? You definitely should as it’s unlike any other roguelike out there.
Washington’s War, reprinted by GMT Games in 2016, and designed by Mark Herman, is an exceptional game on the topic of the Revolutionary War. At first glance it’s a wargame, but, it’s not. In fact it is a political game with a wargame layer. As Clausewitz said, War is not an independent phenomenon, but the continuation of politics by different means.
