TOAW IV Revisited

10/22/18 – RTFM has been spouted. I’ve RTFM. Am returning after reading some 3rd party guides that seem to be more helpful. My argument still stands, but I really want to like this game.

It started in Finland. June 29th 1941. A narrow peninsula was held by Russian troops threatening to drive on Helsinki. The scenario was for Finland to recapture what was lost during the Winter War. The game, The Operational Art of War IV.

To my east is a string of units from the Gulf of Finland all the way to the arctic ocean. But this little thorn… I decide to start there. It doesn’t go well.

TOAWIV is a hex-and-counter multi-theater wargaming simulation base. Upon it you can layer any conflict from pre-ww1 all the way up today. It’s a fairly lofty goal that aims for what CMANO does in the air-sea theater but also adding land units.

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Imperium Universalis : The Rome we Wanted

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.

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Moscow 1941 iOS Review

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?

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Syrian Warfare : When is Too Soon?

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 Review

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?

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Washington’s War [Review] by GMT Games

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.

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War in the West : And Now for Something Totally Different

Gary Grigsby’s War in the West is not in the same vein as his other monster, War in the East. Where War in the East is firmly an Eastern Front game, War in the West is a Strategic Bombing game with a ground combat layer. Where air power is mostly abstracted in WitE, in West, you get to handle it in all the gritty details. It’s not a bad game, but it’s definitely a totally different one.

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Book Review : Atlas of the Eastern Front 1941-1945

Give me a map, a moment, and I’ll wander the world.

Ok, so I’m actually kind of biased here. My Brother-in-Law, an awesome dude, happens to be a professional cartographer. So I’ve spent many a good hour browsing through high-end map coffee table books. Beyond that I spent hours of my youth studying maps, imagining the battles fought on those little squares and circles, and tracing history one page at a time.

My initial drive to get this book was actually from a video game. Sure, I’d read some basic books about the Eastern Front but my knowledge was pretty slim. I’d always been a Battle of the Bulge kind of guy. Then I started playing Gary Grigsby’s War in the East.

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Battles of the Ancient World I : Review

After listening to Dan Carlin’s latest Hardcore History podcast on the Persian Empire I had a hankering for some phalanx’s and good old fashioned ancient battles. This is an era that gets overshadowed by, well, just about every other genre. How many games do we really need about World War 2 Tank Battles? The niche for ancient battles is pretty narrow, but luckily HexWar has a few offerings for those ancient gods of war.

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