Computer Wargames by Leslie KingAfter a break largely due to computer problems I'm back with a few of the latest games (or in one case, an older game that is now available cheaply). Combat Mission : Beyond Overlord. Not an easy game to obtain as you can only
order it on-line, but it's well worth making the effort. It's different from many other games as it's not really
real-time, but it's not exactly turn based either. Play is fairly simple, as you
place orders as to what you would
like your units to do for the next minute, the computer does the same and then
plays out the turn whilst you watch. Sounds easy, but it isn't. You might order
your unit forwards, not knowing there's a hidden enemy ahead of you. Your unit
will not blindly advance, but will take cover and return fire - or even head in
the opposite direction. The AI covering this aspect of the game is very good.
The line of sight rules mean that you can only see what your units can see of
the enemy, so you can order your units to "hunt", so they will advance whilst
looking for the enemy. This is slower but safer -sounds easy again?
.Unfortunately, if your tank is advancing they will button up if they can see
the enemy and get fired on, which limits visibility again. It's all very
realistic, as good commander that you, are you issue orders and everything
breaks down in a minute as the enemy appear where not expected, units advance
more slowly than you would like or refuse to obey your latest round of insane
orders etc etc. In one of my early games I was playing the Americans and holding
a town with Infantry against an Armoured German force. Just as I thought it was
all over, I got some Armour as reinforcements. Great I thought, I can just
advance them down the road to the town. Fat chance, as I watched them get brewed
up one after the other by long range fire before they had got 100 yards.
The controls are fairly simple, as you
right click on a unit which brings up the order menu, you select the orders and
click either where you want a unit to move or the enemy you want it to fire at
You can double click an officer to select all the units he commands (if within
command range) and you can then order lots of squads at once.. If you choose to
fire, line of sight is checked and you are given a percentage of likelihood of
hitting the unit. Be warned though, the unit may well not be interested in your
choice of target. It might well fit in with your overall cunning plan but if the
enemy are right in front your
selected unit, they're going to choose to fire on them more often than
not. Then your orders are placed, you watch
the turn unfold. You can watch this more than once, and you will need to for any
but the smallest battles. You can take different viewpoints, or follow
individual units through the turn, and you can stop and rewind the action. I
usually play with a fairly high viewpoint, but you can get down level with the
eye viewpoint of your forces in either the replay or planning parts of your
turn. This can be vital for checking what a unit can see (and what they
can't!) The graphics are not great, but the
gameplay more than makes up for that. It's unusual to find such good AI in a
game, and none of the battles are a walkover - far from it in fact. You get
plenty of individual battles and campaigns and there's hundreds of hours of play
in the game. I have found the game to be very stable and have had no crashes so
far. It can play slowly, especially if it's a big battle. The game can be ordered from
www.battlefront.com for $45. You may have to pay import duties, but like GMT
they usually put that's it a gift with a value of $5 on the customs declaration
form which means that if you're lucky, you will avoid any extra expense. Xplosiv budget pack I always keep an eye on budget games as you can
get some real bargains - this is no exception. For under £10, you get Battle of
Britain, The Operational art of War 2 (Elite edition) and Chickamauga, all from
Talonsoft. Chickamauga is one of the typical battleground series, and as I don't
have much interest in computer games from the ACW I'll pass on that. Battle of
Britain I haven't had a chance to play yet, so I'll stick with the Operational
art of war 2. I reviewed the first AOW game a few issues ago,
and although I thought it was OK I wasn't overly impressed. I have to say that
after playing AOW2, I went back to the first version again and my opinion of
that has improved. For AOW2 you get a range of modern battles, some historical
and some not. Some of the hypothetical ones are great fun, and I must admit to
enjoying the Fulda Gap one particularly, as it reminded me of the old SPI game.
In fact, the games all took me back to board wargaming as I always play them in
that view. The game controls are easy to use, as you just click on your units
and click on where you want them to move or which enemy you want them to attack.
You can plan your attacks by adding in HQ, artillery and air support, and if
your attack is successful and your units still have movement points left you can
sometimes attacks again. This is dependent upon the average of movement points
used by all your units so far. You can decide when attacking what sort of losses
are acceptable too. The game has some uncertainty to it as well, as the computer
randomly decides at the start of each game turn which player goes first. Two
turns in a row can be good, but it's a different matter when the enemy gets the
same. There's plenty of depth to the game, as certain
units (e.g. recon ) should not be fighting but scouting, and your engineers are
best at digging in, and you can gets lots of information on each unit as to it's
strength and morale. The enemy AI is reasonable, but on the standard settings I
find it very easy to win though it may take a while. There's also the fact that
enemy units quite often attack without paying any attention to their flanks or
isolation, which is not realistic at times. I did enjoy most of the scenarios,
and there's plenty of value for £3.33. |