Akiva

I've played it using both Fusion and Parallels in OS X and it runs like a champ.

I really like how it says 'Losers'. Pull no punches, I always say.

All very good points. Hearts of Iron III is a great example of what you're writing about here: I doubt very many people can manage the game without some AI assistance. On the other hand, I remember one of my first impressions of Empires of Steel is that there's not really much to research except technologies that provide new units and unit upgrades. There's not much in the way of, say, infrastructure upgrades, diplomacy (and espionage) tech, and so forth. I don't think those sorts of things add significantly to the complexity of a game as much as they add options other than building up military strength. In other words, I wouldn't want to not have such things in the future if the reason why for excluding them was that it would just be automated away by player AI. Also, I haven't played against another person yet. It's not always easy for me to schedule time for that sort of thing so I tend to almost always play against the UI (which is another reason why I haven't fired up Hearts of Iron III in months).

Moon, thanks for the unexpected reply. I certainly didn't mean to call into question Battlefront's policies (in fact, the thought didn't even cross my mind when I posted). I think I was more just 'typing out loud' on why I like the game but haven't yet bought it. As Scott_WAR points out, it definitely has that 'just one more turn' addictive factor, which is great. I guess that coming from such complex games like HoI and WiF, it's kind of hard to not keep thinking, 'Man, this would be so much better if...' and just taking the game through its own value. I mean, heck, sometimes it's nice to fire up a game not have to worry about a thousand little details. Anyway, as I wrote, it's probably just a matter of time for me. Each update that Brit pushes out always has at least one new feature or change that makes me sit up and say, 'Heck yeah. That's exactly what this game needs to get even better than it already is.'

I'm not even sure how I came across the title but I immediately fell for the Windows 95-style iconic unit graphics and how quick it was to just slip in and start playing thanks to a great tutorial (this is coming from a Hearts of Iron fan and someone who is eagerly awaiting Matrix's version of World in Flames). I grabbed the demo and was on-board immediately... Except... for the price tag. It just seemed really, really steep for what I was getting: an expansionist game with only one available strategy. Now, before I get launched upon, let me add this: I've been lurking here for awhile now, watching the game develop, update after update, and Brit's just flat-out on the ball when it comes to the game. So, I see that part of the steep price is the constant stream of game updates fueled mostly by immediate response to player requests. That's just amazing. However, I still can't make myself pull the trigger. The game is really fun and each successive update seem to make it better but I'm finding myself hanging out here to see how the game is progressing more often than I am firing up the game itself (admittedly, that's partially because, as a Mac user, I have to fire up a Windows 7 VM first). I'm not really sure what my point is here other than that I have the money right here but just can't justify it right now. Especially when HoI3's next patch is just around the corner (and, for that matter, the 10.4 patch for Football Manager 2010). I'm not demanding a list of plans, really. I guess I'm just saying that I really like this game, it's great fun, but I just can't get over a sense of reluctance. So, in the meanwhile, I'm going to keep playing the demo from time-to-time and watch the active development progress. Something tells me either something will happen with the game that will provoke me into buying it: either an update that I can't resist or the demo expiring. Keep up the great work, regardless.