CMFI VS Achtung Panzer

[TheLotusEater]

I need to know which game has the most realism.

Please discuss this matter

[Vanir Ausf B]

CMFI contains 29% more realism and is lower in saturated fat.

[TheLotusEater]

:cool:

CMFI contains 29% more realism and is lower in saturated fat.

Well that is good news. I need to lose some weight.

Is that all the realism it offers? Or should I stick to CMFI

/Discuss

[Flanker15]

Panzer is built on a tank sim engine so it has the vehicle realism in spades.

[GerryCMBB]

Hopefully the Fact Checkers will get working on Vanir's claims.

Gerry

[Wodin]

I love AP. However I have to say CMx2 seems to be the most realistic. AP is a great game though and any tactical wargamer should have it i their collection (and I hate RTS game, but this one is special and not a click fest).

Ap also has a operational layer which is cool aswell.

For realism though I'd side on CMx2.

[peter thomas]

Tanks seem able to plough through forests in AP. Sometimes they can hardly move in woods in CMFI, sometimes they edge through, sometimes they go round. In AP they drive over trees, knocking them down (beautiful deformable terrain allows you to enjoy this holywoodesque spectacle) - hate to think how long their tracks would have lasted in real life, or the optics, or how long before they were jammed. It looks bad, but it also messes things up tactically.

CMFI LOOKS more realistic when it comes down to sprite behaviour and appearance, but not sure if that makes the results any more real.

CMFI is about 500% easier to learn to play and navigate. It's intuitive. AP is definitely counter-intuitive. And wait till you have to patch it (which you have to as soon as you buy)......my God.....

Arty in AP is a bit badly done. You call down barrages and open top half-tracks drive straight through, linger with shells going off right on top and suffer no damage.

Atmosphere in AP is strong. You can take fantastic cinematic screenshots......though that's true in CMFI too, the black and white snowscapes in AP are seriously atmospheric.

The AI isn't 'scripted' in AP. They go for VPs. Sounds great, but it can just lead to daft, unreal, chase-around-the-map-after-the-free-VP behaviour. I have found quick battles in CMFI to seem slightly more real.

Just my little opionions.

AP also takes ages and you can't save mid-game. In the end I stopped playing it for this reason. To really get into it the battles need to be about an hour long....but sit there for an hour with no saves? I couldn't really get the time to do that. It's certainly a game you should have and try though. Very interesting and atmospheric.

Also, the spotting in AP is a bit off. Makes it hard to set up infantry ambushes for armour, because the tanks seem to spot you, hunkered down in thick forest, from a long way away. And you need to do this a lot in the first scenarios

I guess I think CMFI is far and away - for many reasons, not just realism - the very best tac sim out there. It's a fantastic game. AP is much harder work, and not because it's better. CM Normandy was great too, but had - in my humble opinion - a problem with the implementation of bocage hedges which ruined the realism for me - infantry could only get through thick bocage using explosives or gaps or tanks with forks fitted. If you visit Normandy - or read battle accounts - you will know that the hedges are not impenetrable like this. But in many CM Normandy scenarios your tactics were limited because you couldn't get through the hedges where you needed to (lack of pioneer explosives, rhino tanks etc). CMFI doesn't have this issue.

[peter thomas]

Should add, AP should allow more interesting tactics as the maps are huge and there is ample scope for wide flanking etc. For some reason I've never managed this - maybe because I've usually played the reds and they are usually so embattled and short of men that it's hard enough just to hang in there, at least in the first few scenarios (I never got past the fiorst few scenarios)...

[peter thomas]

oh. And the maps look much better in AP - they are from historical photos, no sharp lines etc as in CM. However, there's still a grid beneath them, as there is in CMFI - which, in both games, sometimes makes placing your men exactly where you want them a bit challenging - they snap to the grid, basically.

AI is better in CMFI, I think. Less stupid suicidal behaviour, on both sides.

Both are equally unreal, I should - FINALLY - add when it comes to simulating a command experience as there is no subordinate AI worth speaking of in either game - you have to move each and every squad. You can't, say, be in charge of a company, give general orders and expect the captains etc to move squads accordingly. In both games you will have to give orders to each and every squad. If you wanted a command simulation then Command Ops is the only one that has AI that does this, but the scale is bigger and so you still end up (commanding at battallion level, say) giving as many orders as you would in CM or AP. PLus that's counters, no fancy sprites.

[womble]

Should add, AP should allow more interesting tactics as the maps are huge and there is ample scope for wide flanking etc.

That's a bit of a false comparison to draw. It's trivial to have "ample scope for wide flanking" in a CM QB too: just set a tiny/small or even medium battle on one of the Huge maps that are available.

But I'm amazed to hear of a game that's less intuitive to the newcomer than CMFI.

[MG TOW]

Both games have very high merit and we should be happy to have them both. Now for the back hand. AP was pretty much killed for me after the last patch resulting in performance problems I won't go into detail here because its being worked on.

Maps terrain looks better in AP, but there is no scenario design capability on new maps like in CMFI. Models of troops and tanks, I'll say close but CM wins. Animations AP probably wins that one, but its close. Honorable mention to TOW 2 for animations actually but now we are venturing off topic.

CMFI wins for me.

[Tempestzzzz]

Both games have very high merit and we should be happy to have them both. Now for the back hand. AP was pretty much killed for me after the last patch resulting in performance problems I won't go into detail here because its being worked on.

Maps terrain looks better in AP, but there is no scenario design capability on new maps like in CMFI. Models of troops and tanks, I'll say close but CM wins. Animations AP probably wins that one, but its close. Honorable mention to TOW 2 for animations actually but now we are venturing off topic.

CMFI wins for me.

I'd have too echo those sentiments.

Incidently the Gravieteam sims do come with modding utilities-but they are a nightmare-clumsy- to use. Not at all elegent in implementing or execution. I spent less then an hour extracting a graphic file to modify and nearly a week and a half of night computer time trying to get it back in the game, show up in the game or crashing with the dreaded 001 error.

It's a small outfit-there product is good-but the provided modding tools are clumsy.

[Vergeltungswaffe]

AP=Checkers

CM=Chess

[peter thomas]

Meaning what, womble?

[womble]

Meaning what, womble?

Meaning pretty much exactly what the words say. I don't think I muffed the writing of my thoughts in this case:

Saying AP is better because there's more room to maneuver is a weak/false comparison, since you can have lots of room (relative to the force you have) in CM too.

I'm surprised AP is less intuitive than CM, because CM isn't exactly the most user-friendly UI and command scheme to newcomers.

[MG TOW]

AP=Checkers

CM=Chess

Checkers is a flat, single dimensional game compared to chess. AP has as much control and complexity as CMFI, IMO. Its implemented differently, but its there.

The environment is more interactive in AP, doesn't affect gameplay but its cool to see wood bridges burn and collapse, tankers on fire in the dark, that sorta thing.

The interface is clunky compared to CFMI, where it counts CM still comes out on top IMO.

[Vergeltungswaffe]

Checkers is a flat, single dimensional game compared to chess. AP has as much control and complexity as CMFI, IMO. Its implemented differently, but its there.

The environment is more interactive in AP, doesn't affect gameplay but its cool to see wood bridges burn and collapse, tankers on fire in the dark, that sorta thing.

The interface is clunky compared to CFMI, where it counts CM still comes out on top IMO.

I believe AP's depth to be much less, so I will have to disagree.

[Erwin]

AP does have v good graphics, but perhaps AP gameplay is more comparable to CM1 (but with a much less intuitive UI)? I tried to like AP, but just couldn't get used to its complexity and figuring out how to do things "right". It does seem a bit closer to TOW which I had similar problems with.

CM2 is a much better simulation than either. So, apples and oranges...

[peter thomas]

I was querying the second half, Womble - the intuitiveness of the UI. It seemed to me that you could meaningfully say that AP is very much harder to get to grips with than CM, but I may be wrong. Maybe I'm just more used to the CM interface. I'm far from a newcomer, sadly. Being new to this forum doesn't mean someone is necessarilly new to the game. I've wasted more time than I care to reckon with the CM series, from CM1 through to CMFI. Ditto with AP, for that matter.

I thought Graviteams first person tank shooter (that was more or less what it was) - Steel Fury - was pretty good, by the way - if all you wanted to do was sit in the tank, move around, fire, follow the preordained orders. I liked the graphics and it 'felt' real despite glitches. Limited interest though, if all you can do is shoot....

I like AP too, but the experience of playing it isn't as smooth as CMFI, somehow. But I might go back and try to work out the patches again, boot it up, try it again, now that I've remembered it. Maybe I'll find something new there.

I also bought Graviteams combo game - Blaze of War. I didn't like that at all, despite it trying to combine the tactical game in AP with the shooter in SF. My copy, at any rate, wouldn't run smoothly and the graphics didn't seem as atmospheric as with the other 2 titles. Not sure why.

[Mitra76]

The two games are different in style, the comparison means little; the only thing in common are the 3d figures. AP is more platoon\company oriented in order management with a good part of game played in the 2d map. CM is more on the direct control of single units and platoon.

[Redwolf]

CM should be utterly superior in computing how anti-armor fire works, mainly because of correctly taking hits at angles(*) into account.

But the game doesn't display values in use anymore, so what's the point?

(*) both plate angles and positional angles

[womble]

I was querying the second half, Womble - the intuitiveness of the UI. It seemed to me that you could meaningfully say that AP is very much harder to get to grips with than CM, but I may be wrong.

I'm not trying to say you're wrong. I haven't any experience with AP to form an opinion either way. I'm just saying that the interface must be opaque indeed to be more unintuitive than CM's.

[Michael Emrys]

Oh, I don't know. Once I reprogrammed the hotkeys to something I was more comfortable with, I can't say that the UI has caused me any major heartbreak. I wouldn't doubt that it can be better, but for now it is certainly serviceable. The biggest problem I've had with it is clicking on the big red button when I mean to hit rewind. I kind of wish it was placed farther from the other replay buttons.

Michael