Spoiled

[RCHRD]

I've never been keen on John Tillers squad Battles Vietnam because it hits a little too close to home. But I ordered his new game about tactical warfare in the Pacific and tried it out today. What a dissappointment. When a unit fires upon another the 'tracer' meanders across the map, the graphics are just plain ugly, and there is no immersion at all. Opposed to this is CM where I have literally ducked when tracers zip, apparently, just overhead. I'm a big John Tiller fan but CM has definately raised the bar for me.

Also, I think I have seen gun tubes in CM depress and elevate. How hard would it be to get them to recoil, even get the vehicle rocking back a bit?

[Moon]

Richard, they do recooil already

[M Hofbauer]

Originally posted by RCHRD:

How hard would it be to get them to recoil, even get the vehicle rocking back a bit?

Look closer. They *do* recoil.

[Michael Dorosh]

What is the name of the game you are referencing - and is there a demo we can download to try it for ourselves?

[RCHRD]

The proud and the few. By HPS simulations. No demo but send me an email with a mailing address and I'll loan you my CD.

[109 Gustav]

Originally posted by RCHRD:

The proud and the few. By HPS simulations. No demo but send me an email with a mailing address and I'll loan you my CD.

Wow, it must be bad. The only way you could borrow my CM cd would be from my cold dead fingers. Either that or promising me a beta copy of CMBB;)

[Mord]

I can understand where Richard is coming from on this whole immersion thing. I have never been a fan of war games that are just a computer generated set of hexagons and little square cardboard chits. The computer has always seemed to me to have much more power than just recreating the games AH use to make exactly as they were made for the table top. Which in my opinion was done for financial purposes, (400 plastic units would probably be costly) and the ability to convey numerical information of the units represented right there on the board for quick reference.

Alot of these games could at least jump up to the graphical equivilent of say Panzer General. I don't see where anything is being lost by doing this. The depth of play and all the calculations are still gonna be there under the hood. And I am not talking "Eye Candy" fellas, (before everyone lights up their torches)I am talking stick figures, atleast! Why can't a tank look like a tank or a soldier like a soldier instead of a square with an X in it?

Mord.

[Seanachai]

Originally posted by Mord:

...I am talking stick figures, atleast! Why can't a tank look like a tank or a soldier like a soldier instead of a square with an X in it?

Mord.

Tradition. Arcana. Operations.

The TAO of combat.

You wouldn't want wargames to look like a children's game, would you?

[Mord]

Ok fair enough. But atleast the option would be nice in alot of these games. Say, like I think TOAW? did where you could have an actual soldier represent your soldiers or you could have a little square doohickey represent the troops.

I mean I can appreciate having to use your imagination, there was a time when that is all we had even with computer games. I can remember Computer Ambush and that was a cool game, Xs and Os for soldiers. I just think they should bring some of these games into the 21st century. Or as I said atleast provide the graphical option.

I still very much want to get my hands on Squad Battles Vietnam. But the guy could have made the graphics on that a little better.

Mord

Mord

[ March 12, 2002, 04:38 AM: Message edited by: Mord ]

[JonS]

Originally posted by Mord:

...a little square doohickey represent the troops...

Those little square doohickeys weren't just grabbed out of thin air. Most plan-view wargames use a form of the standard NATO symbology to represent force types and sizes. Once you get used to the system it makes a lot of sense, and can look (IMHO) quite attractive.

For example, the Panzer Campaigns offers the choice of little men and tanks, or standard symbology. For all its faults (do a search), I always thought the Panzer Campigns plan-view maps with units looked quite nice, while the isometric view with icons looked silly.

This link to HPS shows the plan view with standard symbology.

It depends on the scale of course. For something like CMBO, this would be inappropriate, but at a higher level, for me it makes more sense and is in its own way more immersive.

FWIW

Regards

JonS

[ March 12, 2002, 03:43 PM: Message edited by: JonS ]

[Speedy]

Real men only use the square doohickey.

[Mord]

So basically John S. it's a matter of scale for you, and all in how one looks at it. When you are playing an operational game you are feeling like you are the generals in the HQ looking down at the map and issuing orders, but not really directly like we do with CM? I can understand that if I have that correct.

I am not a big fan of operational games outside of the beer and preztle kind. So maybe I should aim my comment more towards strategic and tacticle type games of this kind. For instance the Squad Battles Vietnam game. I have heard some good things about this game and want it, but I am turned off by the little pictures of heads representing a soldier. But I am not so spoiled that I can't suspend my disbelief enough to get over that. I don't need 3D for every game just would like to see a little more attention put into the graphics.

Mord.

And after looking at that DDay pic even the symbols and terrain could use a better level of graphics.

[ March 12, 2002, 06:19 PM: Message edited by: Mord ]

[JonS]

Originally posted by Mord:

So basically John S. it's a matter of scale for you, and all in how one looks at it. When you are playing an operational game you are feeling like you are the generals in the HQ looking down at the map and issuing orders, but not really directly like we do with CM? I can understand that if I have that correct.

Yes, this is essentially correct.

Regards

JonS

[RCHRD]

I have all five of the Panzer Campaign games. I prefer the 2D view. I play TOAW (A favorite of mine)in 2D. It's not the view but the gameplay. The HPS games I'm referring to are called Squad Battles, essentially the same level as CM. But in depicting tactical combat nothing comes close to CM. And, it seems, it's going to get even better. This conviction is only clear to me because I've tried this other tactical game and it was missing a lot. Mostly intangible things, but I will probably never play a scenario through to completion. It's just not that compelling.

I guess I never noticed the recoil of tank guns because they mostly are pointed directly at me and the view is narrow from my customary tactical formation of headlong retreat.

[Graaf Spee]

Originally posted by Mord:

I mean I can appreciate having to use your imagination, there was a time when that is all we had even with computer games. I can remember Computer Ambush and that was a cool game, Xs and Os for soldiers.

Mord

Now that was a cool game I still remember the grenadethrowing bug. There was no rangelimit, but yor soldiers got VERY tired if you tried a 100+m throw.

For those of you who haven' played it, it used the same WEGO system as CM does and you could play hotseat. Not bad for an early 80's game.

/Kristian