Behind the Times: CMx2 Genres

[Rayak47]

I'm living in Zimbabwe and just read about the launching of CMx2. While most if this has probably been discussed weeks ago, I'd be interested to hear some comments on the rational for the choice of genres:

Modern Era: I applaud the choice of the modern era but question the limited topic. (My thinking was Europe, but I grew up in the cold war playing NATO vs Warsaw Pack.) How hard would it it have been to expand a game based on Syria to include something more historical like the '48, '67 and '73 Arab/Israeli Wars, or South Africa/Cuba? Why not include Western terrain ala Africa Corps so we could still have some European scenarios for us Cold War lovers? Was it just to make some extra money for expansion sets? A hypothetical Syrian Campaign seems very limited in scope.

WWII: A repeat of Beyond Overlord for the first WWII game? That's not very imaginative! Whatever happened to the early WWII game which included Poland, France, etc? Ok, limited interest, although I'd love shooting it out with those early tanks! Why not make a redo of at least Africa Corps? That at least allows you to include the Western Front and vehicles from '40 on?

[J Ruddy]

Welcome to the Forum!

You are correct. Your questions have all been answered before. Actually they've been answered around 487 times before.

Syrian Campaign seems very limited in scope

Yes it is limited. BFC has indicated they are no longer going to make massive Combat Mission games like CMBO CMBB & CMAK, instead you can expect more titles of the limited scope variety.

A repeat of Beyond Overlord for the first WWII game?

It won't be a repeat of the first WWII game, it will be a much smaller scope game. They don't want to have to put 7 different nations with their individual uniforms, kit and vehicles into a single game anymore. So you'll see CM WWII Battle of the Bulge (for example) with US vs Germans. Then maybe a closing the "Falaise Pocket" Module, a Sword Beach Module etc...

There's a lot of grumbling about this, but what the hey, it's their business, they can do what they want. If it makes/breaks them, it's their time & dime...

[MikeyD]

You missed the bedlam. When CM:Shock Force was first announced all the grogs that were expecting/craving CMBO over again practically had a mass coronary!

After much teeth-gnashing, once it was realized a Stryker Brigade game had some major grog potentialities (debating add-ons to M4 carbines, for instance) the grogs were suffiiciently mollified and they stopped setting cars on fire in French suburbs.

[juan_gigante]

Ha! MikeyD wins!

Originally posted by MikeyD:

the grogs were suffiiciently mollified and they stopped setting cars on fire in French suburbs.

[Rayak47]

Thanks for the quick answers guys. While I'm not happy with the idea of the smaller scope games, maybe the can turn the games around more quickly. I just hope they do expansions!

[Sixxkiller]

Hi Ray,

Thing also to remember is the mod community here. I would bet that this game will fit the parameters for Iraq and so forth mods. Knowing how much the people here love WWII I wouldnt be surprised if a modder doesnt make a WWII campaign before BFC does.

Zimbabwe rates right up there in one of the coolest names to say.

-Ray

[Rayak47]

Yeah, I do like the mods, but the ones I've seen are kinda limited when using vehicles that aren't in the game. For the WWII game I'd been looking forward to see some '39-40 battles, they did say at some point they were going to create one, oh well. In the modern battles a grander scope would have had those super shermans, M-48-60's, Chieftans, etc. I'm going to miss all that!

(A friend of mine here was telling me about a pretty large tank battle between Cuba and South Africa duing the Angola war. Cuba had T-55's and T-62's, SA had modified Chieftans and helicopter gunships. Apparently SA cleaned their clocks. I want to see a mod on that!

My wife is telling to get the hell off the computer, ("what kind of forum are you responding too? Battlefront!!??"), so I can identify with "sixxkiller"!)

[SargeMcGruff]

I guess I missed the bedlam to. I was hoping to get to replay the Arnhem scenario from CMBO, it was by far my favorite. I guess a smaller scoped game will be a good change of pace, or even a pace at all(I had to stop playing BF games due to a replacement of computers and my new one didn't have OS classic). I'm really looking forward to the WWII game though.

[kipanderson]

Hi,

I agree with much of the sentiment in Rayak47’s post.

I long lobbied for a Cold War setting for CMX2. The main reason is to get away from the same/usual set of WWII toys/kit. My favourite setting for wargames/CM is still WWII for all the usual reasons that would be supported by most on this forum. However, it would have been fun to play with an entirely different set of toys in a Cold War game. The armies and equipment were real and no more “fantasy” than the CMSF setting.

You get a different set of toys in CMSF/contemporary settings, so why Cold War? Because in a Cold War game you would get First World v First World high-intensity warfare. This is what interests me, First World v First World high-intensity warfare. This is why I am such a fan of WWII wargames also.

However, all of us have to reconcile ourselves to the fact that with five plus titles on the way using the CMX2 engine, few of us will be fans of “all of the titles/settings”. I am confident that there will be both a North West Europe and Eastern Front WWII title so I am a happy chap .

I look forward to CMSF and regard it as a “bonus” title, it will be fun even thought First World v Developing World wargames do not really hit all o f the buttons for me. It is enough that BFC what a break from WWII and are more interested in their chosen setting than in a Cold War game. Sadly .

All good fun,

All the best,

Kip.

PS. I would have gone for “late” Cold War setting. ’80 to’85 would have been fun, truly fun toys .

[MikeyD]

Remember, with CMSF we're getting a lot of the necessary toys for some decent Cold War scenarios. Syria or no Syria, I expect so see more that a couple full-up T-72 (or T-80?) vs defending Abrams "Fulda Gap" -style Red Team assaults. Just because they're giving us a Stryker Brigade company-scale infantry game doesn't mean we have to play it that way. How many tanks at once can the new game engine handle, do you think?

[savagegoose]

the problem with cold war style conflict, ,say red v blue, is the main game would be an air war.

or air unit intensive, at least. cant get away from that fact. i would guess it would all be over once air superiority is gained. then ground forces used to hold off attacks while air force anihalates anything that moves.

this brings me to the importanst stuff games.

it would be unrealistic to try a modern, erm cold war , style game with such a simplistic coverage of air power as cmx1 had.

with air power in, it prob would not be fun to game. or easy to model.

so in that respect syria is an ok setting . as air sup, is already a given.

although im going to skip cmx2 in syria ill look forward to seeing what other setting bf can dream up.

[ December 29, 2005, 01:26 PM: Message edited by: savagegoose ]

[gibsonm]

Originally posted by Rayak47:

(A friend of mine here was telling me about a pretty large tank battle between Cuba and South Africa duing the Angola war. Cuba had T-55's and T-62's, SA had modified Chieftans and helicopter gunships. Apparently SA cleaned their clocks. I want to see a mod on that!

I think you will find the SADF used modified Centurions (firstly "Semel" then "Olifant") not Chieftans. As far as I know, the Brits didn't export any military hardware to SA after it left the Commonwealth.

[Warloc]

I would have much preffered a 1948-73 sim, instead of a 2005 one. Syria vs the USA is just not that interesting, and it opens up too much conjecture about weapon systems that are classified, like the M1A2.

Limited scope games did not make Battlefront the company it is, and I think they are making a mistake in moving away from their core sims.

Cold War would be an air war? How do you figure that? do you have any idea the ammount of tac air the Allies had in Normandy? I didnt see it ruin CMBO? Your way off base. Just because tac air exists does not mean you have to focus on it. You could have some fighter-bombers just like CMBO and it would be fine.

My 2 cents anyways.

[ January 03, 2006, 04:33 AM: Message edited by: Warloc ]

[Abbott]

Originally posted by Warloc:

(snipped)

I would have much preffered a 1948-73 sim, instead of a 2005 one. Syria vs the USA is just not that interesting,

I certainly cannot bring myself to go as far as to claim that "CMSF will not be interesting" without having first seen the game. I also find myself unable to criticize BFC’s choice of theatre given the state of current affairs.

Limited scope games did not make Battlefront the company it is, and I think they are making a mistake in moving away from their core sims.

Maybe mistakes as you see it as a gamer but chances are a sound business decision by a "Game Company". Then again how do we know for sure without first seeing the product? I would rather pay a bit more for BFC's products then lose their productions to our hobby altogether. Other game designers go for the quick buck and have little regard for their paying customers; I have never seen that business model form these guys.

I also like the sound of BFC releasing more games or additions to games at a quicker pace. I see no reason to expect any lesser quality out of BFC which leads me to feel that we will again be offered a product that is superior to any other available in the chosen genre(s). After release you may hear enough good things about CMSF to purchase the game and discover that it is another fine release from a game company with a proven track record.

[ScouseJedi]

I thought that one of the major reasons for a modern release was technical.

If the engine is designed to cope with all kinds of modern weaponry it will not require major changes to include weapons from previous generations.

For instance CMSF will include coding for aiming dedicated laser sighted AT weaponry so it will have everything under the hood to do really complex rangefinging and stuff - you guys know more about modern weapon systems as Im sure you can tell (I was going to use Milan as an example but was unsure how to spell it let alone if it was cutting edge 2007 tech)

What this means is that when they make CM:Caveman they can use the same code to control the aiming and flight of ass jawbones. This contrasts greatly to what happened with CMx1 which was simply unable to be reconfigured for any later combat than WW2.

[MikeyD]

On reflection, I suspect another reason to do modern Stryker Brigade is sales potential within the military as a kinda 'unofficial' training aid. If you're a green recruit enterting of one of the growing number of Stryker brigades you might just want to install CMSF on your laptop. If the first CMx2 game had been a Korean war game you wouldn't get half so much useful info out of playing that as playing CMSF using your unit's current equipment, going up against actual potential threats. The Stryker Brigade sales potential is at the very least in the multiple thousands, which would be a nice fraction of overall sales.

[ January 03, 2006, 09:42 AM: Message edited by: MikeyD ]