CMBB on CMx2 = no more???

[purpheart23]

I absolutely loved the scope of CMBB. Great game. Couldn't really get into the North Africa campaign but CMBO started this love affair. Thanks again BFC.

[Homo ferricus]

...CMBB's marketing campaign was vastly larger and further reaching than our very small CMBO campaign.

Ah, I still remember how I discovered Battlefront and the CM series. It was an innocent time; twas' my 12th or 13th birthday, and I had skipped school feigning illness, so I can spend the day relaxing in my older brothers room reading his Game Informer magazines and laying in the sun. And then, upon finishing the most recent month's issue, on the very last page, I saw a small picture of a 3D landscape, with Sherman tanks and such. The tiny article read, "Demo of the Month: Combat Mission: Beyond Overlord", with a short paragraph describing the demo and where one can download it.

BOOM, that night the demo was on my hard drive.

BOOM, the next day CMBO was payed for and being shipped to my house

[Battlefront.com]

Ah, damn... thanks for reminding me I've been doing this so long you could go from elementary school to college graduate. I really needed that. Thanks.

Yeah, we did pretty well getting the CMBO word out there because we had some great timing. Charles and I also had some great high-up contacts at the big game magazines because of his AH stuff and my Sierra stuff. Those were the days when game magazines were worth spending advertising money on. I don't know that we'll ever go back to those days.

Steve

[Runaway!!!]

Have you ever heard of X-Play on G4 network?

I don't know if they've ever done a game review of one of the CM games, It would be nice to find out though.

[Michael Emrys]

Ah, damn... thanks for reminding me I've been doing this so long you could go from elementary school to college graduate. I really needed that. Thanks.

[solicitously]

We're here to help you, Steve. You know that don't you, buddy? We'll be here to keep you company in your old age after all your other friends have stopped speaking to you when your drooling becomes embarrassing.

[/solicitously]

Michael

[Der Alte Fritz]

Hi Steve

Good news to hear that the CM Normandy project is on its way.

I understand the rational to have the base game followed by a module to add British Troops and then the SS. Followed by the Bulge game and then a Bagration game.

Of course CMBB was a monster project, trying to cover that period of time but more importantly that number of units and vehicles! Did we really need the SPW 251/16 with the Schlappenzpopper attachment for lighting officers cigars??

But the advantage of covering that period of time was that it appealed to a wide audience and allowed a full range of mods, Spanish Civil War, Poland 1939, Sealion 1940 and it allowed designers like George McC, Mad Russian, etc etc to do those big series of scenarios following a unit or personality across the whole campaign.

A wide range with a big audience builds it own momentum, activity, supporting websites, etc. Which in turn can generate extra sales to sub groups for specialist modules. I remain to be convinced that your approach will do this, especially on the Eastern Front. I think you are in danger of just appealing to a series of small special interest groups that will gain no momentum. Look at the experience of CMSF. Mods for Grozny, NATO vs Warsaw Pact, all way off the main US vs Syria subject. There is a case to be made for NE Europe in 1944 because it could only ever cover 9 months. But not for the Eastern Front and the Mediterranean that spanned years. I just fear that by creating a little series of 'matchbox' sized games, you will get a matchbox sized response. In my case, I will buy Normandy and the modules but I have no interest in the Bulge. But I would add extra later units to my Normandy game if the Bulge was a module rather than a game.

So what are the limiting factors in this equation? With the higher level of graphics required, it must be vehicle types and hence number of pixels that need to be drawn. Sure, further units need to be added for longer time scales, but you already have the data from the previous games and that sort of code can be created by a template method. In short, we can only have say 30 vehicles/units in a game and then a module adds another 20 odd. Unlike in CMBB where we had 100s

So my proposal is to adapt your plans. Do not use TIME to limit the selection of vehicles/units but use RARITY to limit them instead. So do a Normandy game but cover the whole 9 month campaign but only allow the most basic vehicles/units. Your standard US/Heer tank unit, tank destroyer unit and infantry unit. Add further variety like more US vehicles, SS units, British units, etc via modules rather than separate games.

Then the Eastern Front and the Mediterranean look more possible. The Bagration module could last from Jan 1944 to wars end using T34/85s 76s ISU 152, SU100, Tigers, Panthers, PzIVs, JgPzIV and Hetzers, basic Russian SMG teams, infantry teams, etc. Add in further units as Guard, SS, Big Cat modules. Do another game for 1942/3.

I think that the Lego approach is correct both for gamers and for your business but I think that a more selected vehicle/unit mix on a broader time canvas would pay extra benefits rather than stuffing gamers into matchboxs.

Whatever it is, you have my support, thanks for the YEARS of fun you have given me.

[Yair Iny]

Der Alte: I think one of the limiting factors to doing the entire western front in one go (time-wise) is the transition from summer to winter. As I recall, Steve said they would need to do the terrain and vehicles with new textures for winter, hence the need for a module, so as to not delay the initial game.

[Der Alte Fritz]

Yet both CMBB and CMAK were both issued with no winter vehicles, just the slots in the game engine for them and these were rapidly filled by modders. Likewise the terrain switching between summer and winter(snow) could be left with the code in place and the images added later. CMSF has several good different terrain conversions already for Europe, etc but you need a mod manager to switch. It is not a major coding problem.

Also as I understand it the Bulge is a whole new game not a module.

Weather, I understand is another matter

[Battlefront.com]

When we set out to make CMx2 we had a choice:

1. Aim to support breadth

2. Aim to support depth

We had tried to do both with CMx1 and it nearly killed us (physically, at times!). We definitely succeeded in getting the breadth, but we were not happy with the level of depth. Partly because of hardware issues, but mostly because of the demands of satisfying breadth. Based on customer feedback it was clear to us then, as it is now, that most gamers want more depth than breadth. Note that I didn't say ALL, I said MOST. We can't make everybody happy so we went with what we felt MOST people wanted.

The effort involved to create the later war period of the Western Front is substantial. It will involve almost completely new TO&E, about the same number of new vehicles as the Normandy game, different building models (unless you guys want Norman houses on the Rein ), weather effects (which are more than just data tweaks), and other things. Plus, we will be introducing new game features into each new Family of games as we go along, so on top of all the situational stuff we have to change we also will have significant development time into game improvements.

The only argument for keeping Bulge together with Normandy is so people can boot up a single game without having to first thing "do I want to play early war or late war Western Front?". Otherwise there's no substantial difference.

The Bulge will be its own stand alone game with its own Modules. It will not be connected to Normandy. That's a decision we made long ago (3 years IIRC) and we're not going to change that.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

And to summarize why we aren't interested in "breadth" any more, I think Der Alte Fritz captured it nicely when he wrote:

In my case, I will buy Normandy and the modules but I have no interest in the Bulge. But I would add extra later units to my Normandy game if the Bulge was a module rather than a game.

This isn't a wrong way to think of adding stuff to the game, but it just doesn't make sense from our perspective. If you want to play with later units in a summer environment, that will be possible with the Bulge game because it covers from Fall 1944 through Spring 1945 (Spring being, effectively, the same as Summer since it's just weather variables that can be set in the Editor or QB). In addition to the ability to do this you'll also get game improvements which won't be available to Normandy as well as the option to play in the Winter if you want to.

It also shouldn't be about cost. The price for the base game is $45, the price for a Module is $25. For the $20 difference between the two you get an entirely new environment (weather, terrain, models, and textures) as well as gameplay improvements. Even if you're not interested in the environment, it's still a small price to pay relative to the value you'll get out of it.

I know there are lots of different customer types out there. And it is quite possible that you're the type that doesn't quite fit the model we've developed. That's OK because there's absolutely no way we can cater to every player type, which means some will like what we're doing more or less than others. Remember that the vast majority of gamers won't like anything we do because it's a wargame, so we're used to not trying to win popularity contests since we'd always lose. For wargaming it is similar... appealing more to one type of wargamer than another is unavoidable. We need to keep our direction focused on appealing to the majority of wargamers, which by definition means losing some sales here and there to those who don't quite fit that mold. Looks like we have you on board for Normandy, but not necessarily the Bulge. As I've recently discussed, we had plenty of people buy CMBO but no other CM game, CMBB and no any other CM game, CMAK and no any other CM game, and combos of this. In other words, we're used to people picking and choosing because that's what people do

Steve

[Apocal]

The Bulge will be its own stand alone game with its own Modules. It will not be connected to Normandy. That's a decision we made long ago (3 years IIRC) and we're not going to change that.

Steve

Is the Bulge game going to keep the previous units and TOEs from Normandy? I could see that being of interest if someone wants to do a "Overlord to the Rhine" type campaign. Which we can do now, thanks to the new campaign system.

[Smaragdadler]

So the main title of CMx2 Westfront Late War will be about bulge. What would be the themes of the modules?

Will there be an extra Hürtgen Forest Module? (don't think so, because it's basically the Bulge "uncut directors edition")

Maybe a Ruhr pocket module (urban warfare) and a Thuringia Campaign module (with added extra 'what if' stuff to make some fictional Patton '46 campaign?)

...ah and there was this Ratte-thingy.

[Battlefront.com]

Apocal,

Is the Bulge game going to keep the previous units and TOEs from Normandy? I could see that being of interest if someone wants to do a "Overlord to the Rhine" type campaign. Which we can do now, thanks to the new campaign system.

Quite a bit of the TO&E and equipment used during Normandy bleeds over into the Bulge timeframe, so where it makes sense the Normandy stuff will be retained. From our perspective people purchasing the Bulge game are primarily paying for the new work we've put in, so if someone wants to skip Normandy and get some of that experience with the Bulge we're fine with that. We don't think many will do it that way, though, so it's not really a problem for us.

Smaragdadler,

So the main title of CMx2 Westfront Late War will be about bulge. What would be the themes of the modules?

Like Normandy, it will be an expansion on theme. There are lots and lots of units to simulate for this period of time so there are no shortages of things to add.

Will there be an extra Hürtgen Forest Module? (don't think so, because it's basically the Bulge "uncut directors edition")

It is more than likely that the basic Bulge game will have support for Hürtgen because US and German forces will be available, the terrain will be correct for that battle, and the range of weather also correct.

Maybe a Ruhr pocket module (urban warfare) and a Thuringia Campaign module (with added extra 'what if' stuff to make some fictional Patton '46 campaign?)

Like any of our games, if the elements are there people can do whatever they like with them. Depending on what you conceive of as a "what if" that is also possible.

Steve

[Mord]

Will Normandy have enough to cover Market Garden? Or will we see it in a module? Seems there'd be some special rules that might apply...bridges will be very important as well as dikes, airborne units (polish units), windmills and some form of river crossing? What is the design theory behind covering it, if there is one? When I think Europe (WWII) I always think of the big three, D Day, Market Garden, Bulge. So, I am hoping we can recreate it (MG) without too much fudging.

Mord.

[Der Alte Fritz]

Hi Steve

I can see where our ideas diverge:

DAF: breadth = "mass" market

BFC: depth = high quality experience

I can see the justification for the NW Europe two game scenario. Modules add extra textures, second game adds extra features.

I just do not see that system translating so well to the Eastern Front given the timescales. Also are you going to have enough new features to justify new games as the system matures? Ok a new campaign, new terrain, buildings, TOE, vehicles (well the Soviet half anyway) and some new programme items - will make Bagration viable. But a second game?? Will you have enough new programme items by this stage? Soviet RKKA simply does not change that much in the last 18 months of the war, terrain and buildings do not change much between Belorussia and Ukraine? So a second game would presuppose a major change in period with changes to both sides vehicles and TOEs.

Well probably more questions than answers but I would urge you to take the broadest canvas you feel you can on your first Eastern Front game. My experience of Panzer Command's two games is that this matchbox approach is so limiting that I lose interest very quickly. This is especially so, given that there are a lot fewer books to read about individual Eastern Front battles than for NW Europe.

PS Can we have Arnhem as a Bulge era module?

cheers

[Redwolf]

So what's the deal with a Russian company doing the first East Front game extension?

I've only seen the bit passed with no further info?

[Battlefront.com]

Mord,

Will Normandy have enough to cover Market Garden? Or will we see it in a module?

The base game for the Normandy Family (we still haven't give you guys the real name ) will only go up to sometime in August, so Market Garden won't be there. However, it's prior to the start of the Bulge Family's timeframe so logically it will be a Normandy Module.

Der Alte Fritz,

I can see the justification for the NW Europe two game scenario. Modules add extra textures, second game adds extra features.

Correct. Modules add TO&E, Models, Textures, sounds (as needed), Sceanrios, and a Campaign. The Marines Module is already out there showing exactly that and how it integrates with the rest of the content. The sum of these is called a Family. Each Family has its own design focus (i.e. new features) and setting.

I just do not see that system translating so well to the Eastern Front given the timescales.

Why not? Traditional wargames usually covered a single battle, like Stalingrad or Kursk. A single Eastern Front Family will have greater scope than that, but less than CMBB.

Also are you going to have enough new features to justify new games as the system matures?

We have enough ideas for the game engine itself we could code for the next 10 years without a release and still not be done. So we have the opposite problem... far more ideas than we have time.

Ok a new campaign, new terrain, buildings, TOE, vehicles (well the Soviet half anyway) and some new programme items - will make Bagration viable. But a second game?? Will you have enough new programme items by this stage? Soviet RKKA simply does not change that much in the last 18 months of the war, terrain and buildings do not change much between Belorussia and Ukraine? So a second game would presuppose a major change in period with changes to both sides vehicles and TOEs.

I think you vastly underestimate how much the forces changed over time. Just about every 6 months there was a major reorganization on both sides, including equipment and force structure. We could do just that and have plenty of content for the purchase price. However, as stated above we'll keep putting in new game features as well.

Well probably more questions than answers but I would urge you to take the broadest canvas you feel you can on your first Eastern Front game. My experience of Panzer Command's two games is that this matchbox approach is so limiting that I lose interest very quickly. This is especially so, given that there are a lot fewer books to read about individual Eastern Front battles than for NW Europe.

I think you're missing the point of depth vs. breadth. Each choice has got to hold the player's attention for at least a reasonable amount of time (anything over 3 months is fine with me, 6 months + is a bonus) to justify the expense of the game. With depth games the attention is held because of the richness of the gameplay. With breadth games the attention is held because of the variety of experiences. A game that doesn't have enough depth or breadth is going to fail to keep attention. It's impractical to have a game that is equally broad and deep. We tried with CMx1 and for us it simply didn't work.

Now, obviously some players rather have more variety than more richness of detail. Others would rather have a richer experience and not as much variety. CMx1 was breadth first, depth second. CMx2 is depth first, breadth second. Ideally we could provide both, but realistically it's simply not possible to do. So if breadth is what you care most about then I can understand why you're not as enthusiastic about our strategy as we are. I can't emphasize enough... we fully understand we can't please everybody equally concurrently. By definition that means some customers are going to be more enthusiastic than others.

The first Eastern Front game will center around Bagration only. That's a huge undertaking right there. Throwing 1943 into the mix is unthinkable to us, not to mention going broader than that.

I don't know that much about Panzer Command, but I would put forward the notion that it isn't just the limited scope of the game's content that is responsible for you burning out on it quickly. From what I've read by Combat Mission fans is that the game itself doesn't break a lot of new ground. That's a problem for a game which is coming years after CMx1 games, especially since it is much narrower in scope without being deeper in details (again, that's the impression I get).

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Redwolf,

So what's the deal with a Russian company doing the first East Front game extension?

A bit of a premature tidbit of information It's one of several possibilities we have on the table for the Eastern Front stuff when we actually get to it. We're making no decisions for a while since we haven't even done the Western Front stuff. But I think it is safe to say that we're going to have some help from a Russian partner (we have several at the moment) to some degree or another.

The basic point is the one I keep saying over and over again... CMx2 is set up to give us flexibility to use outside help to make Modules or, in theory, base games. We're still refining that process and figuring out how to get around some technical partnership development bottlenecks.

Steve

[Boris Balaban]

Steve and insite on a module for 1939 to 1940?

Poland and France battles and equipment?

[Battlefront.com]

Not on our radar for now because we already have a pretty full dance card for the near term. What we're trying to do over the next year or two is to increase our capacity for new content even more than we originally planned for back in 2004 when we started CMx2. The truth is pretty evident... there's far more stuff out there to cover than any one developer could do in their lifetime. We would LOVE to be in a position where less popular time periods, and early WW2 is one of those, could be cranked out and not derail more popular content.

Steve

[Ron]

Wow, good to see the long range plans. Personally I am more looking forward to returning to Normandy than the Eastern Front again. If I was to gauge my playing time with the CMx1 series, it would be something like 50% CMBO, 15% CMBB and 35% CMAK. I really liked the core simulation refinements in CMBB then CMAK, but could never really get into the whole Russian thing. I think I realized I like reading about the Eastern Front, lots of books in my library, but not enough to get into playing it - cultural I guess don't know.

I am all for more depth up front and then more breadth in time with modules. Where do I sign up - let's go

[Apocal]

Apocal,

Quite a bit of the TO&E and equipment used during Normandy bleeds over into the Bulge timeframe, so where it makes sense the Normandy stuff will be retained. From our perspective people purchasing the Bulge game are primarily paying for the new work we've put in, so if someone wants to skip Normandy and get some of that experience with the Bulge we're fine with that. We don't think many will do it that way, though, so it's not really a problem for us.

Thanks for the honesty. I was wondering beacuse my ideal campaign is one covering a set, specific unit from Normandy to the end of the war. I know this puts me in the minority you aren't catering to though.

[Battlefront.com]

50% CMBO, 15% CMBB and 35% CMAK.

I just want to point out that I do not know Ron personally, nor did I coach him to say this. However, Ron, your check and Fan Boi Membership Club card are in the mail

Seriously, this is the most common thing I've seen from people who say they don't play Eastern Front much:

could never really get into the whole Russian thing.

Again, as an extreme Ostfront Snob, I just don't understand how anybody could say that!! But when I step back and look at the whole picture, I completely understand *and* accept it. Even if I understand it the evidence clearly shows it's not just a few people that think this way.

On the bright side, at least I'm not a total groggy fan of something like the War of 1812 or the Spanish American War. Talk about a dearth of gaming available for those subjects So as both an Eastern Front guy and as a game developer I'm more than happy to have the Eastern Front be a very strong second to the Western Front which, in turn, is probably the #1 theater. It means making Eastern Front games is worth the effort, even if it it doesn't make sense to have Romanians in it.

Steve

[akd]

How are you certain that setting was the dominant factor in the relative popularity of previous CM titles? Is this based on sales or on other feedback? Just wondering if there might be other factors, such as the most obvious possible factor, that after CMBO some felt the engine was wearing thin and moved on.

Personally, I never really got into CM:BO, but I loved CM:BB, particularly the early- to mid-war and Finnish front content. I should have loved CM:AK due to my deep interest in the Italian Front, but I think at that point the above set in: I just felt that there wasn't much really new to draw me in and that the game's progress was glacial in comparison to competing interests. In short, it was not the setting that turned me off of a purchase, but the look and feel of the game growing stale (to me). Perhaps the same affected many who purchased CM:BO and played this heavily over a long period of time?

Anyways, I wholeheartedly endorse future Ostfront snobbery and early-war content.

[Battlefront.com]

There's plenty of evidence to suggest that the Western Front is the more popular front in general terms. We just had a semi-detailed discussion about this last week. The evidence for it is overwhelming and completely sensible when examined. Therefore, it's not just our own internal sales and observations that are at work here.

As a follow up CMBB should have sold less than CMBO. At least that's generally the case for game series. The exceptions are when the 2nd game is in some ways better than the first. Examples of this are Warcraft II, Close Combat II, Quake II, etc. In our opinion CMBB is the better, more polished game compared to CMBO. Therefore we thought it would buck the trend of reduced sales and instead go the opposite direction. It didn't do that, though it did better than typical sequels.

Rule of thumb is that each sequel does about 50% what the previous one did. Part of this is because rarely does a game developer put the best subject matter in Game #2 or later. Part of that is sequels generally don't change the gameplay enough to entice the entire original audience back. It's easier to do for games like Quake where the technology is what largely drives interest, not necessarily the subject matter.

In any case, we agree with you that by the time CMAK came out the game engine was "stale". In fact, we almost didn't make CMAK because we weren't sure it we could squeak out another game with the same engine. Content played no part in that decision, BTW, we just asked ourselves if we should start coding CMx2 (something we decided to do around 2001/2002) and forget about doing CMAK. As it happened, after CMBB came out we decided to give CMAK a shot because sales of CMBB were good (though less than we had expected). Part of that decision, however, was to add almost nothing new to the game engine itself and instead just put in the content. We also started it off at $35 instead of $45.

I know some people have a hard time believing that we decided to ditch the CMx1 codebase even before we had released CMBB, not to mention CMAK, but we did. We've always been long range thinkers. Which is probably why we're still in business and thriving, while so many other wargame companies have gone kerplunk.

Steve