Couple of questions, need some help.

[Sneaksie]

Yes, CC games are still unsurpassed infantry gameplay-wise (too bad it's damage modeling is too simple to speak about nowdays). Especially CC2 is still unique with it's simulation of the entire Market Garden operation. This is an interesting effect actually - more schematic old 2d games seem more life-like than modern 3d ones.

Why is it so? I'll quote my old post from Battlefront forum about possible cause of this:

Note that making 3D versions of CC (GI combat and another one), transferring all gameplay elements exactly and, AFAIK, having access to CC infantry AI coding resulted in epic fail compared to original games so it's not that easy for some reason. This is an interesting question why. My opinion is that in CC you're really restricted - you can't order individual soldiers around, and you could only guess what's happening in the house where two hostile squads meet. Your imagination portrays what's happening there for you, and no future CPU, AI code or super videocard would be able to compete with your imagination. On the other hand, in ToW, where you can zoom to any soldier's face you see all the AI quirks clearly. Some people reported that playing Kursk in top-down (tactical map mode) they felt that their soldiers act smarter

BTW, actually Steel Fury and Kharkov 43 (and T-72 sim) are from the different development team (i heard they're making a T-62 sim now), and games from MoW series were developed by various other teams. For example, there is MoW: Vietnam on the way (by the team that made Red Tide).

I haven't had a game give me wonderful little moments like that since CLOSE COMBAT. This game is a real treat and I will do whatever I can to help advertise it.

Thanks!

[nodlew]

I remember the imagination. I grew up playing RPGs like Dungeons and Dragons, Traveller, Melee, and tactical board games like Panzer Leader. My friends and I would even invent our own role playing, military, and sci-fi games, when we weren't in the woods taking enemy positions with pine-cone grenades and sub-machine guns made from vacuum cleaner parts. When I was a little boy, before personal computers I played with plastic army men and I remember dreaming that one day they might be able to make little robot army men that would bring the game "to life," which is essentially what computer games do, except better, because computer army men are a lot cheaper than hundreds of little robots would be, and they never wear out.

Sound effects were something that you provided yourself--I can still produce dozens of pretty decent weapon and battle field sounds with my voice. It's a skill that you never forget. I wonder if little boys can still do that. Not as well I, would guess.

My favorite CC game was Close Combat III: The Russian Front. Actually it was the first one I bought, and I absolutely loved it. I never played II or I because the graphics of III were much better and it put me off. Battle of the Bulge was good. And of course all of the mods for III really kept the game growing and expanding and kept me playing it literally for years. CCIII was actually a pretty good-looking game, for being 2d--without the necessity of 3d it was possible to make nice looking maps and units, all of which moved and fought in very convincing fashion, and it all ran flawlessly on a computer that didn't have enough HD space to even install a modern game. It was of course a quantum leap beyond Steel Panthers which I also played way back when. The thing about Close Combat that hooked me was the realism. The game literally could not get boring because it was like watching real battles unfold, not like trying to beat a computer. You felt like you were trying to beat, not the computer, but the Germans. I felt some moments of real triumph playing that game, like the time I had a paltry force of Airborne Paratroopers with a few measly AT guns, bazooka teams, etc., maybe a Sherman and an M10 and I had to defeat a landslide of German armor including Panthers and King Tigers. You guessed it, Bastogne. Hitting that Panther with a bazooka and seeing that nice big shower of sparks and smoke was like: Yeah! Take that you Nazi bastards! (not propaganda). Learning to play Close Combat was learning to deploy troops on a battlefield, its lessons would transfer directly to the real world.

And of course the units in Close Combat were somehow imbued with something you never find in computer models: character and personality. Somehow, looking down like God on that poor, wounded and bloody foot soldier as he crawled painfully across the frozen, shell blasted map, panicked and trying to find some place not to be shot at, you felt sympathy for him, and you hoped he would make it.

One other thing about Close Combat. I don't remember once ever while playing that game thinking "Ok, this is stupid. Real troops/tanks/guns/cannons/bullets/explosions/...etc. don't work that way." I remember thinking, or shouting, "Stop! The other way, you idiot!" Or, "Oh, crap, I did not think that was going to happen..." But in its terms, the game was completely believable. If I lost, I scratched my head and re-strategized, but never did I want to contact the game designers. It was, in a word, perfect.

[nodlew]

BTW, actually Steel Fury and Kharkov 43 (and T-72 sim) are from the different development team (i heard they're making a T-62 sim now), and games from MoW series were developed by various other teams. For example, there is MoW: Vietnam on the way (by the team that made Red Tide).

Different development team, Ok. Not really sure how all of that works. Different teams working for the same company on different projects/series of games? Do the teams interact at all? They must. I know that TOW and MOW have very distinctive looks and completely different gameplay styles. But there are similarities as well. I suppose there would have to be, both of them being RTS games centered on conventional ground warfare, mostly in the WWII era.

I am looking forward to the T-64 vs. The M-60 game. I liked Steel Fury very much until the limitations of the AI and the impenetrability of the Mission Editor caused me to lose interest in the game. I hope they can get the infantry sorted out. There were lots of problems with Steel Fury. Anti-tank guns were usually buried in the ground, unable to fire, or cocked at ridiculous angles. Infantry modelling was too crude, and the AI, though deadly accurate, was very mechanical and predictable.

The Mission Editor needs to be simplified, or at least it needs a detailed manual--in English as well as Russian!--explaining how to use it. The longevity of a game is essentially and directly dependent upon its modability by users, both in terms of the campaigns and missions available to play, and also the available units and some of their attributes, such as infantry weapons, ammo load-outs, etc. New expansions and sequels to games will always be in demand because of major improvements to a game that modders are generally not capable of. They will be more in demand, if the games are known to be mod-friendly.

[nodlew]

I finally lost two battles as the North Koreans. I was given two SU76s, two AT guns, 2 mgs, and infantry against a huge US tank company with artillery support. Some of my guys didn't even have rifles. There was no time to prepare defenses, and after killing our own weight and more in the enemy, we were overrun by heavy tanks and massed infantry. It wasn't fair.

But, while the battles took place, we surrounded the "victorious" Yankees. Let the capitalist pigs savor their triumph while they can. Tomorrow belongs to us.

[Sneaksie]

Looks like you're having fun

[nodlew]

The capitalist dogs of the American 7th Infantry Division were indeed crushed by the heroic 203rd Tank Regiment of the People's Republic. Our revenge upon them was hard won, but sweet in the achievement of it.

Now only one Yankee, Capitalist, Pig-Dog Imperial Army (now that's propaganda!) remains, and it is utterly surrounded and cut off.

After that? Who knows. Growing in strength, perhaps we shall bring the light of Communism to liberate the enslaved people of Japan from the American Dogs!

One day the whole world will be free to think and do as we do as loyal comrades. And if they are not, we will liberate them until they do.

[dce21b]

If you select your group of soldiers and then assign them a group number cntrl 1 for example. That group will keep selected formation. But you have to select group by its number or it will not work.

[nodlew]

Thanks for that info, dce21b. I didn't know that. As a rule I assign groups to my armor and artillery, and special infantry units like scout/snipers. Guess I'll have to start doing it for infantry squads as well.