Wargame

Brass Hats is very much a game in the vein of Advance Wars or Military Madness. It's turn-based, you have your guys, you move them around, they attack other guys, they die, maybe you build some more, maybe you don't, and hopefully they kill all the bad guys. If there's something really witty left to be said about this subgenre of game, it ain't gonna be here and now.

What I love about this subgenre is the attention required from you is completely on-demand. Whatever other swarm of media devices you have ongoing in the background, your attention can shift seamlessly between them and this type of game, given its quick, turn-based nature. But games like this can be a little too simple when you have the brain cycles to spare. However, Brass Hats, with some small additions and adjustments to the overall formula, sharpens the strategy to a finely honed point.

Making History reminds me of the games from Paradox, most famously Europa Universalis. That's a bit of a paradox (hem hem), because Paradox has its own (excellent) WWII game, Hearts of Iron -- but HoI is very much a war game, and while military conflict is central to Making History, the war side of the game is much more abstracted, and at a more grand strategic level, and it pays much more attention to economics and diplomacy.

I haven't played a board wargame in some years, but there was a period in the 70s and 80s when I played virtually everything of importance in the field, and it's still a genre for which I have a high degree of empathy. While there are any number of games I remember fondly, and even a few I view as superb and worthy of study today (including Dunnigan's WWI and Chadwick's A House Divided), Zucker's Napoleon's Last Battles is a game I still think of almost sublime in its focus, concision, and all-around polish. It's also simple enough that I can suggest that, even if you never play another board wargame, you should play this one, to get a sense of what this particular genre is all about.

On this particular Tabletop Tuesday, it is our honour and privilege to direct your attention to the seminal game Little Wars, designed by the late Herbert George Wells. (Since last week we pointed to a game published in 1904, we thought we'd do something more modern; Little Wars was published in 1913.) And lest some of our readers of the gentler sex take objection to our subtitle, we will note that this is indeed the subtitle Mr. Wells (that advocate of the female suffrage, and proponent of Free Love) chose for his own ouevre.

Little Wars is a game of enormous importance, at least for those of us interested in the historical evolution of games as a medium; the first commercially published rules for gaming with military miniatures, it leads directly to the modern miniatures wargaming industry (including such offshoots as Warhammer)--and indirectly to the board wargame, the tabletop roleplaying game; and to all of the digital game styles influenced thereby, including computer wargames, the RTS, digital RPGs, and (of course) massively multiplayer games.

Hundred Years' War is a game involving dozens of players, played out over a period of months, in which each player represents a nobleman of France, England, or one of the surrounding countries--except for the four who represent the Kings of England and France, the Black Prince, and the Dauphin, and to whom most of the rest of the players report. There are two complementary sides to the game--the economic game, which you can play with occasional updates to your fiefs' orders every few days, passing on money and troops to your liege; and the military game, which is played out in realtime, with players on one side messaging each other to coordinate the movement of armies across France and England.

There's nothing like this anywhere. BUT. This is basically a pure-text game, and one that requires a serious commitment to play.

From Slovakian developer Lonely Troops comes a well-conceived turn-based wargame with something of the feel of the Panzer General series, but set on a Dune-like desert planet in the throes of an emerging war. It features a nicely intuitive interface (and a good tutorial to teach you to use it), well conceived missions, and good quality music. Fans of games like Massive Assault will find a lot to like here--and gamers who like thoughtful strategy rather than the frenetic action of the RTS will enjoy it, too.

During the Second World War, British intelligence believed that, once the Germans defeated the Polish Army, the Nazi forces would easily outnumber the combined Franco-British units on the Western Front. Estimates indicated that the German strength on the Western Front was currently circa 60 divisions to the combined 88 divisions in France (72 French divisions of regular army, 4 British divisions of land units, and 12 divisions of fortress garrisons). The combined force was not quite enough to warrant a direct assault across the by-now refortified Rhineland, but the story was to become worse with the surrender of Poland. With up to 40 divisions transferred from the Eastern Front, this would enable Germany to actually outnumber the Allies by 12 divisions. This combined with the Luftwaffe's superiority in planes (circa 2,000 compared to 950 for the French and British alliance), had to seem ominous. [Figures gleaned from Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm, p. 480.]

Massive Assault Better Than MissionForce: Cyberstorm

Massive Assault offers a series of 31 scenarios, five (5) campaigns (three for the Free Nations Union and two for the Phantom League) composed of four or more "steps" (scenarios) for each campaign, and a World War mode where blitzkrieg is the name of the game and the secret allies dynamic (one of the twists which will be explained later) can often make or break you. Players take the role of either imperial commander or leader of the democratic consortium. The variety is amazing.

Since it was founded, Slitherine has been producing a series of excellent wargames with both a strategic component that covers an entire war on a province level, and a tactical component that involves battles of large numbers of soldiers in a 3D representation. Legion has been one of their most successful titles, perhaps because it covers a huge period of Roman history, with 20 something scenarios and 3 complete campaign games, along with extensive diplomatic rules to cover relationships with other powers that can affect the outcome of a war.

Since it was founded, Slitherine has been producing a series of excellent wargames with both a strategic component that covers an entire war on a province level, and a tactical component that involves battles of large numbers of soldiers in a 3D representation. In Gates of Troy, they take their characteristic approach to the Trojan Wars--obviously, a game based more on legend than their more historical game--with individual "heroes," detailed diplomacy with the different powers of the world, and 6 different campaign games.