wargamingscribe.bsky.social
Started as "all the computer strategy games in chronological order". Now a bit more.
https://zeitgame.net/
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Avalon Hill and SSI have special privileges :)
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I had missed it because it is tagged as « boardgame » instead of « wargames » in SpectrumComputing. Thanks for the notice…
… but still not going to do it. It’s a straight Risk clone, which joins the «Star Trek clones» and the «Galaxy clones» in the « not going to cover them anymore » category :).
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Granted, WW1 Germany was not a "democracy".
In any case, I reckon it explains why the accusation that Zelinskyy is a dictator because he does not organize elections really sticks in USA.
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The problem is that it is terrible. As I often say, EF 1941 is like the invention of perspective for cwargames, and NC's dev predates EF41. Still, a fair attempt at incomplete info and delayed orders.
But yes, emulate an Apple II+, anything later and you won't receive reco reports.
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You won't find it. I had to trade it (+2 others) to a collector in exchange of my Napoleon's Campaigns box.
I'll upload the 3 manuals (Ram!, Incunabula and Beast War) once I have the greenlight.
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Indeed. With the name of commenters :)
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I also suspect AH never feedbacked the third party game they released, hence bizarre features like healing in REAL-TIME in a turn-based game! "Stare at the screen to heal". Read more here:
zeitgame.net/archives/16937
Bext article: Ram! - an Avalon Hill trireme sim for DOS. No cohesion, as I said.
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I have had a draft of an AAR of this game for two years now. Not a wargame + in space, so I decided not to release it.
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I never expected the “Clean Waffen-SS myth” to be a thing.
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Carriers at War was extremely detailed, but easy to play as it removed all the clutter and focuses on what matters: move your fleets, find the enemy, launch your planes. A large part of the game could be automated, the rest was real-time!
Read my review on this milestone:
zeitgame.net/archives/16864
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After their seminal Reach for the Stars (which formalized the space 4X genre - to this day), Roger Keating and Ian Trout worked on a Pacific War title - Carriers at War, released in November 1984 for Apple II and C64. It revolutionized the genre (2/3)
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A typical village from France, Poland, Italy, Germany and Soviet Union:
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I like it, but we getting away from the military/wargame theme.
I think you would like PBF
pbfcomics.com/comics/guntr...
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This one is literally an ASL meme :)
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Advanced Squad Leader :).
Sometimes, when I want to laugh in a wargamy way, I take a random page of The Campaign of North Africa and read it. Everyone knows the Italian pastz rules or the fuel evaporation/faction rule, but honestly any page is a gem.
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It almost happened like this to Pappenheim during the battle of Lützen (1632). After a force march to support Wallenstein, he arrived late on a battlefield enshrouded by smoke. He ordered at some point a charge to the Swedish flank but wasn’t heard - he charged almost alone, and was fatally wounded.
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Napoleon's Campaigns was typical of the 1979-1981 era of cwargaming, when designers assumed that making games realistic would make them good. Then Eastern Front 1941 arrived - and it was like the invention of perspective. Later games were not always good, but earlier games were suddenly all dated!
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I gave the game two chances in 2021 and found it terrible. I found a fix for a crippling issue and gave it a last chance last week - still terrible. Read all about it here:
zeitgame.net/archives/16760
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But if you made the effort to understand the rules and invested hours in it, you could play...
... a terrible game, where the best strategy was to create a megastack and destroy the enemy!
I played Napoleon's Campaign twice in 2021 and found it terrible... (3/4)
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The game was incredibly complicated, and released at a time when there was almost no collective wisdom on what a good wargaming UI was - so it shipped with a map and a set of counters. It was optional to use but honestly it was must easier to push the counters compared to using the in-game map (2/3)
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Chers confrères, je vais poser un congé Mercredi
- Ah tiens. Tu vas faire quoi Cédric?
- Oh, rien de particulier.
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Toute arme à trois phases de devpment.
- La première, c’est quand elle est expérimentale et moins efficace que des systèmes éprouvés,
- La deuxième, c’est quand elle est standard et que son usage/contre est intégré à la doctrine,
- La troisième, c’est quand elle est montée sur des pick-up Hillux.
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Je peux vous prêter celui-là pour aider.
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I scored +7 points (losing the Bismarck) and +36 (return to Bergen). Can you do better?
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I am speaking of computer wargaming. I quit on tabletop wargaming after a particularly jarring game of Jutland where both my opponent and myself had to use Excel to follow our fleets, which never saw one another :).
[I am exaggerating, but only a little].
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Not really veteran - I played CaW as part of my coverage of all computer wargames.
CaW is by far the best naval warfare game I played so far as part of my paleo-gaming, but I also found it deeply flawed and often downright frustrating.
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Ian Trout, designer of CaW, prefered history over balance so the « Japan Swipes South » campaign is horribly one-sided. Likewise, balance did not prevent him from designing a « Philippine Sea » scenario to showcase how futile Japanese efforts were in 1944 vs radars, proxy fuses and pilot training.
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@digiantiquarian.bsky.social a fait une chronique en 4 parties de l’univers culturel et mental autour de X-Files - ce qu’était le complotisme à l’époque, ce qu’était une série télé, ce qui de x-files était atemporel ou propre à une époque - etc. Vivement recommandé.
www.filfre.net/2024/09/the-...
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Well, I write about Spanish (and other) VG history, not retro culture - except when I mention that La Pulga is the first Spanish game, which is a cultural fact and not a historical fact. I suppose I am part of the broadee retro culture however.
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I can read it alright, tho slowly.I chose English and Spanish in college and they followed me for years, plus I am French in the first place. However, when I try to speak it, Romanian words come out of my mouth as I learned it (and other languages) later. Spanish is just too similar for my brain :).
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I could only cover so much, so I focused on Investrónica (the "official" channel for ZX81/Spectrum computers) and skipped Ventamatic (the major "unofficial" one), and on La Pulga (officially the first Spanish game, in reality probably not) and eschewed FRED, which followed it by a few weeks.