2 April 2015

What does the game development process look like?  It’s not always pretty.  There’s a lot of hand-scribbled work along the way, as these pics from an old playtesting game of Warfighter: Asian Thunder from BayonetGames demonstrate.

The setup:  The Iranians are closing on Salyan, their first objective on the road to Baku, Azerbaijan.  “North” is to the left on this map.  The Azeri civilians in Salyan might offer some resistance to the Iranians, as the Azeri reinforcements come charging toward the city.  An American company has landed at the airport, but is not prepared to advance into Salyan in between the Azeris and Iranians until the situation develops.

One player is controlling the Iranians, the other has the Azeris and Americans, and the civilians.

Initial Iranian fire has no effect on Salyan, as the Azeris start to move forward (off image, to the bottom).  Now that the Iranians have fired on the civilians, however, the US starts to move.  In reaction to the Iranian fire, none of the Salyan civilians have (yet) taken up arms against the invaders.

Leaving a platoon behind to guard the airfield, the US Stryker company closes on Salyan from the north, as the Azeris move in from the west.  While some Iranian units are stunned with fire from the Azeris, their infantry is able to grab large chunks of Salyan, supported by a tank company from the east, and their attack helicopters (seen in the bottom right corner of the map heading out of harm’s way).

US counterattacks on the east side of town have stunned some of the Iranian defenders, but the attack helicopters have forces the Azeri infantry carriers to disperse, and cut one US Stryker platoon to half-strength.  The civilian inhabitants of Salyan have all but disappeared from the battlefield at this point.

In the end, the Iranians prevailed on this day.  They held Salyan long enough to fortify it against any significant counterattacks, and the US and Azeris were forced to regroup with reinforcements before trying again to liberate the city.

What happens when we reboot the scenario for another try?  We’ll find out next time!

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