Month: December 2012

12/16/12

A Civilization V AAR – Part One

Brant Guillory, Decmber 16, 2012

Brant’s kicking off an extended Civ V AAR, with commentary on his game, and tips & tricks as he goes along.

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I’ve been playing every version of Civilization, starting with the first one back when I was in college. And I lost more than a few nights to the “just one more turn” bug. Civ III was my favorite for a long time, but Civ V is rapidly overtaking it, with the mixture of social policies, faith, and city-states really combining to keep my interest.

I’m chronicling this play-through with Carthage, and I’m also trying a few new things just to see how it goes, so expect to see a few “huh?” moments as I puzzle my way through some of these decisions. Expect this AAR to run for quite a while, with about 10 screenies with commentary for each article.

And while I’m no Civ expert, I’m pretty experienced, so you’re going to get a lot of “this worked for me” but it’s entirely likely you’ll find someone, somewhere who vehemently disagrees. But, hey – we wouldn’t be Grogs without some complaining, right?

 

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The setup.

I’m playing as Carthage, which I’ve only played one time before. I wanted to trample folks with elephants, but I also like the idea of free harbors in each city. I’m also playing on a huge map with small continents, which should play to the harbors’ strength in connecting trade routes. I’m also playing at “quick” pace, in the hopes of finishing the AAR before 2014.

Even with a huge map, I’m only playing with 9 opponents and 16 city-states. This should give us all a lot of space to explore and noodle around.

 

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The start.

I’ve got tundra around me, and some green stuff to the south, so I suspect I’m up against the northern edge of the map. Lots of silver, stone, and marble nearby, which will play a big role in which technologies I start to research.

 

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Founding the first city.

I’m a fan of the production queue. It takes one thing off of my mind, and it also helps keep me on track for longer-term strategies. I end up starting and stopping a lot throughout the course of a complete game, and this lets me stay on track if I don’t get to play for a day or two – no going back and recreating a near-term strategy. I also like to get some scouts out as soon as possible. I want to know what’s over every hill in sight. Normally, I build a few warriors between the scouts in case I run into the inevitable barbarians a bit too close, but this time I’m going to get a monument built a bit earlier to get the culture numbers cranking up.

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12/14/12

PC Game Review of Strategic Command WW1 Breakthrough

A review by Boggit, 14 December, 2012

Developed by Fury Software and published by Battlefront Inc.

Wargamers have recently had a series of fine wargames set during the First World War competing for their attention. With the Breakthrough expansion to Strategic Command World War One, Boggit takes a Grog’s view of whether this is just “Over the Top” or “Bang on Target”.

 

Strategic Command World War One Breakthrough is Fury Software’s latest addition to their Strategic Command stable of games. Strategic Command World War One Breakthrough is an add-on to Strategic Command World War One, so what has changed with the addition of Breakthrough, and for those unfamiliar with Strategic Command World War One itself, how does the game play?

Breakthrough makes a number of changes to the Strategic Command World War One game engine and introduces a new unit – the armoured train, which substitutes for the rail gun in some scenarios. The game engine changes cover a host of improvements including new hotkeys and some nice combat features like combat unit swapping, improved bombardment options, and so on. Supply rules have been overhauled and improved. Breakthrough also adds a variety of additional scenarios and a range of modding features to the game editor.

 

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What scenario to play? Action takes place from the muddy Flanders fields to the jungles of Africa.

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12/12/12

Game Review of Call of Duty: Black Ops II

Developed by Treyarch and Published by Activision

A review by Jim Zabek, 12 December, 2012

Call of Duty is a well-established franchise that has become almost a perennial expectation to first-person shooter fans. But has it taken a step toward becoming a full-fledged wargame? Read what GrogHeads’ Jim Zabek has to say on the subject.

The Siren’s Call

The Call of Duty franchise has been so successful that it has been played by nearly a full generation of gamers. Its trademark is an intense single-player campaign powered by a game engine that gives a robust multiplayer game longevity that few FPS games can hope to match.

The breakup of Infinity Ward a few years back briefly left the franchise’s future in question, but development studio Treyarch stepped into the breach and has deftly managed to fill the role of a top-shelf FPS development house. With the release of Black Ops II they have demonstrated that they can consistently deliver games at the highest caliber and gamers will buy them unhesitatingly. Within two weeks of its release, Black Ops II grossed over a billion dollars and eclipsed revenues generated by Hollywood’s biggest blockbuster movies. By any measure it is a grand slam. Let’s look at why.

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12/2/12

Review of Alea Jacta Est

Published and Developed by AGEOD

Reviewed by Boggit, 2 December 2012

Boggit returns to the “old days” when Rome ruled the world, and argued over it incessantly.

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Alea Jacta Est is the latest addition to the well regarded series of strategic/operational wargames produced by the Indie developer AGEOD. Alea Jacta Est is concerned with the wars of Ancient Rome with a particular focus on Roman Civil Wars, although it is possible to assume a non-Roman role in some of the scenarios.

For those who have played previous AGEOD releases, like Wars in America, Rise of Prussia, or Revolution Under Siege Alea Jacta Est will seem quite familiar at first sight. To some extent this is a superficial familiarity since the game engine has been tweaked for Ancient warfare rather than one where firepower is a critical factor, resulting in subtly different gameplay. For example, cavalry charges take on a new importance and are potentially deadly, depending on the terrain being fought over. There are also new siege rules reflecting the realities of Roman Legionary siege techniques and so on.

If you are new to AGEOD’s wargame titles the gameplay is quite unlike many wargaming titles where players tend to have considerable control over their pixel armies. Here you are in the world of the Commander in Chief – you can give your armies rules of engagement, set their aggression level (or combat stance) and order them to a location. There to do battle – or not! Commanders do not always follow orders to the letter, but can place their own interpretation on them based on their characteristics. This can result, for example, in a defensive or passive posture when you’ve instructed an aggressive stance. It can also result in generals delaying in implementing their orders. The classic example is Napoleon’s general Grouchy failing to pursue Bluecher – the aggressive/assault posture being modified to defend! It is a beautiful feature for a game at this level and particularly reflects the command and control difficulties of the pre-radio age.

Commanders can have a wide variety of traits, each of which can influence either their direct behaviour or the way they affect the political situation, for example Julius Caesar has as one of his traits “Fast mover” which gives a 15% stack move bonus, another trait is “Propagandist”, which gives a boost to loyalty in a region where he is present.

 

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Oh, happy day! Well not for the Senate anyway! Alea Jacta Est features lots of ancient “events”.

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