08/15/13

Allied General Part 1

Developer: The Lordz Games Studios

Publisher: Slitherine, Ltd.

Panzer Corps is by now an established franchise. Aimed at entry-level wargamers it is a fun, light wargame which has attracted a lot of veteran wargamers who are looking for an uncomplicated game that is both challenging and fun. Allied Corps is a stand-alone game but can be combined with its German-oriented counterpart to open up a two-sided campaign where either the Axis or Allied side can be played. As a stand-alone game only the Allied campaign is available, though individual scenarios can be played by either side.

The game comes with five campaigns, each opens in 1940 – 1944. It also comes with 30 individual scenarios. Like its spiritual predecessor, Panzer General, the lure for the campaigns are the creation of a core force which the player shepherds over the course of the war. By the end of the war he has (hopefully) crafted a highly experienced lethal force that can smash through any encounter.

That’s all well and good, but I’m more interested in firing up a one-off scenario and letting the fur fly. After examining the various scenarios (including a hypothetical face-off between the Western and Soviet forces) I decide I’m in the mood to crush the Germans’ rockets in the scenario V Rockets Sites. It takes place just after the capture of the Arnhem Bridge and my task, simply enough, is to capture the rockets.

I fire up the game on default settings with medium difficulty (called “Colonel”) with Weather, Supply, Fog of War, and Undo all toggled on. Not that I like to use the Undo feature, but true fat-fingered mistakes can happy. I’ll try to avoid using it.

The AAR opens on October 8, 1944. My orders are simple. Capture and hold five objectives. OK, let’s see how this goes.

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08/13/13

Tuesday Screenshot – A GrogHeads’ Exclusive Sneak Peek at Flashpoint Campaigns: Red Storm

Yep, we’ve got ’em first and hot off the… well, the computer monitor (boy does that sound anti-climactic).

Anyway – here they are and ENJOY!

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08/10/13

Democracy 3 Preview

Developer: Positech Games

Publisher: Positech Games

Author: Son_of_Montfort

Have you ever watched the news or CSPAN and thought, “I can do better than those guys?” Well, with Congress’s approval rating at a low of 15%, chances are that you have. Cliff Harris and his UK-based company Positech Games (known by Grogs for Gratuitous Space Battles and Gratuitous Tank Battles) want you to put your bragging to the test in their upcoming governance simulation, Democracy 3. I got a chance to look at a near-Beta version of the third incarnation of Positech’s game of political intrigue and national management and I am happy to report that it is a news junkie and amateur pundit’s dream.

Democracy 3 follows the model of its predecessor fairly closely and, at first glance, the changes appear to be subtle. Like many of Positech’s newer releases, Democracy 3 now sports full HD resolution and a fairly simple but functional UI. The simplicity of the UI used by the Democracy series allows players to get a plethora of information with very little effort, hovering over key policies and modifiers or hot linking from faction to faction. This is extremely important, given that running a Democracy, not to mention winning elections (perhaps the most important goal of the game), requires a well-informed player. Just like the previous title, Democracy 3 has players make decisions in running the country in two main ways – implementing new policies from a fairly detailed list or altering already implemented policies through a simple slider. In order to implement or change a policy, the player must have and expend a certain amount of political capital that accumulates each turn, influenced largely by the player’s choice of ministers in his or her cabinet.

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08/8/13

Prosciutto – Hamming it up with the di Parmas… Part 17

In Part 16 Oberto’s forces supported by the mustachioed legions of Bulgaria all but destroyed any effective armed resistance against his claim to independence. In this part he achieves his ambition, has a fine Italian woman on her knees and cleans up the mess……

Beaten, stripped of wealth and facing ruin, Matilda kneels before Oberto and offers surrender. The first part of his plan has finally been completed, his promise to his father as he lay on his death bed has begun to be fulfilled.

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08/7/13

Go To Games: 7 Wonders

Brant Guillory, 7 August 2013

For a lot of people, their “go-to” game is the game they boot up on the computer when they have time to kill in the evenings, or over a weekend when they’ve got the game on TV and want to safely ignore commercials. And while I have a few casual “go-to” games in the digital world, I would be remiss if I failed to extoll the virtues of my tabletop “go-to” game for multi-player gatherings: 7 Wonders.

For most wargamers, 7 Wonders barely registered on their radar. A fast-playing European production, 7 Wonders has an abstract combat mechanic, and one that can be safely ignored and still result in a resounding victory. With so little battlefield relevance, it’s not wonder that many grogs steered clear of 7 Wonders when it was released. Their loss. Seriously.

The core schtick of 7 Wonders is a play-a-card city-building mechanic where players use resources to build parts of their cities, including attempting to build one of the Wonders of the Ancient World. The original game came with players’ boards for the widely-acknowledged 7 Wonders of the Ancient World, but subsequent expansions (including a brand-new pack of boards) give players almost 20 options around which to build their cities, including the Colosseum, The Great Wall, and Stonehenge.

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