Wargame of the Year 2007 election

External Since: Jan 01, 2008 Posts: 2

I didn't find a single wargame released in 2007 that picqued my interest
enough to give it a whirl or purchase it. I'm mainly into tactical/grand
tactical level WW2 and even Napoleonic, medieval and ancient, so here it is:

1. Nothing
2. Zip
3. Nada

Honourable mention (s):
Battlefront - almost but not quite
Kharkov - better late than never - I hope!

Regards

<eddysterckx.RemoveThis@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:2865ed6e-e5c4-4b8a-984c-70de452f7809@z11g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...
>
> Hi,
>
> Yup, it's that time of the year again and this time there's again a
> Grand Prize for you to win : Pat Proctor & Shrapnel have graciously
> offered a copy of the Air Assault Task Force wargame to one lucky
> participant. If you already have the game, Shrapnel will let you pick
> any game of your choice from their current catalogue. And to make it
> absolutely clear : voting for AATF will *not* increase your chances of
> winning it (*).
>
> The Rules :
>
> 1) 1 (wo)man, 1 post - all votes in the open, no emails.
> 2) The game must have been published in 2007 or late 2006 - in other
> words : if you think a game published late in 2006 didn't get a fair
> chance last year, feel free to add it. AATF got added per default as
> it caused this rule change to begin with.
> 3) Post your 1st, 2nd and 3rd place choices - 1st place gets 5 points,
> 2nd gets 3 points, 3rd gets 1 point.
> 4) Votes must be in before January 15th, 2008
> 5) In case of a tie, the award is shared.
> 6) Developers are strongly encouraged to vote as well - there's no
> shame in believing your baby is the best looking.
>
> This is what's at stake for the developers - again created by Daniel :
>
> http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/AlbumIndex?u=4124492&a=32625734&f=
>
> My vote - entirely based on how much fun I had with them :
>
> 1st place : Commander : Europe at War
> 2nd place : AGEod's Napoleon's Campaigns
> 3rd place : Punic Wars
>
> To refresh your memory on what games got published this year :
>
> Air Assault Task Force
> Thermopylae
> Down in Flames WWII - Bombers
> Ancient Warfare : Punic Wars
> Battlefront
> Close Combat : Cross of Iron
> Making History - The Calm & The Storm 2.0
> Silent Hunter 4
> Panzer Campaigns - Budapest '45
> Civil War Campaigns - Atlanta
> AGEOD'S American Civil War - The Blue and the Gray
> Theatre of War
> Civil War Battles: Campaign Chickamauga
> Squad Battles - Soviet-Afghan War
> John Tiller's Campaign Series : Matrix edition
> Carriers at War
> Commander : Europe at War
> Ta.La.Co.Si (Tactical Land Combat Simulator)
> Guns of August 1914-1918
> Combat Mission : Shock Force
> Hornet Leader
> Advanced Tactics (People's Tactics 2)
> Napoleon in Italy
> Strategic Command 2 : Blitzkrieg - Weapons and Warfare
> John Tiller's Battleground Civil War
> John Tiller's Battleground Napoleonic Wars + Age of Sail
> AGEod's Napoleon's Campaigns
> Cose Combat : Modern Tactics
> Panzer Tactics (DS)
> Great Battles of Rome
> Larry Bond's Harpoon Commander's Edition
> Modern Campaigns - Danube Front '85
> Empires in Arms - The Napoleonic Wars of 1805-1815
>
>
> If you think I missed one (or several) feel free to add them - this is
> not a list of nominees.
>
> Greetz,
>
> Eddy Sterckx
>
> (*) This is how the winner of Air Assault Task Force will be
> decided :
>
> 1) Every entry/voter is given a random number by me
> 2) When the election is over I zip this list, password protect it and
> send it to Mr. Beretta and everyone else asking for it - without the
> password.
> 3) I'll ask Mr. Giftzwerg to pick and post a number between 1 and ...
> 4) I release the password so Mr. Beretta and everyone else can check
> who won the game.

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

External Since: Nov 08, 2007 Posts: 83

> This attitude is poisoning computer wargaming.

<sigh>

> Should not a criterion for a "Wargame of the Year"
> be that it is published in a good state, without
> the need for fixes or improvements so significant
> as to change a judgement of the game? That it is
> so well-designed that you don't have to spend weeks
> "understanding" it?

I knew someone would post a response like this. I agree, games should
work right from the first release and should be great fun. However,
the reality is (and the wargaming community is fortunate in this
regard) that many wargames get improved _after release_ by their
developers for free. We're not talking bug fixes, we're talking
significant improvements based on community feedback.

> If ACW came out *last week*, I would still vote for
> it. Has it improved since then? Yes. Has there
> been fixes? Yes. Did they make a loser into a winner?
> No. It was a potential winner out of the box. It
> was a sure-fire winner for me after a few nights'
> gaming.

I agree, ACW was great at initial release and is even better now. The
same can be said of FOF and of virtually all of our releases.
However, I can also say that those of our releases that came out in
November or December have often not had the type of post-release
improvements that releases from earlier in the year have had . It's a
pleasant fact of wargame development that this happens, not a problem
or a poison. I'm just saying it should be taken into account - but
most importantly I just don't think most wargames can be really fully
explored and enjoyed in less than a month. If you told me that within
a month of starting to play ACW you had mastered it and fully grasped
its entire design and so forth, I'd say there's no way. That's my
point - yes, it's a bit of a nit pick but we're all free to be pundits
here.

Regards,

- Erik