By Tim Stone on June 20th, 2011.
While those who don’t read history are, allegedly, doomed to repeat it, they can at least sleep easy knowing they’ll never find themselves on wargame forums grumbling about infantry AI, ballistics modelling, and uniform accuracy. There have been occasions during my long career as a bedroom battle orchestrator, when I’ve wondered whether I wouldn’t have been a much happier player had I steered well clear of history books, documentaries and message-boards. Read the rest of this entry »
Those Existential Tank-Traps
By Tim Stone on June 6th, 2011.
No battle reportage this week. Rather than confuse you with another tale of how Easy Company went east then north a bit then left a bit while Baker Company went west then south then right a bit, I thought I’d try to get to the bottom of a feeling that has gnawed at the edges of my wargaming pleasure for the best part of 30 years. That feeling could be described as unease, or perhaps, disquiet. At a stretch you might even call it guilt.
By Tim Stone on May 23rd, 2011.
Turn to page 20 of Flight Simulator X’s pathetic excuse for a printed manual and you’ll see a credits list of around 160 names. To my knowledge only one of those names belongs to a wargame design visionary. Quite what Peter Turcan contributed to the final FS isn’t made clear (‘User Experience’ covers a lot of territory). To understand what he contributed to computer wargaming, you need look no further than 21-year-old watershed Waterloo. Read the rest of this entry »
By Tim Stone on May 9th, 2011.
Three of PC wargaming’s most succulent fruit reached ripeness in the same fortnight in autumn 1997. Having featured Sid Meier’s Gettysburg! and Close Combat 2 in the last two Heavily Engageds, it only seems right that the subject of this week’s rumble reportage is the third of the trio. Beyond the jump is a world of hard-won hexagons, coveted core units, and tight timetables. Ready a salute, you are about to enter the command tent of Panzer General 2. Read the rest of this entry »
By Tim Stone on May 2nd, 2011.
This week’s battle broadcast comes to you from a picturesque Dutch city on the banks of the Rhine. It’s September 1944, and a beleaguered force of British paratroopers, clinging by their fingernails to positions around Arnhem’s strategically-vital road bridge, are about to participate in what could well turn out to be their final action. All that stands between the Red Berets and total annihilation is a couple of 6-pounder anti-tank guns, a flamethrower, two PIATs, a few dozen Stens and Lee-Enfield rifles, and one mediocre wargamer who has known and loved Close Combat 2: A Bridge Too Far for the best part of 14 years.
By Tim Stone on April 25th, 2011.
Being the oldest RPS contributor has certain advantages. You can attend preview events in un-ironic cardigans, you can admit to finding 90% of manshoots deadly dull, and best of all, you get to sit in the RPS rocking chair and regale the young’uns with tales of wargaming glory. That’s what Heavily Engaged is all about. Over the next month or so, I’ll be giving a selection of the worthiest military strategy games on my shelves, the AAR treatment. Expect lashings of martial drama, tactical blunders aplenty (it’s a while since I last played some of these), and maybe even a little dash of post-result historical analysis. Read the rest of this entry »
