Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Apparently taking some cues from Silent Storm (a good thing), Zeal Game Studio’s Team Assault: Baptism of Fire is a turn-based, skirmish level WWII tactical wargame. With an emphasis on realism, including morale management, and bullets that penetrate cover and have a tendency to kill rather than chip away at health bars, it sounds like exactly the sort of thing I often rudely expect other games to be. Put a point and click adventure in front of me and even if I’m enjoying the plot and humour, I’ll be making mental notes about the lacklustre attention to damage modelling and the over-simplified chain of command. Trailer and more details cowering in the foxhole below.

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You lot got very excited last time I talked about upcoming turn-based World War 2 tactics game Team Assault: Baptism of Fire. And why wouldn’t you? I can’t imagine a better way to spend a Sunday than customising a force, taking it online, fighting other customised forces in the style of a tabletop miniatures game, drinking some tea, getting spanked by some French guy from Calais, pouring the rest of your tea down the sink in a seething rage and tweaking your force again.

On the subject, I have a couple of nice pieces of news to report. One, the devs have just started accepting beta signups. Two, they’ve announced that the game will ship with not only a map editor, but mod tools. That’s what we like to hear. Register away, lads!

Swedish indie studio Zeal has announced Team Assault: Baptism of Fire, a project we’ll be paying attention to in future for three reasons. First of all, the developers have cited the turn-based tactics of Jagged Alliance and X-Com as influences. Second, it looks like a turn-based Men of War. Third, the way it’s structured, with players building custom armies using a set number of points, is designed to scratch the exact same itch as tabletop miniatures games. More details and a trailer after the jump.
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