Spooky
Posts: 816
Joined: 4/1/2002
From: Froggy Land
Status: offline
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Here is a short description of the "old" Bomb Alley computer Game (http://www.atarimagazines.com/creative/v9n9/179_Strategy_games_and_simula.php) :
Bomb Alley
The year is 1942, and even with Russia and the United States in the war, Adolf Hitler's dream of world conquest could still come true. His hopes are pinned on the Afrika Corps commanded by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, the master tank commander known as The Desert Fox. Standing in his way to the Suez Canal and an eventual linkup with the Japanese is the British Eighth Army and an island sitting astride Rommel's air and sea supply lanes--Malta.
In Gary Grigsby's Bomb Alley, the Axis player has one important job: to keep British convoys from resupplying their "unsinkable aircraft carrier,' Malta. In this monster-sized naval/air strategic-level simulation the players have at their disposal virtually all of the ships and planes which took part in the actual campaign between June and late August, 1942. The Axis player commands over 150 ships, from cruisers to motor torpedo boats. The British player has a similarly diverse collection, numbering over 160 vessels.
The game control system is essentially the same as used in Grigsby's other "monster' game, Guadalcanal Campaign. Each player may have as many as eight task forces on the map at any time on a variety of missions including bombardment (to support--or attack-- invading Nazi ground troops on Malta), transport, combat, submarine, emergency resupply and evacuation.
Waves of bombers pound ships and shore installations. Other planes are used to search for enemy convoys. Submarines lurk in the waters through which the enemy must pass. British convoys of transport ships are heavily escorted by cruisers and destroyers, intended to draw the bombers and subs away from the transports.
The key to the game is the proper use and convervation of air power. The planes simulated in Bomb Alley represent a wide range of the many types flown during the war. The Axis player intercepts British bombing missions with high performance Messerschmidt Me 109 fighters. The British player counters with nimble Spitfires. Alongside other classic planes like the deadly Ju87 Stuka divebomber, the Do17 bomber and the Ju52 trimotor transport are such lesser known planes as the Fairey Fulmar, the biplane Swordfish torpedo plane, and the deadly Italian bomber, the SIAI Marchetti SM 79.
The action in Bomb Alley is fast and complex. Unlike Guadalcanal, in which combat is infrequent (carrier task forces spend many game turns in harbor refitting and reforming, reflecting the way the real campaign was fought), Bomb Alley offers combat almost every turn.
The main campaign scenario is 164 turns long, covering the period from June 11 to August 31, 1942. That is a formidable gaming challenge in itself. For those with less time and patience, there are two shorter scenarios. One is a re-creation of the last-ditch attempt to resupply the island, "Operation Pedestal,' the other is a re-creation of the German invasion of Crete.
The strong point the three scenarios share is realism. They faithfully recreate the strategic choices the commanders faced and the dilemmas they had to resolve. The ships and the planes all perform according to historical fact. Add to this the non-stop action and you have a formula for great strategic wargaming.
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Bomb Alley?? - 
And not wanting a battle is not in ones power if the enemy has the speed to close the range.
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