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Les_the_Sarge_9_1 -> (12/6/2002 7:27:50 PM)
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I'm not sooooo sure all wargame designers understand the one most important aspect of wargame design, WAR.
My main beef with HoI, judging my opinion entirely on the comments of gamers you realise, because I generally prefer gamers comments over gaming companies opinions, is the game ends up a parody of WW2 regardless of how "fun" it might be to some of it's supporters.
One commenter describing Brazil conquering the US, sorry, that killed the game right there.
Germany landing in the US is plenty insane, but Germany had a war machine at least.
Strategic Command's inability to allow muliple types of units in a hex, or multiple counters, sorry, but while the game does play, and does play well, that design feature speaks to me of inexperience of how to make wargames right from the get go.
Claims of unit composition won't cover it. A single ground unit prohibiting placement of a naval unit in a major port simulataneously is just plain clumsy designing. If an air unit can't occupy the same hex, then you have definitely no understanding of game design sufficient for grand strategy.
Those comments might seem harsh, but if I can't see any reasons, for those gotesque errors in game design.
I don't doubt there are some very talented programmers out there, but they appear in some cases to only have mastered the ability to code, not actually develope credible simulations.
There is a term common to roleplaying games "suspension of disbelief".
If a rolegamer is playing in a game, where the GM DM (or whatever terms hits your fancy) inserts all manner of incredulous and unlikely information without any justification, the game loses credibility and becomes a farce.
Grass is green, water feels wet, gravity, etc etc all are assumed details. Remove enough assumed details, and you better be prepared with a reason (and a good one).
The Steel Panthers crowd would not let the game go until all the values were hammered out. Today Steel Panthers World at War 7.1 is one of the most credible games I have ever played.
It might not be everyone's cup of tea, but don't waste your time trying to pick apart how accurate it is (including the moronic assertion it doesn't depict time correctly).
I might have even broke down and bought SC if the stacking issue wasn't there. Lame AI would not have mattered much (I would have either played both sides or played it against a person). The problem would not have mattered much about idiotic production potentialities, I have played games before with "understandings" of what is considered game ruining advantage exploitation.
There is more to making a good wargame than being able to code awesome visuals. It's not being able to understand "logic" all the time. I am sure there are a few board game wargames out there, that could make the shift to RTS mode. But I don't think many computer game designers fully understand how to make them wargames initially.
You have to have a genuine wargame first, then add the AI. The AI will make insane choices and have idiotic parameters, if it isn't playing a wargame in the first place.
When I play Advanced Third Reich, sure there are a lot of choices to make. But some choices are stupid and stand out as stupid in such an obvious fashion. And yet the AI does them. And it's because the AI isn't playing a wargame, its just going through a list of random choices.
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