I reckon there are few more evocative sound effects in computer wargaming than the wave files in CMBO’s audio folder numbered 900 to 904. Used to communicate close quarters violence largely ignored by Big Time Software’s no-frills graphics engine, these…
When you’re a member of the snobbish Wargame Reviewer’s Guild, heaping praise on a title that doesn’t model line-of-sight and battlefield fog of war, and treats beverages such as tea and coffee as potential battle winners, isn’t without risk. It…
One of the reasons I prefer first-generation Combat Mission to second-generation Combat Mission is the AI. Although the German troops in Bounce the Bogen don’t have a carefully prepared battle plan to guide them, at present they’re doing a fine…
Congratulations Master of Command, as you’ve passed your three-hour audition with flying customisable colours, Tally-Ho Corner’s next available feature slot (07/11/25) is all yours. Your next challenge is keeping me entertained for a full week.
How about I relay this turn’s developments in reverse benefilogical order rather than chronological order? ‘Benefilogical’ is a word not found in many dictionaries. It means “arranged in order of welcomeness”.
A is for Alphabetised wargame, sim, and site news. Now and again, assuming I can persuade Austerity’s Blackburn Cirrus Bombardier engine to perform the miracle of internal combustion, I spend a few days scouring Simulatia and Grognardia for stories with…
This sixty-second burst of WW2 WeGo action leaves map square 29, 4, 5 and its environs reeking of cordite, limonene, and pinene. The citrusy terpenes waft from conifers violently pollarded and pruned by 25-pounder rounds.
Very few people in the world of computer wargame design have been concocting conflicts sims commercially for as long as Robert Crandall of On Target Simulations. Although the father of the chaos-embracing Flashpoint Campaigns series is busy putting the finishing…
Before the war the village of Nottingheim was something of a tourist magnet. The big draw wasn’t the castle, it was the famous Eichhörnchenhaus and its unusually tame residents. As CMBO doesn’t include an ornate squirrel tenement among its building…
Computer wargames and combat sims are dab hands at history dissemination and tactical instruction, but how well do they teach the rules of war? Let’s find out. Beyond the break are twenty questions designed to test your knowledge of International…
Three HE rounds traverse the River Bogen during this sixty-second slice of Combat Mission: Beyond Overlord. The first across is 76mm in diameter and, apart from upping the pace of a gaggle of retreating German OAPs, achieves little. The second…
From their resolve and fighting prowess, you wouldn’t guess the four-man German team next to the railway bridge has a combined age of 263. The plucky band of Deutsch pensioners is led by a hard-of-hearing forester called Franz, a veteran…