Been waiting on this for a few years. Matrix Games will be releasing Campaign Series Vietnam on January 20:
https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=5127226
https://www.matrixgames.com/game/campaign-series-vietnam
The game will cover from 1948 - 1967 with a future release covering the rest of the war. Over a hundred scenarios covering the French war, the South Vietnamese guerilla war and the early years of American involvement.
An example of gameplay:
Yeah, this one looks pretty wild. I have the Middle East one, though I haven’t played it much. It is really good though, despite having some rather ancient roots. Supposedly the ME one will get upgraded to Vietnam quality in the future.
Some of the things that I like about this one are the “A Week in…” linked battles system and the attention to the French era as well as the more familiar American period of the war. And it looks like the scale and system are well suited for the type of warfare being simulated.
They are also working on an automatic battle generator although that will be coming after the 1.0 release. Can’t be sure until I play it, but this has the feel of a labor of love product with huge period feel.
I love that his desktop has work stuff, Campaign Series games and Darthmod.
Yeah, this is definitely a labor of love. The AARs and other stuff in the forums are useful if you are curious as to whether this might be for you. The Matrix forums in general are often a challenge because meaningful info is buried amongst all the non sequiturs and general noodling common to wargame boards. Occasionally, in between the posts bitching about not supporting Windows 7 and 1024x768 CRTs you can find good info.
Campaign Series Legion site has a huge amount of info about the upcoming games, including about the American scenarios included in the game:
The 323 page manual has been released:
This looks really interesting. I am not a Vietnam War scholar, and I haven’t read extensively about the war in ages, but I do have some interest in it. Largely because as a youngster I watched the news about it on TV while my father was over there fighting. Growing up in an Army family in the 1960s, Vietnam was a permanent presence pretty much, into the early seventies. And after that, for the remainder of the decade at least, Vietnam cast a long shadow over many aspects of American life. The war still has powerful meanings for those who lived through that era, veterans or otherwise, but for thee nation as a whole it has been largely forgotten I think. In many ways, the G.H.W. Bush administration framed the first Gulf War as a formal exorcism off the ghosts of Southeast Asia. By that time though most folks’ understanding of the conflict was shaped by Hollywood and partisan rhetoric; the reality of what was going on and why it happened had been to a great extent lost, or at least repressed.
So, good to see a fairly high-profile game on the conflict, even if this one of course is a very tightly focused look at battlefield dynamics.
I wonder what @Navaronegun thinks about it?
I won’t buy/play it because it’s from matrix and it won’t scale properly on 1080p.
Simple answer.
Did you try thee Middle East version? It seemed to work perfectly fine on my 1080p monitors.
I always wait for a steam release so I have the option to refund.
Matrix has earned zero trust from me.
Fair enough for sure. What makes it doubly difficult is that “Matrix” games are really games from a multitude of developers, all of whom have different levels of skill and offer different degrees of reliability. There is little consistency.
Campaign Series ME isn’t on Steam is it? So I doubt Vietnam will be either.
I will purchase the game but I largely share your sentiments. Still waiting after all these years for AI in World in Flames has left a very bad taste in my mouth.
Yeah, again, inconsistency. Some stuff is on Steam, some isn’t. Some stuff gets put on Steam later, and you get keys, other times you don’t. Some stuff is really modern, and runs smoothly on modern rigs, other games are nightmares of decades-old tech cobbled together by self-taught programmers.
Slitherine doing a big showcase on new games this week, but no mention of the new game actually coming out this week.
Not so much inconsistent as they don’t really put much effort into supporting and marketing the niche games with low sales.
I have never understood the Slitherine/Matrix approach to marketing, or their business model in general. I guess it works, as they are still here. But it always leaves me scratching my head.
Or maybe that’s just lice.
A good play through by Agrippa Maxentius of one of the scenarios:
Good initial look by Strategy Gaming Dojo:
Played the battle of Long Tan since my old man was stationed at Nui Dat for a while (not during that battle though).
Oof, not a good one to start on being outnumbered so much! But the system works well - you really get a sense of how valuable the choppers are being able to cover a dozen hexes every turn while your grunts struggle to make it through 2.