Heh, thought I was the only one! I love wargames, military history and grew up around firearms but I lean fairly liberal…thought people like myself shouldn’t exist! ;)
I’m a socialist who likes wargames, I never found it ironic, ever…'n’stuff
Growing up in Georgia (the USA, not Tbilisi!), I’d often spend weekends playing wargames, sometimes with friends, sometimes with actual clubs that met regularly. Invariably, the latter were populated by what we called “steelheads,” guys who would never play the Soviets in any game, always played the Germans if they could, and talked incessantly about the Wehrmacht as if it was their own private Boy Scout troop.
That’s disappointing that the message boards have devolved – I suspect that’s likely due to 2 factors:
- the recent games haven’t been as broadly successful as the early ones, so there’s fewer people and more clique-type behavior on those forums;
- Shock Force being a contemporary wargame, in a setting similar to where western countries have been fighting, spawning misdirected aggression in the guise of jingoism.
And Janster, it’s completely appropriate for socialists to like war!
Thank you Desslock, being a pacifist is an entirely different thing.
I used to post on those forums back in the early 2000s. Mainly on the General Forum which was very vibrant. Now the GF is a total wasteland where no one posts. I can’t believe a forum can go from one end of the spectrum to the other so quickly. What a shame.
Oh and I’m also a liberal war gamer. I don’t think we are as rare as you guys think.
Liberal wargamers aren’t that rare, I agree, they’re just often a lot less visible. For a lot of reasons, one being the need/desire to sort of not make waves when surrounded by a lot of very non-liberal people. I played wargames to have some historical simulation-style fun, not to debate politics, so I just sort of shut up and pushed counters. To be fair, most of the clubs I was in later on were a lot better at least.
Funny how we’re all leftists here. I would call myself a socialist most definately, and a pacifist as well. Fuck war. Does make for awesome games and interesting stories tho.
So combat mission is but a hollowed out husk of its former glory eh? how are those russian games 1C made that had pretty much the CM design documents for a blueprint? Theatre of War series. any good? im not a proper grognard, tho i do know how to make grunting noises.
Why make war when you can play war?
Wow, I didn’t realize the similarities/origins of the Theatre of War Games. Maybe that’s why the 2nd Gen Combat Mission games thought adding real-time gameplay was a good idea. Does anyone actually play these games that way? WEGO is actually a great feature, and makes playing by email a lot of fun.
Well, I’m going to jump in again. I never played the original Combat Mission (a lot of CMBB and CMAK though) so I’m going to play a few email sessions after nabbing it at GOG.com. And I’m going to order Fortress Italy - there are so many reviews online that I’ll probably write a formal review for it, so stay tuned.
There are socialist pacifist liberal wargamers?
Uh-oh.
Technically speaking, this seems at least factually accurate.
I’ll really look forward to seeing that review. It would be nice to see a review from someone who can appreciate wargames for what they are but at the same time isn’t completely invested in the game or drunk the Battlefront kool-aid.
Oh man, does this thread bring back memories. I played the bejabbers out of CM1/CMBB/CMAK. Met one of the Battlefront staff right before Shock Force was released. Nice enough guy, but I came away with the impression that they were convinced the old fan base would follow them in the new direction of the franchise. I remember thinking, “You’re going from WEGO set in WWII to real time asymmetric modern warfare. Even if you pull this off flawlessly, your gonna lose a lot of support.”
Of course it was far from flawless.
As noted above, they’ve got a different fan base now. I liked the old one better.
What’s wrong with CM Touch?
Desslock - if you’re up to playing 2nd gen Combat Mission I’d be happy you play you. I’m not quick on turns so might just do 1 turn per day - but it’d be fun.
It’s a shit game made to exploit the tablet market. No doubt they saw the success on the platform of games like Battlefield by Slitherine and wanted their own piece of the pie.
I see that battlefront is charging for patches again. If you pay $55 for the first CM2 bundle then you’ve got to pay $10 more in order to being it up to 2.0. I can almost understand this for people who have already bought the game (although being extremely dickish), not including it with the game for future buyers is just insane.
One thing BF knows is how much they can exploit their customer base, and how much that customer base will defend being exploited. Which is why I have not bought a BF product after a boxed copy of CM1 Afrika Korps many years ago, and I do not see that changing any time soon.
New expansion announced for Italy – it’s mainland Italy, involving the battles at Monte Cassino and around the Gustov Line – that makes this an auto-purchase for me, since there’s actually a campaign for the Polish elements of the British 8th Army, which would allow me to retrace through the battles my father fought in. For a mere additional $35, on top of the $55 main game. $90 - that really is appealing to a niche market.