I destroyed 75% of the Soviet forces on the second tutorial, but it then gave my home victory location worth 1500 pts to them so I lost. There are a few bugs that need to be ironed out.
I shouldn’t feel too bad, even the tutorial manual loses the mission!
But yeah, for tutorial these missions really kick your ass!
I like they way they use them to teach lessons more than give you an easy win. But if you are totally new to the system, they might not be as effective until you have gone through the manuals first. I played the old ones a lot, so it wasn’t confusing, but there is still a lot of stuff that’s new.
Yeah, in the first tutorial, it asked me if I wanted to call the mission complete, with like 6.5 stars. I wanted to destroy the rest of the Russian column, which I did with zero additional losses, but then I ended up with 5 stars, not quite sure how that happened…
In case any of you were thinking of getting me a wargame for Christmas, there are lots of superb choices here… :)
How do you guys like the WEGO in the new Flashpoint game?
It’s what makes the game work IMO. The time between orders varies with things like electronic warfare levels, fatigue, etc. so you have to deal with changing levels of control over events. With SOPs implemented now, you are closer to being in the role of a commanding officer; you and your staff make the plans but it’s up to the troops to carry it out. WEGO also really emphasizes the need for recon and intel. It’s one of the few games where taking the time to recon the enemy and find their main points of resistance is not just a good idea, it’s vital.
Sounds good. I’m a fan of WEGO in many contexts, and this seems like one of them.
I do have the previous Flashpoint game, and I did like it, but a lot of the UI stuff is a bit different, or it’s stuff I’d forgotten. Haven’t had time with it since Friday night, but it’s pretty impressive. I played through the first tutorial 4 times, mostly in part, just trying to learn the UI.
Definitely am going to read the manual. So far I was just looking up stuff now and then.
The game definitely has a cool factor to it. Lot of complexity, though.
It’s deceptively deep in some ways. It looks pretty easy to just order stuff around, but actually accomplishing anything is much harder (who would have thought?).
I tried another small scenario, me in charge of a Czech vanguard tasked with seizing three towns. Didn’t even get one of them before being reduced to below 50% effectives. One, though I thought I scouted well I didn’t; and two, doh, night time means bupkis to US Cav troopers with M1s and Bradleys. Lost most of my maneuver force to long range fire in the dark (well, dark to me!).
I installed the original Flashpoint a few weeks ago after not playing it for years. Really enjoy the game. Need to get this new one now.
Original as in the really original mostly text-based game or the later original in the ancestor of the current engine? Both were great.
No…the Matrix game. Never heard of a text based version.
Eh, never mind, I think I must have been thinking about some other game. I dimly recall a game with a similar scope and maybe name that was DOS or early Windows, but it was probably not related. Carry on, nothing to see here.
This was Simulations Canada
Might have been the one I’m thinking of, I played that a lot. Guess it has no relation to the Flashpoint games. There was something else though as well, but it either has slipped my mind in total or never existed :).
I believe the programmer for Flashpoint was originally doing an update to the Simulations Canada game from the 80s, but the project morphed into what it became during development.
I found this on the matrix forums: Is OTS the current incarnation of Simulations Canada? - Matrix Games Forums
Ah, ok, the mystery is solved! Thanks! That’s one of the joys of getting older…you have a lot of memories but not all at the same time!
I never played the original, but I remember reading about it in Fire & Movement magazine and thinking it would be neat to play since they tended to do these games that were a mix of board game and computer game. IIRC there was a map you could mark up with a grease pencil or something like that. They had a game about one of the Arab-Israeli wars as well using the same system I think.
Has anyone here tried Flashpoint: Southern Storm yet multiplayer? I’m not ready for that yet, just curious how well it works.
Yep. I remember that vividly. It worked pretty well too.