I was digging through my boxes of old games looking for Grand Prix Legends when I found Panzer Elite. I remember enjoying this a lot about forever years ago, and remember that there was some further development of the game and then some modding and whatnot. I did some searching and apparently there was something called Panzer Elite Three with a bunch of “Ostpak” mods and the whole thing just sounds great, from a Google search standpoint. Has anyone here played this recently (or even not so recently) who could recommend this?
I found a bunch of links, although many of the are about the Panzer Elite faction in Company of Heroes. But these seemed promising:
It looks like the game is even available on Gamersgate. Any hope of making this run under Windows 7? And will it be worth it? The original Panzer Elite was very good, although I remember the release being fairly buggy.
GoG’s one-click install is certainly the most painless way to get started. You might have to be the one to tell us about the mod scene. Let us know, because it’s in my backlog. I’ll bump it up if people start playing this again.
By the way, I’m hearing the Three Moves Ahead crew in my head: “that’s Bruce’s kind of game: it has panzers, and they’re elite.”
P.S. Go make insightful and witty comments on my Unity of Command diary this week!
Man, that takes me back. I went back and read the review I wrote for either CGM or CGW, can’t remember which (just looking in my freelance archive of old reviews) and it makes me want to go back and play it again. FWIW the review is dated December of 1999 and I mentioned some issues with some sound cards - remember those days? ;)
Man, that takes me back. I went back and read the review I wrote for either CGM or CGW, can’t remember which (just looking in my freelance archive of old reviews) and it makes me want to go back and play it again. FWIW the review is dated December of 1999 and I mentioned some issues with some sound cards - remember those days? ;)
I would love if someone would do a tutorial or a walkthrough for my poor pathetic brain to comprehend. The one time I tried firing it up (the GoG version, picked up after a bout in World of Tanks turned frustrating) … well, I mean, I thought I did ok just getting through the waypoints but that’s about as far as I got before getting my squad killed.
One of those days when the backlog is … yeah, I can’t even finish that sentence.
Hmm, looking at the GoG main download - which is 450MB - there’s a separate download there for “mods” which is 255 megs. So that might be worth investigating.
I’m running through a few older games in my backlog to see if they’re worth leaving in there. I tried a scenario in this one. It’s okay except the camera is really rough. The vertical sensitivity is too high and the horizontal sensitivity is too low. And the camera kinda tracks the tank as it’s moving over terrain. It doesn’t bounce around with it, but it moves enough that it’s impossible to see what’s going on.
There’s a tutorial document in the GoG release. They say to play the St. Lo scenario. I ran through that pretty well until I went to complete the primary goal, which requires 50% of your force to reach the final town. I kept ordering my wingmen into town, but only one of them showed up. I clicked the triangle to check the view of my other wingman, and the dumbass was turning in circles back at the first town. I had to babysit him all the way to the end.
I’ve been playing a few 10-15 year old games lately. It really makes me appreciate how far the industry has come in terms of usability. There are some things mods can’t fix.
Not sure what I’m going to do with Panzer Elite. When I get some more time, I plan to rent a copy of Steel Beasts Pro PE. That might be a better option at this point.
Don’t worry, if there’s anything interesting to post, I will find the relevant thread!
It’s mostly stuff that hasn’t worked out. I’m rapidly running out of free time with twins on the way, so I’m making some tough decisions. Pathologic and Klingon Academy didn’t make it. I’ll probably play a few scenarios in Panzer Elite and call it done. I think I might sneak in SWAT 4, Jedi Academy, and Independence War to see if I like them. I’m pretty confident about JA and IWar.
I also went on a retro kick recently, and had pretty low success rates due to my demands for high gaming value. Ultima 7, Darklands, Pool of Radiance, Ultima Underworld, Sid Meier’s Antietam, and Crusader were all cool to see but just rough enough that I decided to retire them gracefully. I can accept that I don’t have time to play these classics anymore. Maybe one day I’ll look them up again.
Just looked in my freelance files, I reviewed Panzer Elite for either CGW or CGS+; it was 1999. One caveat from the review: make sure you have the latest drivers if you have a non-Sounblaster soundcard. ;) But from the review, other than having to micromanage some of your wingmen who like to charge into an open field under fire, it was a very good tank platoon commander sim for its time. Also, you are in the platoon commander’s role, so you can’t jump into the other tanks, only give them orders.
I don’t know how it will hold up today, but from my notes that I used for the review, it was a good sim for 1999.
It’s still one of the top 2 tank sims. With the ultra-grognardy Steel Beasts as No. 1. That kind of says a lot. Actually, it screams “WE REALLY NEED A MODERN M1TP SIM”.
I mean, there’s WoT and War Thunder’s copycat, and whatever DCS is doing, but those really aren’t tank sims.
Steel Fury, although tricky to get hold since the publisher went bust[1], when fully modded up with the Steel Panzer mods and bug fixes, is worth tracking down for all your T-34 vs. Mk IV needs.
Damn I loved Panzer Elite. Steel Fury scratched that itch a bit, but it was no where near as compelling as Panzer Elite IMO.
It was one of the first games to model fully destructible buildings, and even did line of sight and collision checks on alpha textures, which let you shoot through partially destroyed walls.
Do you guys remember how you approached the game in terms of managing wingmen or getting into the gunner seat to fire manually every now and then? Any favorite scenarios? Someone mentioned Operation Torch. It isn’t clear whether my mod compilation picked that up or not.
