![]() Counter-attacks arrive from unexpected directions villages change hands multiple times during the course of an op the urge to push forward is constantly checked by the impulse to rest, protect flanks, and prevent pocketing. Manoeuvres on the strat map generate complex tactical battles of delicious unpredictability and variety. Where other wargame studios rely on the skill of their scenario smiths to generate excitement and challenge, Graviteam rely wholly on an AI intent on seizing/holding strat-map Victory Locations and maintaining a viable front line. Dwarfing its friendly custom battle builder and random scrap generator (both of which utilize portions of the same seamless 140 square kilometre tract of Donets Basin terrain) the way a King Tiger dwarfs a Kettenrad, Mius Front's campaign mode offers two sizeable summer 1943 operations each completely dynamic and playable as either the Germans or Soviets. Ah, so it was an unspotted 45mm AT gun that eventually slew my last halftrack and it was my immobilised StuG not my Tiger that finally nailed that troublesome KV-1.Ħ. Very, very, few wargames offer a superior campaign experience. After a battle the multicoloured impact labels that fur the hulks of vehicles and guns like extraterrestrial hyphae, tell dramatic stories of survival, luck and loss. It's impossible to hurry on to the next engagement in a campaign without first taking advantage of the 'tour battlefield' option. On other occasions, no amount of industry and ingenuity will rectify the situation.ĥ. GT's ballistics still impress too. Sometimes a reverse order, direction change, or deft nudge from another vehicle will save the day. Retracing the route you eventually locate the absentee writhing in a steep-sided gully or nose down in a trench. After a lazily plotted advance over difficult terrain, it's not uncommon to find that you've got a missing AFV. A few even fake their own deaths, sitting quiet as tombs until the crews that abandoned them in panic summon up the courage to return.ĭirect a heavyweight up a steep slope, or across a frail bridge or yawning anti-tank ditch, and the wonderful physics can change the whole course of a scrap. Some burn merrily after coming to rest, shaking their surroundings with secondary explosions long after the battle has moved on. Some haemorrhage blazing fuel during these terminal rambles. For every two or three landships that perish demurely, there's usually one that hams it up outrageously, trundling on out of control after its crew have baled or died at their posts. ![]() Tank deaths in Mius Front frequently warrant a few turns of the mousewheel. Graviteam started out making AFV sims, and that respect for mass and momentum has seeped into their wargames with mesmerising results. Roll on the launch and the inevitable flurry of 'How do I.' forum threads.Ĥ. GT's physics remain amazing. After around sixteen hours of campaigning I'm still a bit baffled by the artillery plotting system, the mechanics of reinforcing depleted platoons between battles, and the best way of using my little teams of battlefield telephone engineers. While newcomers should, with the help of a malnourished manual and a handful of tutorials, be able to grasp the basics of moving and fighting within an hour or two, elements of the campaign system and new tactical complexities like comms and command points could confound for days if not weeks. Tuition and documentation really aren't Graviteam's forte, and the reworked GUI is arguably just as elaborate/idiosyncratic as the old one. The strat layer is turnbasedĪnd looking on as waves of Soviet infantry surge towards my trenchlines, I can't help picturing Graviteam Tactics: Gaza-Beersheba.ģ. Anticipate a little confusion in your first week. Watching Lend Lease tanks like the Stuart, Valentine and Matilda doing their thing I can't help wishing the third/fourth instalment in this realism-heavy real-time* wargame series was subtitled Gazala or Kasserine Pass. Graviteam's Eastern Front obsession is completely natural, and guarantees realistic maps, authentic soldier expletives, and authoritative orders of battle but does risk alienating wargamers a little weary of rolling hills, thatched dachas, and endless T-34s. ![]() Poor show.Ģ. The choice of setting may leave you slightly disappointed. ![]() Route a Tiger tank through a field of sunflowers and the Panzerkampfwagen VI will be squeaking just as loudly when it exits the field as when it enters it. Having spent a couple of days with the latest build of this painfully overdue Operation Star sequel, I'm now in a position to say with certainty that the Ukrainian devs have made no effort whatsoever to model incidental lubrication. ![]()
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