World At War – Stalingrad
As you can imagine, I expected a lot from a game with that title. Especially since the battle at Stalingrad is one of the most intense battles in the whole of World War II. I have to say that I didn’t get quite what I expected. Let me explain.
Setting
The setting of the game fails to capture the athmosphere of Stalingrad. Actually, I shouldn’t be the one to judge since I’ve never been there, but at least in my opinion, a game with that title should have a more sinister feeling. Or at least a colder athmosphere.
Gameplay
All of you who played the Battle Isle series will feel at home. The screen is partitioned in a myriad of hectagons, on which you can place your units. The game itself is structured in three different phases: The planning phase, the execution phase, and the after-action phase. In the first phase, as you might have guessed, you plan the moves of your units, the supplies, the attacks, the arrangement, and so on. By pressing Alt + E, you move on to the execution phase. In this phase, you sit back and relax as your units move around and battle the enemy. After everything is calm again, the game automatically goes to phase 3, in which you can read the after-action reports and see how well your men are doing. Morale is also an important factor in this phase.
Furthermore, the game has daytime and nighttime, which is very important in terms of cover, rest (dig in your units at night, then let them sleep), and concealed movement. Artillery is poorly to not at all usable.
Sound
There is sound in the game, although only when certain actions are taken. For example, you can hear the gunshots and explosions in the execution phase, you hear a „no go!“ sound when you have scrolled to the bottom of the map, and you get error sounds when trying to do something impossible, like moving a static unit
Graphics
The game uses 256 colors, but not very well. The main screen consists of a map where you move the units, so there’s not much to animate. The explosions you see on the screen are limited to a little red flash and the „bang!“ sound.
Conclusion
Over all, I give this game a 3. Why? Because those of you who loved Battle Isle may actually like it. Those of you who don’t have just wasted their time reading this. Stalingrad is not a bad game, but it’s disappointing. You could have made much more out of a game like this. They did okay, though. 3 points for that.
Stalingrad World at war Posted on: 2013-10-28 by slinse One of the finest games I first played on the computer! |