Prins van Oranje wrote:Frankly, it looks like this suffers from the same problem every other Napoleonic wargame made on computer suffers from. For example, why do I - as Commander-in-chief - need to get down to ground level and observe individuals fighting? It is totally pointless and gobbles up unnecessary RAM. Secondly, they still cannot give the formations the correct number of men: so instead of 800 men versus 1000, we get 80 versus 100. When I played tabletop napoleonic miniatures, every figure represented about 3 or 4 'real' men and I thought when computers came along that we could finally have a game that showed the true scale of these massive battles. Sadly, this has not proven to be the case. A proper Napoleonic battle would be concerned with formations, not individuals. That is why NCP is so good, because combat is primarily determined by organisation and formation - individuals count for nothing, unless they are commanders.
You may prefer Histwar's games, but to me they make the same mistake that all other games of this era make - they concentrate too much on how it looks and not enough on how it feels.
Sorry, Prinz, but are we talking about the same game ?
First of all, there are no Histwar "games", just Les Grognards (the author, JMM, did indeed made another game, more than 10 years ago, called "La Grande Armee at Austerlitz", but is pre-history).
And I assure you, HWLG goes fully to the feel rather than for the "looks":
- 3D view is pretty good iIMHO, but it is not comparable to NCP, the graphical quality is much lower, in fact that's one of the criticisms of the game. But the details are all correct, meaning uniforms, flags, etc.
- 3D view is not really "needed". If you want, you
can play exclusively in 2D, but you would miss the "action", that represents very much accurately a Napoleonic battle - formations, marches, defensive lines, arty batteries, etc: they are all faithfully represented.
- Although the INF scale is 10:1, deployed arty is 1:1. And I am pretty sure no high-end PC could handle a 1:1 scale. Remember, while NTW limts the field of battle to 20 units, in HWLG ALL units in each historic battle are represented. Waterloo is awesome !
- The game is all about you as Commander in chief, in degrees almost unimaginable. You are supposed to give detailed orders to your Corps Commanders (that will follow them - or not - according to their capabilities, terrain, etc), not to your units (although you can). And with full, "grognard level" FOW, you will give orders in the map, but in 3D you will only see what your Commander in chief would: You have to listen (yes, listen), to the sound of the guns, see the smoke, etc, to know if a battle has started, you will have to choose a strategically situated, high point to see the most of the field, and wait (yes, wait) for the dispatches to arrive from your troops. You hardly can get more "feel" than this.
- You will not see unhistoric behavior: no hand grenades, no "Alexander the great" charges, no pikes on the field.
- You will get lots of richly detailed historic battles, that come in the game and in lots of MODs that are continually being released.
- For those interested, multiplayer works great, according to the forums.
Bottom line is, although not perfect (some bugs exist, some features are yet to be implemented), HWLG is by far the best napoleonic tactical wargame ever, period. His author is comparable to our Pocus and PhilThib in his undying devotion and support.
IMHO, again, no serious wargamer should pass the oportunity to try this gem.
Regards