AirLand Battle, as you might know right now, was the name of a legitimate US Army doctrine for Europe during the cold war, which basically dictated tactics on how to use close-air support for frontline troops. In a similar fashion then, one of ALB’s main improvements is to include jet-aircraft to the unit roster – some 150 of them. To compensate for this, they’ve ramped up the game engine itself to include bigger maps, but more importantly maps that have some verticality (apologies for that) to them. Now you can have large snow-topped mountain ranges and valleys, which even land units can traverse to some extent and air support can be called in from off map to keep the skies clear and to provide ground support for your troops. It’s now a whole new level of tactics that you have to watch out for (you thought helicopters were a pain?).
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| Planes can't refuel or re-arm 'on-map'; they have to leave the combat space completely |
Another thing Eugen were very eager to address was the single-player portion of the game. Even they realised that the single-player element of European Escalation wasn’t up to scratch, with odd difficulty spikes, a fairly bland narrative, and an odd attrition system that could really screw you over late in a campaign – but that’s all about to change. The vision for AirLand Battle is to have an experience that’s just as good as playing a multiplayer game – with a large dynamic and persistent campaign – a ‘simulator’ of a large scale conflict, complete with events, politics, weather effects different divisions, armies and fronts… sounds impressive, but it also sounds like a bit of a mission to design. The team wants it to come in at around 30 hours (and you can choose a difficulty!), and you have a lot of flexibility.
Multiplayer is also getting some love to – they’re experimenting with 10 vs 10 battles, and whilst the technology is there and the game can handle it (your internet, on the other hand, is a different story), Eugen want to make sure big brawls like this don’t ruin the ‘essence’ which was communicated to me in a bizarre Mario analogy. You can also observe any game that’s being ‘broadcasted’ as a spectator, which the team hope will raise the social aspect of the game as people can share and observe their tactics. Building your decks as well is also going to be improved – a new armoury interface to accommodate the 300 odd new land units and the four new factions (Sweden, Norway, Denmark & Canada), and you can also build truly national decks, with bonuses and incentives included if you go all with one nation (like extra deployment points, for example).
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| "Err... Jeff" "Yes Bob?" "We're almost flying upside down again..." |
Even the AI behaviour scripting has been improved – especially with regards to Urban Warfare. Instead of clumping around awkwardly inside or around a house, infantry will smartly occupy a couple of houses, as well as having scouts at houses down the end of a row or district, providing realistic tactical cover of an area. Also, towns have been designed better to look less regimented and blocky, and there’s going to be more urbanised maps as well. Interface wise, there’s also a lot more feedback and a lot more options as well – for example for logistical units you can choose whether they just refuel, rearm, fix up, or have a mixture of them.
If you were undecided about Wargame before, then we hope this new game will help persuade you to jump on board. Existing users… well, we hope Focus are kind to people who bought the first game in terms of pricing and incentives, but even Eugen themselves aren’t really thinking much about how they can make the transition easier – they’re focused solely on making a good game better, and from their point of view if you like it, then money isn’t really an issue. Tough love perhaps, but we’ll have to wait and get some hands-on time before we see whether it’s worth it. We like what we’ve been hearing though. Wargame: AirLand Battle is due out sometime around March 2013 for PC.
Most Anticipated feature: Well, the dynamic and persistent campaign brings back fond memories of our Close Combat days,
