1 33"x 22" map; 280 counters; Rules booklet; Scenario booklet. Boxed. The Gamers, 1-888-842-6377. $38 (but $29 pre-pub) In an obvious ploy to capture both ends of the Desert Crowd spectrum, Dean Essig, the happy honcho of The Gamers, has released two Summers in the Sand items. One is the long-awaited - especially for those who still haven't finished playing CNA - DAK, a hyper-intensive, OCS system overload requiring rental of a minor chateau to acquire sufficient play space, as well as an extended sabattical to finish the task. However, realising that the Bigger is Better Boys aren't the only consumers, Dean has reached out and touched the other end of the gaming world with Crusader, a Standard Combat Series game on the Allied offensive around Tobruk in the winter of 1941. SCS, of course, means few rules and Igo-Hugo simplicity with enough bells and whistles to provide sufficient detail so that you don't confuse the Desert War with, say, the Crimea. Crusader is one of those games that prove to be rather tough to "review". It's not bad; far from it. But it doesn't stand out as anything special. It's just, well, there. I suspect that its main appeals will be subject matter and ease of access, two not unformidable assets for any game to have. The game carries the usual highly polished, and quite individual, look that is endemic to all Gamer's products. The map is nice, with good detail, the counters attractive and user friendly, the rules clear (the font seems to be getting a bit bigger, thankfully), even as The Gamers' recent no-retail policy has somewhat cheapened the box. (No back cover info.) I do have one question, though. Why, pray tell, do the Germans have to be the same color (albeit about 2 shades lighter), counterwise, as the Brits? Aside from being confusing to those of us who have trouble seeing anything smaller than a house, it assumes that printers have abjured the use of any shade of gray. And don't give me the Authenticity of Uniform Color routine, either. (Ed. That is exactly what The Gamers' position is on this issue, and rather adamant they are.) Using that fallacious bit of reasoning, the Poles were all dressed like Santa Claus, the South Africans were all part of the Tangerine Corps, and all the Italians resembled nothing less than a 1950's school bathroom. Utilitarianism obviously (and thankfully, for the most part) not the current fad in Homer. Withall, it looks very pleasant laid out on the table. Crusader's big plus is that you can start playing about 10 minutes after you open the box, not including the rather long time it takes to set up the units. (I am not a big fan of The Gamers' sporadic hex-numbering system, but that's no reason not to buy a game.) Less, if you've ever played an SCSer before. Doesn't get much more basic than this: you move, you fight, you exploit (with mech/armor). Every once in a while you drop in an air point, and keep your eye on that Supply Line. Now you know how to play. It's time-honored Igo-Hugo, with nothing to tax even those who haven't advanced past Afrika Korps. The CRT is steploss/retreat oriented and rewards aggressive play … especially for the Allies here, as they have more steps to lose. Dean has redone the Overun concept, and you can now convert retreats into step losses (a major problem in the original Afrika). He's also added a clever rule for bringing back "destroyed" units: Reconstitution. (A rather clumsy word - sounds like orange juice - but a bit more historically accurate than, say, Resurrection, which it resembles more in actual practice.) And the artillery system is a bit more than one usually gets with Basic games. Be warned, though. Dean has applied the official kaybosh to the Reserve rule, a somewhat peculiar design decision for desert warfare games and one which caused a great deal of comment on the Internet (among the 17 people that are there). So, while it's easy and fast, it also has just enough flavor to keep you interested. What will keep you more interested than the game's mechanics is the basic situation. Operation Crusader covers the Allies' well-timed offensive to retake Tobruk, late 1941. The onrushing 13th and 30th Corps catch the Axis troops moving back towards Tobruk in preparation for another Rommel attempt to assault the city, creating, at least initially, a mad whirlwind of driving tanks and frantic defenses. The Allies swoop in from three different areas, with the Axis split into three fairly separated targets. While most of their armor is headed, apparently, directly towards the Ariete, busy whipping up a batch of Penne al Ortolano around Bir el Gubi, it is truly up to the Allied Player to decide what to do with his forces, and where to concentrate his attacks. That part of the game, maybe the first two turns, is a lot of fast, furious, desert-swarming fun, as there is lots of action-reaction, with some neat head-banging. After that, well, all the units more or less have decided where they are going to concentrate, and the game turns from wide-open to a grind-em down special. True, that reflects what happened, more or less, and the Axis player always has the option of pulling troops away from the Tobruk perimeter to hit south, but that has its own, obvious, built-in dangers. It's not that a grind-em down game is bad or boring, it's just that, if you were expecting lots of flanking and sweeping maneuvers, you're not going to get much of it after the first few days. Now, that is certainly not the fault of the game or the system. But what it means is that, if you find that that type of battle is not to your liking, you're not going to find much amusement in exploring the depths of the system. There are none; nor were any intended. What was intended was what you get: a fast, playing, accessible game on a fairly interesting, if not exactly engrossing, subject. That The Gamers, and Crusader, deliver with a fair amount of style and aplomb. Before bowing out, I do make note of one of the more involved e-mail discussions rattling around the BROG topic on AoL: whether or not companies should be producing more simple and accessible games, rather than pumping out those herniatic horror shows some (but not everyone) complain are killing off the hobby. Without getting into details, I do note that, at the time we went to press, the simple, accessible, one map/one evening Crusader is being outsold by its companion, "Looks Great/Never Finish It" special DAK … two-to-one. Something to chew on between turns of Home Before the Leaves Fall. CAPSULE COMMENTS Graphic Presentation: Excellent, altho are those Germans or Brits? Playability: Biggest selling point. Good solitaire, too. Replayability: Depends on how many different plans the Allies can come up with. Wristage: OK, nothing taxing. Creativity: Nothing new here, except for the nice Reconstitution rule. Historicity: Evocative if not incisive. Sufficient for the system. Comparison: Lot easier to play than the old GDW banger, and has a better "feel" than some recent Command deserters. MiH's Triumphant Fox (Gazala) is more interesting, but more involved. And if you (admit to having) bought FGA's Crusader game, maybe you can now use the set-up here to play that. Overall: Nice job. Looking for an accessible game, playable in an evening, on a fairly interesting subject? Try Crusader. Back to Berg's Review of Games Vol. 2 #26 Table of Contents Back to Berg's Review of Games List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1998 by Richard Berg This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com