First I would like to thank the guys who emailed me with info on the T43 (Take a bow Len Brewer, Greg Seefeldt and Randy (RDFRAF) who highly recommends Shogun Total War which I saw today at Media Play but succumbed to temptation and bought Starship Troopers, one of my all time favorite books by Robert Heinlein and a good movie if you like scif). I could not resist the chance to shoot bugs! You guys were right on the money. I recently purchased THE T34 RUSSIAN BATTLE TANK by Dr. Matthew Hughes and Dr. Chris Mann published in 1999. It's an excellent work and verifies what you guys told me. If you are interested you can find this book plus lots of other good stuff at www.motorbooks.com! Once you make a purchase, they will send you catalogs that have some discounted books from time to time that can save some $. Give it a try. When you are out shopping if you stumble across Sid Meier's Civil War Collection BUY IT! I am just getting into it and it appears to be a great value. This collection contains Gettysburg, South Mountain (prelude to Antietam) and Antietam. The documentation and history especially for South Mountain and Antietam is almost worth the price even if you don't play the game, it's that good! Be warned, the history is so extensive it will read like a textbook and take quite a few hours to digest but anyone who is as obsessed as I am will love it. I also recently found Sid Meier's Waterloo supposedly with a similar game system to the Civil War package but it is still virgin with the cellophane not yet penetrated. I just picked up Age of Sail II today. As you can surmise, we will be shifting away from WWII next issue for reviews of the games just mentioned above. On to Close Combat Invasion Normandy. This is a pretty good game if you like this style. The things I disliked in Close Combat Battle of the Bulge have been improved. I found myself having fun with this game even though it is almost all infantry small unit action and you probably know by now that I'm an armor buff. The game starts with the landings at Utah Beach, not the walkover people think it was! I have been there and walked the ground. It is definitely worth at least a half day. A full day or more is recommended for Omaha and Pointe du Hoc, You'll never forget a few days in Normandy! Great food and wine are extra bonuses. There are two beach scenarios and two scenarios depicting the airborne landings of the 101st Screaming Eagles (always a favorite of mine as a friend of mine, Wally Strobel of Saginaw Michigan, is the trooper with the blacked out face seen talking to Ike in the oft seen photo taken just prior to D-Day) and the 82 nd All America Division. The game continues with the taking of the Cotentin peninsula, also known as Brittany, culminating in the capture of Cherbourg, the deep water port needed to support the invasion. The game goes no further than a line straight across the Cotentin peninsula. There are, however, lots of battles to be fought. There are 44 individual battles, I think, counting the numbers was difficult. There are 7 Operations with the usual Close Combat style of multiple battles in an Operation. The ultimate of course is a choice of four campaigns. The first is Airborne Attack or Attack from the Skies which starts with the Utah Beach scenarios and the airborne drops cited above and comprises 16 battles. The second is Attack on Cherbourg or Taking the Port, 7 battles that continues the first and third campaigns. The third campaign is The North Flank or The Quinneville-Montebourg Line which also leads to the second campaign Attack on Cherbourg or Taking the Port. Then there is also the Grand Campaign beginning with Utah Beach, June 6,1944. Some 30 plus battles, you don't want to know! I am currently playing the grand Campaign and I find it a bit con fusing. The battles are fun but not easy, those wily Krauts are giving me a hard time! Switching sides is also very frustrating as you are really outgunned on the beaches with set troops that you can't improve. You can however, defeat the paratroopers if you upgrade your forces and really use some skill and luck. The graphics are excellent, as good or perhaps slightly better than Close Combat III The Eastern Front. It may be my imagination but the scrolling seems better or maybe I'm improving my poor scrolling skills. The zoom out is also excellent which allows me to see the whole picture as it happens and I found myself zooming in and out a lot. This is the first time in the Close Combat series that I have been able to really watch the action in the mode which the game intends. The troops look like the white computer images shown in the movie PATRIOT GAMES ( one of my many favorites) where the CIA sends in a team to destroy a terrorist camp. In this game the GIs or Landsers move nicely outlined in yellow which is easily visible. You can see the smoke explode and attack with the smoke cover if you can and should. This also is the only way you can worm your good infantry squads up to close assault a tank or other armored vehicle. You can hit an open topped Armored Fighting Vehicle (American Tank Destroyers, Half-Tracks etc.) successfully with mortar shells and you must have 1-2 mortar teams in every scenario, but closed top vehicles are tougher (e.g. Tanks, Sturmgeshutz) and require very good tactics once off the beach. It is important to improve your forces wherever possible. Most scenarios allow this option. YESS!!! I have found the small teams (sniper, bazooka, maybe MG-still not decided about MG) to be almost useless so far. If you discover differently, please email me so I can learn. You get three platoons of five teams for each platoon, a total of 15 teams and /or vehicles. The manual says that your troops are the lead unit in a regimental combat team. Perhaps this is better than previous Close Combat games. You may have the illusion that your company sized force actually matters and it seems to matter as you move on to other battles or scenarios! There is no cost for improving your forces as there was in CCIII but you also have less choice although I think it's pretty good. This game is very historically accurate so there is very little armor (weep, weep) and I have been forced into a new appreciation of our fathers and grandfathers who fought these battles against very tough, nasty opponents who thought they were fighting for their homes and families too! This is bloody, small unit actions a la SAVING PRIVATE RYAN and you will take losses. It is impossible to avoid casualties in this game. Good and superior tactics are rewarded. Read the manual, do the Boot Camp. Then advance slowly (sneak) from cover to cover using smoke and suppression fire to facilitate movement and you will still get ambushed and clobbered occasionally. You probably need the 60 minute or more mode because this is an infantry game and they can't move as fast as the armor dominated Close Combat III Eastern Front, unless you want to get your Ass kicked hard. Well, so much for this issue, if you haven't read Citizen Soldiers by Stephen Ambrose, get a copy and read it. Back to MWAN #112 Table of Contents Back to MWAN List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 2001 Hal Thinglum 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