Tried it for about 5 minutes. It looks horrible, a very unpleasant blurry mess for the eyes. Gameplay, big meh there too. I'm probably not fair, but the engine used just rubbed the wrong way. We got games from early 2000 that look much better than this.
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The Great War: Western Front - WW1 strategy from Petroglyph - now on Early Access
- Thread starter jebsmoker
- Start date
Wonder why they choose to make it look like shit... Maybe they can fix that before release.
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Early Access on March 30:
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Anyone playing this already? Is it any gud?
Harthwain
Magister
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I bought it and I have some free time so I will be coming back here to report whether it's any good or not.
If you don't want to wait, you can watch The Historical Gamer playing it.
If you don't want to wait, you can watch The Historical Gamer playing it.
Harthwain
Magister
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OK. I am back after playing a while.
In short: it's a pretty good game and probably THE BEST strategy WW1 game I have seen to date, at least in terms of depicting what a meat grinder it was.
Be warned though - the game requires a certain mindset to play. It's not for everyone.
All in all my experience has been quite positive. I haven't seen a game this interesting in a long while.
In short: it's a pretty good game and probably THE BEST strategy WW1 game I have seen to date, at least in terms of depicting what a meat grinder it was.
Be warned though - the game requires a certain mindset to play. It's not for everyone.
Infantry dies FAST. Even charging against simple trenches manned by regular infantry means a whole battalion/unit will disappear in an instant. Now imagine doing the same when said trenches are supported by Maxim guns and while enemy (heavy) artillery is dropping shells on you. This is hell and losses are going to be terrible, as is apprioriate for the setting.
And that's only the beginning of the game - I have yet to explore bombers, tanks, gas, flamethrowers, etc. So the tools for breaking the stalemate and to provide strategic variety are there.
Some decisions are questionable though: in order to allow aircrafts to shoot down observation balloon (that provide visibility) you have to invest a bunch of points into tech tree, despite the fact that aircrafts (with machinegun on them, to fight other aircrafts!) are literally the first aerial tech you unlock.
The game is complex, in a good sense.
You have gold and supplies. Troops' losses are replenished with gold. Equipment (such as tanks, aircrafts, etc.) is bought with gold (and can be lost permanently, unlike infantry). Supplies can be bought with gold. So having gold is good. Which means you should conserve troops, because losing too many troops will cost you money. But to conserve troops and gain objectives you need to use supplies and supplies are limited (you get a certain amount of both gold and supplies each turn), so using too much supplies isn't without consequences either, because it can eat into your strategic reserve of supplies.
This creates a certain set of checks and balances you have to take into consideration, because each army has a limited amount of "local" supply per territory and attacking enemy territory also requires a certain "tax" of supplies (depending on the size of the attacking force), so you can't attack willy-nilly. Also, both attacking and defending tires out your army, meaning that attacking the same hex will make it easier to break troops' morale, but open you up to the same tactic when it's your enemy's turn (battle fatigue regenerates at the start of your own turn).
Another interesting aspect of the game are persistent trenches - each province is a hex. Each hex has 6 sides. This means you can, potentially, have six maps for any given hex. And each unique map will have its own set of trenches that was left from any previous battle fought between Hex A and Hex B. This means each fight will be that much harder on account of having to find a way through even more complex maze of trenches. "Trench warfare" is name of the game here.
Also, each battle is on timer (20 minutes). You can pound enemy lines endlessly with artillery (assuming you have supplies for that) and then attack, but this will leave you with less time to capture all objectives. Of course, you don't have to take ALL the objectives in one battle. But until you do, you won't be able to breach the defenses of the region and take control over it.
Because each region has a bunch of stars to signify how well fortified it is (from 1 to 5). Taking a place with 2 stars will require two "total victories". While normally I don't like the idea of timers, in this case it's a pretty good way to encourage you to act suboptimally if you want to capture as much ground as possible. Which means losses will likely be horrid.
This really helps to capture both the idea of a stalemate and that each "inch of ground" comes at a certain cost, and even capturing one well-defended point can be a minor victory that's a good stepping stone to greater victory in the future. At the same time you can see "Great Victory/Sweep" info, while looking at the casualties and realize how phyrric this victory was in terms of resources (men/gold).
It's good to see that the AI can offer surrender and ceasefire terms when it deems it appropriate to do so (which you may or may not accept), so you don't have to always play through all 20 minutes very time you go to a battle.
Negatives?
AI can make questionable decisions sometimes (such as spending all its troops in a counter-attack, leaving its positions pretty much exposed for your own attack, if you have spare troops yourself).
Some tech is strangely placed - you have to research balloon hunting missions somewhat deep into the aerial tech tree, despite the fact that the very first tech unlocks aircraft that are capable of shooting down enemy aircrafts, I guess this is for balance reasons but I still don't like it.
Troops' movement can be weird sometimes when it comes to moving via trenches and it sometimes can result in lossing troops unnecessarily, because they take a "shortcut" that ends up with them walking into enemy gunfire.
And that's only the beginning of the game - I have yet to explore bombers, tanks, gas, flamethrowers, etc. So the tools for breaking the stalemate and to provide strategic variety are there.
Some decisions are questionable though: in order to allow aircrafts to shoot down observation balloon (that provide visibility) you have to invest a bunch of points into tech tree, despite the fact that aircrafts (with machinegun on them, to fight other aircrafts!) are literally the first aerial tech you unlock.
The game is complex, in a good sense.
You have gold and supplies. Troops' losses are replenished with gold. Equipment (such as tanks, aircrafts, etc.) is bought with gold (and can be lost permanently, unlike infantry). Supplies can be bought with gold. So having gold is good. Which means you should conserve troops, because losing too many troops will cost you money. But to conserve troops and gain objectives you need to use supplies and supplies are limited (you get a certain amount of both gold and supplies each turn), so using too much supplies isn't without consequences either, because it can eat into your strategic reserve of supplies.
This creates a certain set of checks and balances you have to take into consideration, because each army has a limited amount of "local" supply per territory and attacking enemy territory also requires a certain "tax" of supplies (depending on the size of the attacking force), so you can't attack willy-nilly. Also, both attacking and defending tires out your army, meaning that attacking the same hex will make it easier to break troops' morale, but open you up to the same tactic when it's your enemy's turn (battle fatigue regenerates at the start of your own turn).
Another interesting aspect of the game are persistent trenches - each province is a hex. Each hex has 6 sides. This means you can, potentially, have six maps for any given hex. And each unique map will have its own set of trenches that was left from any previous battle fought between Hex A and Hex B. This means each fight will be that much harder on account of having to find a way through even more complex maze of trenches. "Trench warfare" is name of the game here.
Also, each battle is on timer (20 minutes). You can pound enemy lines endlessly with artillery (assuming you have supplies for that) and then attack, but this will leave you with less time to capture all objectives. Of course, you don't have to take ALL the objectives in one battle. But until you do, you won't be able to breach the defenses of the region and take control over it.
Because each region has a bunch of stars to signify how well fortified it is (from 1 to 5). Taking a place with 2 stars will require two "total victories". While normally I don't like the idea of timers, in this case it's a pretty good way to encourage you to act suboptimally if you want to capture as much ground as possible. Which means losses will likely be horrid.
This really helps to capture both the idea of a stalemate and that each "inch of ground" comes at a certain cost, and even capturing one well-defended point can be a minor victory that's a good stepping stone to greater victory in the future. At the same time you can see "Great Victory/Sweep" info, while looking at the casualties and realize how phyrric this victory was in terms of resources (men/gold).
It's good to see that the AI can offer surrender and ceasefire terms when it deems it appropriate to do so (which you may or may not accept), so you don't have to always play through all 20 minutes very time you go to a battle.
Negatives?
AI can make questionable decisions sometimes (such as spending all its troops in a counter-attack, leaving its positions pretty much exposed for your own attack, if you have spare troops yourself).
Some tech is strangely placed - you have to research balloon hunting missions somewhat deep into the aerial tech tree, despite the fact that the very first tech unlocks aircraft that are capable of shooting down enemy aircrafts, I guess this is for balance reasons but I still don't like it.
Troops' movement can be weird sometimes when it comes to moving via trenches and it sometimes can result in lossing troops unnecessarily, because they take a "shortcut" that ends up with them walking into enemy gunfire.
All in all my experience has been quite positive. I haven't seen a game this interesting in a long while.
Thanks for taking the time to write this.
How much of a 'horde RTS' is this? By which I mean, from the pre-release vids I had the uncomfortable impression that this was one of those fake modern RTSes where infantry doesn't matter, can hardly be controlled and comes in the millions whose only purpose is to run forward and get slaughtered. So I guess the question is how much 'micro' is there to be had?
How much of a 'horde RTS' is this? By which I mean, from the pre-release vids I had the uncomfortable impression that this was one of those fake modern RTSes where infantry doesn't matter, can hardly be controlled and comes in the millions whose only purpose is to run forward and get slaughtered. So I guess the question is how much 'micro' is there to be had?
Harthwain
Magister
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No problem. To be honest it's a bit of a rush job and there are some things I didn't mention (espionage, which falls under research, for example. National will, which serves as "how much you can fuck up" currency), but I did touch the most important points.
Strangely enough infantry purpose IS to get slaughtered because the very nature of the game is to be a meat grinder, yet at the same time it is the most important unit in the game. In the sense that only it can capture trenches and thus take over objectives. And taking objectives measure where your attack/defense will be placed on the scale between victory or defeat (which is very granular).
First of all - it's real-time with pause during which you can give orders to units, so you don't have to have quick fingers to control the battlefield. Compared to older RTSes, where you gave order to individual units or something like Company of Heroes, there is much less clicking involved:
- Most of my units' management boils down to getting together a bunch of battalions and ordering them from point A to B and then to C (or from A to B).
- Dropping artillery is quick and easy (it's literally three clicks: click artillery, click the order, click the position).
- Withdrawing a unit from battle is a single click. Same goes for summoning a unit.
- There is a bit more micro when I break up attacking units to fill up individual trenches (each trench has two slots and you want to take 3-4 of them), but that's about it.
Why was the game abandoned? They could have patched it more and released an Eastern Front DLC but instead they just ditched the game after 2.1
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Guess it just didnt sell. The game is fine but not all that special and I guess it got sort of lost in the market...
Raghar
Arcane
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They didn't bother to remove Denuvo, thus nobody aside of paying customer played it, and paying customers had better games to spend money for.
Aka when developers are making games to earn profit...
They needed to add details, and learn to play its own game to make capable AI.
Aka when developers are making games to earn profit...
They needed to add details, and learn to play its own game to make capable AI.
Harthwain
Magister
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What do you mean abandoned?
No patches since September and the game is still perceived as in need of fixes.
Nutmeg
Arcane
Unless the bugs are of the sporadic crashing kind, who cares about the little quirk here and there like a bit of terrain units can get stuck on, especially if you know what triggers the bug and how to avoid it.
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