*** 1944: Across The Rhine Review ***
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1944: ACROSS THE RHINE
MicroProse
Reviewed by: Tim Chown
Game category: Commercial
Game type: Simulation/strategy
Price: #29.99 (UK CD)
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Required: 486DX/33 or better, 2x CD ROM, 4Mb RAM (8Mb for digital effects)
20Mb hard disk space, SVGA graphics, Microsoft mouse, MSDOS 5.0
or above, MS CD Extensions 2.2 or better.
Control: Keyboard (lots!), mouse, Joystick/Thrustmaster/Flightstick Pro.
Sound: Soundblaster Pro/16/AWE, Roland, PAS, GUS, AdLib.
Reviewed version : CD release (July 30th 1995).
Reviewed version on: 486 DX2/66, 8Mb RAM, Panasonic 563CD, SB16
Reviewer recommends: Pentium processor, 16Mb RAM, Quad speed CD drive,
as suggested on the game box.
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A bridge too far?
[LINK]
A lot of hype has surrounded the release of 1944: Across The Rhine. It
is probably one of the most eagerly awaited releases of the year, and
has been delayed for some time now. Finally it's hit the shelves, but
what have we got? The box says "simulation", the game tries to be both
action and strategy, yet the final product seems to be something else.
The game comes on CD (and almost certainly CD only) and is accompanied
by a 140-page gameplay manual and a 140-page historical reference
book. This makes the box satisfyingly heavy, but the manual only
really starts to make sense after you've played for a while. Thus
1944: ATR is a game with quite a steepish learning curve, rather like
MicroProse's air combat "simulator" 1942: Pacific Air War. In fact
these two games do have some similarities in style (and some glaring
differences). However, once you've wrapped you mind around the game,
its style, and the controls, things tend to fall into place.
Installation was very easy. The drawback is that for a full install
you need 90Mb of HD space. A minimal install is 8Mb, plus a required
12Mb free for disk swap space. You'll need really to load more than
the minimum to reduce the big delays in loading battle scenarios, so
expect to lose around 50Mb to this game, even with a quad speed CD.
The install picked up my sound card automatically with all the right
settings (I have a SB16) and seemed happy with my VESA choice. You can
run at 640x480 or go as high as 1280x960 (or so) but I settled for
800x600 on my local bus Orchid Kelvin card, and this gave me enough
room on screen to lay out the four main windows, more of which later.
(This means the screen dumps here are bigger than the usual Game
Domain 640x480 - sorry!)
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Presentation and Style
[LINK]
Signing up for a career on the western front
The big problem ATR has with presentation is the horrendously slow
load times to get into the battle menu and then into a battle itself.
OK, I only (!) have an 8Mb DX2/66, but to get the deployment screen
for a scenario took about one minute, then to go from there into the
battle itself took around two minutes. Interestingly on my friend's
32Mb P90 the load times were not significantly better, with CD and HD
access being just as frenzied. Yet to be fair there is a lot of detail
in the game, and the graphics are very high res, and you get the same
problem with, say, Wing Commander III. Until CDs or HDs get faster,
it'll be a fact of life.
I guess the crux of this review is to discover just what ATR is meant
to be. I would not class it as an action game, for reasons which will
soon become apparent. It seems to be best suited as a real-time
strategy game, yet this takes away the fun of building your character
from the bottom up - a platoon sergeant can't control a battalion.
Your character can gain medals and get promoted if you do well, and
with promotion comes control of more units. If you prefer, you can
start as a high ranking officer and control everything.
The ATR battle maps are 10km by 10km, which is about the right area to
have a battalion level conflict. This will usually mean in a smallish
skirmish 4 or 5 companies on each side fighting it out, each company
being made up of 4 or 5 (or so) platoons. The platoon is the smallest
visible unit in battle - one vehicle is a platoon, damage to the
vehicle means one or more real vehicles have been destroyed. There are
many different vehicle types in ATR - light, medium and heavy tanks
may dominate, but infantry, anti-tank guns, tank destroyers, etc all
are included. You can also request off-map artillery and air support.
_________________________________________________________________
In Battle
[LINK] [LINK]
Selecting a battle to play, then deploying your forces
The easiest way to get into the action in ATR is to select one of the
dozen or so scenarios, each of which can be played from either the US
or the German side. These, like the rest of the battles, are set from
mid 1944 through to the end of the war, so the classics like the
Battle of the Bulge are in essence represented. Yet as this is a
battalion level game for the most part, grand scale strategy is not to
be had.
Selecting a battle is easy enough, then you're either thrown into the
deep end if you choose to be a battalion commander or you can paddle
around in the shallows as a platoon leader. The time of day and
weather all have a bearing on your tactics and the game play, and
there are many different types of encounter; for example an engagement
sees both sides on an attack after common objectives (marked by flags
on the map).
The deployment screen lets you place your forces. Oddly even at
platoon command level you seem able to move other platoons around at
this point, which seems daft. You can also inspect and reorganise your
troops' organisational units, zooming in in detail to see where they
are placed and what they are ordered to do. A unit can have one of 12
or more different types of order to carry out, including probes, all
out assault, delay, bypass, etc.
Once you're happy with what you have, and you've set the realism
details, you get cast into battle. Well, actually you go and make a
quick cup of tea, then come back into battle, but the wait isn't too
bad and it gives you a chance to read more of the manuals! Realism
includes opponent and friendly experience levels, fuel and ammo
options, morale options, spotting options (full, partial or limited -
limited is realistic) and more. In a campaign you can tweak these as
you progress.
[LINK] [LINK]
Using your binoculars, checking your ammo levels in the rain
At last I'm in my tank (or rather my virtual platoon, represented in
the game by one tank), riding along. By default your driver is in auto
mode and will take you along the path you've set or that has been set
for you. While rolling along you can inspect all four main windows and
tinker around. In this sense it is a simulation. There you are in a
tank in a battle, with a respectable 3D view, plus battle map views.
Very pretty and almost fun to just watch (even if you enter the
accelerated time mode, which sadly doesn't often go fast enough). At
any time you can take driver control and go off on your own, but this
can be rather suicidal - returning to auto driver control lets your
driver reform with the parent unit.
The little command window has tiny icons that let you change your
view, move to another tank, zoom in and out on the platoon level map,
switch icon styles, jump back into your own character's tank, jump
into the gunner's seat, and so on. All this can be done via function
keys too. While cruising you'll just use your hatch (command open)
view and maybe rotate your turret to see to the sides and maybe use
your 7x zoom binoculars to watch for enemies.
The big problem is that the 3D view is small, and cannot go full
screen. What a crying shame! This means the gunner view is extremely
small and that makes 3D combat very difficult as enemies are very hard
to spot even when you peer hard at your screen, especially when
there's no feedback on where your shots land (bar a voice shouting
"hit" or "miss"). You can of course jump back to your turret (command
closed) view and let your gunner shoot for you, but I really want to
do the shooting, and the small window makes that too hard. I have hit
and destroyed enemies, so maybe I'll get used to it, but I shouldn't
have had to.
Another problem that I had was my Gravis Pro joystick wouldn't
calibrate properly, so I have to do all my movement and other
operations with the keyboard, awkward when the number pad moves your
view/gun, the number keys control speed and turning, the function keys
change your views and many of the other keys do something too! After a
while you cope, but initially it can be frustrating.
[LINK] [LINK]
The gunner's view of carnage, and what it's like to get toasted
The pictures above show me in the heat of battle, with tanks burning
all around - my HQ and #1 platoon are KO'd and I'm out on my own. All
around the US forces are retreating, morale shattered. Not a good day,
but we took a lot of Germans with us. An external chase view pops up
if your tank is knocked out, though you also access this at any time
(or if you want to "ride" with a non-tank unit). The right-hand
picture above shows me dying in a different dawn encounter (note the
difference in the battlefield map with limited spotting rules).
Battles can drag on a while, and there is no option to save a battle
in progress, so you have to end it or quit, usually to lose. I guess
there is just to much detail to save to disk, but the omission of this
option is again frustrating. You can pause game and return, but that's
not really sensible to do overnight or longer. The battles also don't
always have clear conclusions, and can end up with both sides
defending one of two objectives unwilling to attack the other's
position - at platoon command level you can't do much about that.
What can you ride? The US side includes: M4 Sherman, M10 Wolverine,
M18 Hellcat, M36 Jackson and M5 Stuart. The German side includes:
Pzkfw IV, Pzkfw V Panther, Pzkfw VI Tiger/King Tiger plus the
JagdPanther. Yet each of these (bar the JagdPanther) looks very
similar, nay the same, when being driven in.
Overall the in battle graphics are pretty good, with lots of varying
terrain and units, sounds are OK but nothing too special. Digitised
speech is used for messages between commanders. The four window
approach however means it's hard to feel combat "atmosphere" - you
feel abstracted from the battle, almost as if you were playing a "god"
sim like SimCity. Bizarre, but the box does say "simulation" I guess.
_________________________________________________________________
Campaigns
[LINK] [LINK]
The campaign map early on, and reorganising/inspecting my units
(please excuse the screen dump corruption - my fault not ATR's! :)
You can fight one of three campaigns from either the US or Gemeran
side following the historical route of one of a number of real
divisions. Or if you prefer you can play a hypothetical campaign where
anything goes and the Germans can push the US forces back to the seas.
The campaign lets your character go day by day through life in either
army, and while many days are idle ones you can get called into combat
at any time. Combat can be tense as it's not just about winning, it
may be prudent to cut losses and live to fight another day. Even with
the German experience set to "green" I found my US compaign to be
grinding too slowly, with losses so heavy my attached companies were
withdrawn from my battalion.
At campaign level you can manage fuel, ammo and organisation if you
choose to, scheduling rest for units and watching over replenishments.
This seems to be where ATR shows its depth - it isn't really an action
tank game - it's strategy with real-time "tactical" combat thrown in,
and if you can master the tiny gunnery view then that's a very nice
bonus. As your campaign progresses you can win medals and see your
personal diary get filled out.
The campaign system is detailed, and it gives motivation for success
in battle, and for not taking victories at all costs when more
cautious approaches would be more suited. Each campaign battle has
different objectives and orders - one day you might be on an assault,
the next a defensive holding mission.
_________________________________________________________________
The Battle Builder
[LINK] [LINK]
Building my own battle, then riding in my own twilight and snow
If the campaign system doesn't appeal you can build you own custom
battles, save them to disk and play them at your leisure, even package
them to floppy and post them to a friend to try. Above you can see my
efforts; you can select general terrain type, weather, time of day,
etc and then place extras on top, with whatever battalion units you
like. You can add minefields, roadblocks, pillboxes, and yes, even
herds of cows. I'd trade those cows for a full screen 3D view in
combat though!
The battle builder allows you to specify random forces for one side
which are weaker, matched or stronger than the forces you specify for
the other side, so you have some sort of random scenario creation
ability, though it is a little limited. However, we will no doubt soon
see FTP sites springing up offering lots of ATR scenarios, much as
there are for WCSII:Tanks! and other games.
_________________________________________________________________
Gameplay
I guess the crunch is the gameplay. To be honest this is meant to be
somewhat a "first impression" review - I have only played ATR for
around three evenings now. The problem is that you're caught in two
"worlds" - one is the strategic level orders, which is minimal if
you're a sergeant in one platoon (you can get promoted as you
progress) and the other is the combat simulator. The strategic side
kind of works, and once you get used to it you can control your forces
effectively, coordinating companies, using recon units, etc, but the
combat simulator really is something of a no-no because of that tiny
gunner's view.
Then there's the slooooow load times. If you accept them then yes you
can tolerate it, but it is frustrating. I'm used to Terminal Velocity
and Descent with high quality high-res (high enough!) action; I'm
saddened that that could not be recreated here in combination with the
strategy element. This feels like a Windows application, not a game,
which (to me) is a shame. Perhaps the game designers wanted it that
way, perhaps the coders didn't have the skill to do it "properly"
(toggle to full screen lower res combat), we'll probably never know.
So this is a game that is initially very frustrating, yet I have found
some amount of that feeling has waned, and I am getting to an almost
neutral point now, verging on enthusiasm to play. Maybe in a week I'll
be ranting about ATR's good points, who knows?!
_________________________________________________________________
Summary
What can I say? This was for me one of the most eagerly awaited games
of 1995. Follow the US or German forces over the last year of the war,
fighting battles where you can ride in any vehicle. It's ambitious for
sure, and has achieved a lot, yet I feel kind of let down. The problem
is that this game is neither here nor there. It is much better as a
strategic campaign game with real-time "tactical" combat, where the 3D
view is just an embellishment, not to be used in earnest. What is
frustrating is that the 3D gunnery is there, but just so small as to
be near unusable. Then again had gunnery been fullscreen I would be
raving about the game, only bemoaning the slow load times. It's a fine
line.
As a game it's relatively bug free. Yes my joystick fails, and yes
I've crashed on a memory error once, but apart from the deployment
oddity mentioned way above, it seems quite good for a MicroProse early
release (then again compared to Master of Magic, it would!). The sound
effects don't make much (any?) use of stereo, and there is no
multiplayer or head-to-head option - a great missed opportunity there.
Overall this is a game which promised so much, is a game which I
really want to like, and yet it is hard to know how to appraise it
because I'm not sure what it's meant to be. If you play it for its
strategic aspects I think ATR is more than good, and it is growing on
me, but I would certainly recommend that you try to play it somewhere
before you splash out hard cash for it.
I mentioned 1942: Pacific Air War earlier - an excellent flight combat
sim by MicroProse. Now that too had a steep learning curve, had me
frustrated early on, I took 2 days to finally shoot soemthing down yet
in the end I grew to love it. I'm not sure 1944: Across the Rhine will
get the same affection. I think it might, and I'll give it every
chance. All the same ATR deserves high praise for its goals, which it
achieves at least in part. It does have strengths and a lot of depth
and detail for the (patient) strategy gamer. Doom afficionados look
elsewhere!
Next on the horizon lie Steel Panthers and Beyond Squad Leader ...
_________________________________________________________________
Copyright (c) Tim Chown for the Games Domain, August 1995
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