This game compared to the first

[super400]

How do you guys like it? Lot better than the first? I loved Axis and Allies, and have been looking for a computer game like it. Also, is the 1st game included in this release, or just discontinued? I can't find it anywhere, not even on the site for purchase.

[Joel Billings]

The first game is no longer in print (or available via digital download), although since it was distributed at retail you might find a copy somewhere on the internet or in a store. WaW has been called been called A&A on steroids, and AWD is WaW with a booster shot.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: super400
How do you guys like it? Lot better than the first? I loved Axis and Allies, and have been looking for a computer game like it. Also, is the 1st game included in this release, or just discontinued? I can't find it anywhere, not even on the site for purchase.

GGWAW-AWD is much better than plain old GGWAW1, and I loved the first one.

It is nearly the perfect level of complexity for me, enough to make things pretty realistic while still being able to handle the global conflict over 7 possible years of war without getting bogged down in the details. If you loved Axis and Allies but always wanted just a little more realism in supply and industrial aspects, or in tech upgrades, then you'll love this.

The things that stand out to me that make GGWAW-AWD better than GGWAW1 are:

1) politics/diplomacy. Its pretty rudimentary, but its a good thing. It gets the job done and provides some variability without distracting from the main foci, which are war, production, research. It also allows the game to start in 1939, whereas GGWAW1 had to start in 1940 after certain pieces had already fallen into place.

2) revised combat for air units. It's much more realistic than GGWAW1. In GGWAW1 bombers would routinely wipe out land units (most typically artillery), now this is much less frequent. But air power is unquestionably a requirement for other reasons. Also, defending bombers now stay on the ground in air-to-air combat, so they can't be annihilated by attacking fighter sweeps but now must be hit by air-to-ground in the airfield. This gives bombers a much better defensive survivability.

3) other combat revisions. There is the introduction of "bombardment attacks" and "suppression fire", which allows some good complimentary relationships between artillery and other land units. There is a Combined Arms bonus so that you want a good balance of armor/infantry/artillery/air.

4) amphib assaults are modified. It is harder to do long distance assaults, and you can no longer "land and run" in spoiling attacks like you used to be able to do. Op-fire against landing units has changed to include air-unit op-fire, again increasing the value of air.

5) map mods. In particular, the Russian Far East is fixed so that the route from Japan to Moscow is not so short as it used to be, and Scotland is no longer 1-sea-zone from Europe, so Sea Lion is now more likely to land in England than Scotland.


It is definitely more complicated than Axis and Allies. If that doesn't turn you off then I think you'll like it. I hear that the AI is decent, but that's subjective. It is improved over GGWAW1. I never play against it. You'll find it good for at least a couple training runs, but ultimately you'll want to play humans in PBEM.

[GKar]

While I liked the first one, it never really got me hooked. This one does. Enough said! [:D]

[dobeln]

Other nice touches include the more active role for Russia in determining whether to try to push for war at the cost of worse troop deployment, as well as subs not being an uber anti-capital ship weapon. 

[super400]

Sounds great. I loved A&A in college, along with Fortress America and some other board games which are probably extinct by now. Thanks:)

[Joel Billings]

I just taught my 9 year old son Fortress America last weekend. We used to play that at SSI quite a bit. That was a great game as almost every game was close and resolved by around turn 6 or 7.

[Petiloup]

Definitely a better feel than WAW in general. WAW was nice but once you found about submarines ruling the seas and air power then the game was going to illogical conclusions with the US building no CAGS but only submarines to blockade Japan, bombers destroying German troops one after the other and Germany doing the same against Russia wondering why to bother building tanks really.

All in all definitely AWD is a great game for a strategy game with still the weakness of fighting for a region instead of an hex that leads to some issues sometimes but this goes with the size of the game.

Now for me the best advantage of AWD compare to other games is how easy it is to play it, how difficult it can be to master, it encompass the World and how fast a game can be started and finished by PBEM.