OT: CCAW Screens

[MarkShot]

I guess the AI is good enough.

[utexgrad]

In another life I used to do software reviews and SSG was kind enough to send me a copy of CCAW, which I still have. It came with a cool tri-fold card with all of the maps printed on it, and the "press kit" I got with it said it would retail for $69.95 US and would run on a 386, but a 486 was recommended. It also required 2mb (yes, MB) of RAM, VGA graphics, DOS 5.0 or higher and an ad-lib or sound blaster card.
 
They also included a registration card that if you returned it and $2.50 for postage they would send you a Hunt the Bismarck scenario for CCAW. Hmmm....wonder if I can still send it in and get that scenario.....
 
Ah, nostalgia......

[MarkShot]

Here is a sequence of screen shots showing how a squadron transfer strike works in CCAW.

This is the Wake scenario. Halsey and the Lex are SE of Wake. The Japanese are preparing to invade; advancing from the South.

[MarkShot]

There are already two squadrons in the air on their way to strike at the invasion force.

[MarkShot]

I still have one squadron of torpedo bombers left to commit. Here you see them, but without the range to reach the enemy troop transports.

[MarkShot]

Here you see the same squadron again, but this time they will use Wake as refueling stop before heading back to the Lex.

Tada!

[MarkShot]

Another strike transfer shot ...

[MarkShot]

At wake (turning around) ...

[MarkShot]

At wake (turning around) ...

[MarkShot]

I don't think I fully understand transfer strikes yet. It seems that the squadron strikes the target, then flies on to the land base. Then, it needs to wait for at least one full day worth of turn around. The next morning it flies back off to the carrier. The thing I don't understand is why it cannot refuel and fly back to the same day?

[Vincenzo_Beretta]

ORIGINAL: Grauer_Wolf

I have the game too, but my Version have not Scenario Atlantic and PQ 17.

My copy had scenarios for all the major battles in the Med, too (Matapan, Cape Teulada and Operation Pedestal among them), plus, IIRC, Norway, Artic Convoys, North Cape (against the Tirpitz) and a bunch of others.

The current iteration of CAW evolving in that great game would be a naval enthusiast's dream [:D]

[helm123456789]

When the first version of Carriers at War was out SSG also had an inhouse magazine called Run 5 they sent out I think quarterly that had scenarios you could build with the scenario editor (Feel Old Now).  Spent many an hour building the scenarios from the magazine.  Wonder if SSG still has the old scenarios or maybe they could do reprints of the magazine in PDF.

[Erik2]

ORIGINAL: helm123456789

When the first version of Carriers at War was out SSG also had an inhouse magazine called Run 5 they sent out I think quarterly that had scenarios you could build with the scenario editor (Feel Old Now).  Spent many an hour building the scenarios from the magazine.  Wonder if SSG still has the old scenarios or maybe they could do reprints of the magazine in PDF.

The problem with the scenarios in Run5 is that the tables instruct you to input numbers wich stand for different characteristics, type of aircraft etc.
So you may have to run the scenarios in the editor on your C64/Apple to decipher them...
Better to convert the scenarios in CCAW first.
BTW, I still have my old C64-copy with the hardcopy maps etc and also all Run5-magazines.
Nostalgia [:)]

[MarkShot]

Hmm ... I was watching this History Channel today. I felt a temptation to reload CAW/CCAW and give them another go. (archived to tape)

But should I allow myself to be tempted?

I originally archived them, since I didn't think there was enough hardcore strategy besides playing hide and seek in the clounds to make this worth too much time.

Has anyone been playing either of these for more than three months?

Or perhaps I should go back and play some HCCE or H3? But then Harpoon is very savage; a few missiles ruin your whole day. Not much give and take there.

Well, interested to see if anyone has made a big time investment in this title.

Thanks.

[Prince of Eckmühl]

This is an interesting topic to the extent that a lot of the art strikes me as sort of garish. Earlier on in the post-release chat about the game, I considered suggesting to SSG that they substitute hi-resolution black-and-white photography like that found in a lot of WW2-era magazines for the grainy, color-screens included in the game. That I didn't bother to do so is a testament to the deaf-ear that the developer turned to the several voices, hereabouts, that roasted the game for it's devotion to the former's apparent credo, "we sold boatloads of this stuff back-when, so don't go telling us how to make games."

Seriously, I fired up CaW '07, just a few days ago and played the Midway historical scenario. Not fifteen minutes into the game, CAP Zeros shot down six B-17 attacking the Kido Butai. What struck me as genuinely irksome about the event was not the outcome (which truly defies history, as no B-17 of any type was lost to Zeros at Midway), but the fact that the bombers were B-17D, rather than the much more survivable B-17E (that actually participated in the battle). It's worth noting that more than one poster cited this and numerous other OOB errors in the game as shipped and subsequently patched, all to no avail.

At no point has SSG ever shown any interest in rectifying such oversights. It probably shouldn't bother me, but the latest, patched version crashed on me shortly after the B-17D were shot down, a metaphor for CaW '07, perhaps. Suffice it to say, I won't be purchasing any more of their games.

PoE (aka ivanmoe)

[jco]

Pfiuh.... after watching the screenshots from the begining... i wanna play this game AGAIN!!