Are We in the Right Track with Big, Complex Games?

[pompack]

I played my first Grigsby game almost 30 years ago (on an Apple II)- I think the first one was Guadalcanal

My first thought was "This is the greatest game I have ever seen". My second was "This is the worst interface design I have ever seen" and for someone working in military electronics in the late 70's that was really saying something.

Through the decades I have continued to repeat that every year or so as he produced new games. About the time of Second Front (early 90's) I added "Hasn't this guy every heard of probability distributions?" as I watched combat results play out one shot at a time across thousands of miles of front.

But the point is that this guy stands alone above everyone else in producing incredibly neat games that offer tens of thousands of hours of enjoyement. The interface was ALWAYS clunky and there was usually a brute force approach that often swamped the computer (and the operator) in a morass of detail: but he gave me the games and no one else ever came close.

My hat is off to the AE team for giving us this game, but it is at heart a Grigsby game: brute force nitty detail with an interface intermingled with the game logic that defies anything but minor changes and a GAME (not a simulation) that is immersive for thousands of hours.

So if anyone can EVER provide a Grigsby game with a clean, user-friendly (repeat buzz words as required[:)]) user interface than I will certainly buy it, but until then I am grateful that there continues to be a succession of Grigsby games. [&o]

[fbs]

ORIGINAL: pompack

But the point is that this guy stands alone above everyone else in producing incredibly neat games that offer tens of thousands of hours of enjoyement. The interface was ALWAYS clunky and there was usually a brute force approach that often swamped the computer (and the operator) in a morass of detail: but he gave me the games and no one else ever came close.

Cheers to that. By the way, anyone knows what happened to that 1905 Russo-Japanese War 3D game that Mr. Grisby was working after he dropped from WITP?


Thanks,
fbs

[crsutton]

The game is complex but anybody who has been around some time remembers the massive boardgames. Pacific War, Europa, Advance Squad Leader. (Have you ever seen the rulebook for Advance Squad Leader?). Thing is, most of them were beautiful but totally unplayable. Not only did you need massive amounts of space, you had to actually have your friends come over to play which is sometimes impossible even in heavily populated areas. Good luck if you were in a rural area. ( FTF is still the best way [;)]) And one rampage by your f**king cat could ruin a half year's worth of gaming. Sometime I will have to tell you about the roast beef that killed a game of Red Barricades.
 
Computers now make it possible to tame the beast and make a monster playable. We are in a golden age of wargaming right now. I can wait to see Grigsby's Russian Front game.
 
I have two great campaigns of AE going right now. One opponent is in Poland and the other is in Germany. Since I took up computer gaming about ten years ago, I have made good friends with people all over the world. I dreamed about gaming like this for 30 years. I owned and loved the old Avalon Hill Flat Top and wished that I could see it on a computer. For years I wished for this....and, now it is here and better than I ever expected.   I am having such a good time in so many ways. Only problem is that my wife just can't stand to see me so dang happy.......
 
 

[decaro]

ORIGINAL: John Lansford

I like AE as much as anyone, but I feel like the developers got confused as to what kind of game they were trying to create.

Did they want a strategic level game, where TF's slugged it out with each other and divisions assaulted defended islands, and logistics and the build up of same was vital?  Or did they want an operational kind of game, where individual ship captains, pilots, the positioning of search arcs and the availability of torpedoes may mean the difference between victory and defeat?  Because, if you've got a strategic game the level of detail in AE is ridiculous, but if you've got an operational game trying to cover the entire Pacific Theater with that kind of detail is just too much for most players.

Perhaps that kind of detail should have been used for a redo of UV, which is a more manageable AO than the entire Pacific.

There is a tendency for game sequels to always be "bigger, better," but I would prefer more "manageable, playable".

[Cribtop]

I'd love fewer clicks, but to me the big advantage of all the micro-managing is very simple - you can't "beat the game." The complexity and detail mean a relative paucity of simplifying abstractions. While this fact is carpal-tunnel inducing, it reduces dramatically the likelihood that one or more of those abstractions will result in reality-warping uberness for any one strategy, unit, etc. (Sure, we had to put paid to uber cap and arty exploits and things of that nature, but there are no Zergling rushes or Stugs that pivot on a dime and thus don't need turrets a la Steel Panthers).

The result of all this? When I play some games, I think "I need to race down the tech tree to get the MacGuffin unit, after which I can sweep all before me." In AE, I find myself thinking things like: "How can I gain air superiority over New Guinea?" "Is this a strategic objective worthy of committing my carriers?" "How can I solve the logistical issues that will allow me to continue to advance along this axis?" That, in a nutshell, is the beauty of the game.

I join those who would love to see the interface improved even further, but I realize there are some limitations resulting from the Grigsby license to the original code.

[bradfordkay]

ORIGINAL: Joe D.

ORIGINAL: John Lansford

I like AE as much as anyone, but I feel like the developers got confused as to what kind of game they were trying to create.

Did they want a strategic level game, where TF's slugged it out with each other and divisions assaulted defended islands, and logistics and the build up of same was vital?  Or did they want an operational kind of game, where individual ship captains, pilots, the positioning of search arcs and the availability of torpedoes may mean the difference between victory and defeat?  Because, if you've got a strategic game the level of detail in AE is ridiculous, but if you've got an operational game trying to cover the entire Pacific Theater with that kind of detail is just too much for most players.

Perhaps that kind of detail should have been used for a redo of UV, which is a more manageable AO than the entire Pacific.

There is a tendency for game sequels to always be "bigger, better," but I would prefer more "manageable, playable".

But you were given just that with the Guadalcanal scenario in AE. A two in one deal!

[Mynok]

ORIGINAL: crsutton

I have two great campaigns of AE going right now. One opponent is in Poland and the other is in Germany. Since I took up computer gaming about ten years ago, I have made good friends with people all over the world. I dreamed about gaming like this for 30 years. I owned and loved the old Avalon Hill Flat Top and wished that I could see it on a computer. For years I wished for this....and, now it is here and better than I ever expected.   I am having such a good time in so many ways. Only problem is that my wife just can't stand to see me so dang happy.......

Amen! I love what the net has brought to wargaming.

[Marty A]

If they were to put the naval patrol and waypoint functions into witp and remove the 1944 allied cap bonus i would think that be a better game. read that to mean more fun to play.

[spence]

My only micro-complain is search arcs. IMO it's not Yamamoto's or even TF commander's job to play with the search arcs every day...

Really...the assignment/lack of assignment of search aircraft had a much more important and decisive impact on the outcome of the Battle of Midway than who was the section leader in the 3rd Watch on Hiryu.

IMHO AE has a lot of detail that matters not at all. I still love the game but some of what the player needs to worry about is not properly a concern of the the theater commander or even TF commanders.

[decaro]

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

ORIGINAL: Joe D.

Perhaps that kind of detail should have been used for a redo of UV, which is a more manageable AO than the entire Pacific.

There is a tendency for game sequels to always be "bigger, better," but I would prefer more "manageable, playable".

But you were given just that with the Guadalcanal scenario in AE. A two in one deal!

Yes, the one scenario, and that's the reason I finally went off the deep end and bought AE.

However, I miss the 15+ ship battles off the 'Canal as the AI tends to use musch smaller TFs; perhaps the AI just isn't that interested in the island as it is worth far fewer points than in UV.

I have noticed that this scenario seems to have been "tweeked" since AE's release, but understandably it wasn't a priority for the developers.

[MorningDew]

ORIGINAL: cap_and_gown

It seems to me that it is not an issue of "hyper-realism" vs "playability." Rather, realism can still be achieved with some degree of abstraction, something that the UV-WitP-AE series has been woefully lacking in. For instance, tracking individual pilots is stupid. For a small game, its kind of fun to see an individual advance. But not for a theater of war involving millions of men. One could easily imagine that a squadron's pilot quality could be abstracted using the exact same mechanism as is currently used, but presenting the player with only the average quality of the squadron, not the individual quality of each pilot. Likewise, messing with altitudes is stupid. This game is not a flightsim. Let the computer decide. These are my two main micro-management issues. Individual ships and numbers of planes in a squadron is fine by me. But getting down to individual men and how they engage the enemy is a little much.

Still an all, I love the game.

I'll agree and disagree with this. I think your first point is the most important...playability. The tracking of individual pilots is awesome, but it is important for these kinds of features to be able to be turned over the a competent AI-helper. Same with altitude etc.

[Puhis]

ORIGINAL: spence

My only micro-complain is search arcs. IMO it's not Yamamoto's or even TF commander's job to play with the search arcs every day...

Really...the assignment/lack of assignment of search aircraft had a much more important and decisive impact on the outcome of the Battle of Midway than who was the section leader in the 3rd Watch on Hiryu.

IMHO AE has a lot of detail that matters not at all. I still love the game but some of what the player needs to worry about is not properly a concern of the the theater commander or even TF commanders.

I love the game too, it's the best strategy game I've played. There's no any major issues, but there is some small things I don't like/understand.

I can ignore squadron leaders or ship capitains if I want to, every squadron/ship have one default leader. But I can't ignore search arcs. The problem is that this game is grand strategy game, not tactical game. In this game turn lenght is 1-3 days, when IRL new search archs were set every day several times. If we play two day turn, the planes keep searching same sectors on a day 2 even when the enemy was spotted somewhere else on a day 1... I think that this is a (small) issue, the game is not nearly flexible enough to use that kind of detailed search.

Another problem is that one plane can only search one sector per day, no matter what the range is. Shorter range should mean that plane could search more sectors per day. So small search plane groups are virtually useless because they can only search so few sectors...

BTW, Midway is not good example why the game have to have search archs, because in this game when carrier TFs launch an airstrike it's detected anyway...


Manual 10.1.1.1 DL OF NAVAL TASK FORCE
...
Add 2 to DL - TF has Air Combat Mission and it reacts to an enemy TF
Add 1 to DL - TF has carrier(s) launching a strike Mission (per air unit that attacks/escorts from TF)

[Sheytan]

I owned SPI Terrible Swift Sword, War in the East, and War in the West. TSS was the only one of the three I wargamed against a opposing team. However, imagine playing either of the latter two solo. I did, so for me WITP and AE is actually quite easy to play. The computer manages much of the stuff I would have to dig into rule books to clarify, and I dont need a pool table as a map stand to play.

And the best part is, irrespective of the size of the computer game, or the number of counters...the dog or cat cant ruin weeks of gaming with one jump.

So for me at any rate the size or complexity isnt a game breaker. What is would be too much redundant clicky clicky. This presupposes the game is good to begin with of course. And in that context of WITP and AE are very good games.

ORIGINAL: fbs


While reading madgamers' concerns that AE is too complex and all, it got me to think about the following: the first computer wargame that I really liked was Panzer General. It was a beer and pretzel abstraction of reality with some 20 units that was very, very fun, and any kid could play. Then I found Steel Panthers, and it was a blast - another small, simple game with some 100 units where I had lots of fun blasting them allied tanks from reverse slopes.

The next significant one was TOAW, but then I didn't have as much fun. I liked TOAW much more in principle, because I'm a grognard and TOAW was definitely a grognard's thing. So I could revel for hours with the 4,000 units and detailed TO&E in the Barbarossa At Tactical Level scenario, but it was a much more serious commitment.

The next escalation is AE; it probably has in the range of 10,000 units plus 10,000 people around, and a game can last for months. The first turn can take days to plan, and the rules are so complex that you have to read a 300+ pages manual and read some 100-500 posts to get through exceptions, details, clarifications, etc...

Then, what's next? A game with 100,000 units that will take years to go through? Don't take me wrong in asking that -- I'm a grognard, and I like AE a lot. I revel in studying complexity (I'm paid good money to debug large, complex systems -- and I use to study Linux kernel as a hobby), so my opinion of the increased size and complexity of computer wargames will always be "Yeah!". I can't help myself. But I'm candid about that: these big, complex wargames are starting to look more like a scholar's research project than a game.

So I wonder what happened with the simple pleasure of hiding my Panthers waiting in ambush. Are we really on the right track with these large, hyper-realistic games?


Thanks,
fbs