Will Bulge make Airborne Assault redundant?

[bink]

Hi,

I look forward to Battles From The Bulge, and have considered Airborne Assault as well. With all the evolution in the game engine and general similarities, is it worth getting Airborne Assault?

Thanks

[JudgeDredd]

Yes. Conquest of the Aegean is a fantastic game...besides, this one is still at least 6 months off (I'd say).

COTA is worth every penny.

[simovitch]

If by Airborne Assault you mean either HTTR or COTA I would say definitely - I still play both. There are a couple of fairly good Bulge hybrid scenarios done for HTTR as well if that's your cup of tea.

The basic gameplay will not change so you can always train in Greece, Crete, (and North Africa with Patch #3) and move on to Holland before taking on the Ardennes.

[Fred98]

There are 3 games
 
Airborne Assault
Highway to the Reich
COTA
 
 
The first, Airborne Assault is obsolete.  COTa has many improvements over HTTR making it much more user friendly.
-'
 
 

[Erik Rutins]

Note that per the announcement we just released, COTA and HTTR are now on sale through December 31st. IMHO both are still worth getting and since the sale will end with a price increase, there's never going to be a better time than now to pick them up.

[bink]

Erik,

I thought Airborne Assault and Highway to the Reich were the same game? Why is the price going up at this point, when it is already so old?

Thanks,

bink

[HansBolter]

I'm just a beta tester who got onboard after COTA was released, but I believe people are confusing the name of the game engine with the games.

The game engine is called Airborne Assault.

The three games released under that evolving engine are:

Red Devils over Arnhem (original game I know nothing about)

Highway to the Reich

Conquest of the Aegean

Again, my understanding is that the only game in the series that can truly be considered obsolete is the original release Red Devils over Arnhem, although my knowledge is second hand. While HTTR does not have the supply functions added to the engine for COTA, it is definitely not an obsolete game.

While Battles from the Bulge will have additional improvements incrementally added to the engine it won't make any of the previous games obsolete.
It may also come with a revision to the name of the game engine as the focus is moving away from "airborne" operations, but I won't try speaking for Dave on that issue and risk divulging something I shouldn't.

[Arjuna]

Thanks guys for responding.
 
bink,
 
The info supplied by HansBolter is correct.
 
As to why the price of our games are going up in January, that's pretty simple. Its due to the depreciation of the US dollar. Our royalties are paid in US dollars. Over the last year the US dollar has depreciated more than 25% against the Australian dollar. So we are getting a lot less than we were. We have worn that for over twelve months but cannot do so any longer. So the prices are going up.
 
It's no different to other imported products that are subject to currency fluctuations. The fact is that the US economy has performed badly and the Australian economy has been going gang busters. This is reflected in the value of the currencies. It sucks but that is the way of the world. And don't be surprised if there are more price adjustments to come. It's very likely in the next few months that the US Reserve Bank will lower interest rates again and that the Australian Reserve Bank will raise them again, further closing the gap in the respective value of the currencies. This will place pressure for a further rise in the sale price of our product.

[bink]

Thanks for the clarification. I always had seen "Airborne Assault: Highway to the Reich" and thought that the "Airborne Assault" and "Highway to the Reich" meant the same thing.

Does this mean that since all games are part of the Airborne Assault series, that they are paratroop based? How does this fit in with the new Bulge game?

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: bink

Thanks for the clarification. I always had seen "Airborne Assault: Highway to the Reich" and thought that the "Airborne Assault" and "Highway to the Reich" meant the same thing.

Does this mean that since all games are part of the Airborne Assault series, that they are paratroop based? How does this fit in with the new Bulge game?

See my post above. I alluded to the possibility that now that the focus of the games will be expanding beyond airborne operations the name of the game engine may be changing as well.

Actually, both HTTR and even more so with COTA, include quite a bit of non-airborne forces and operations. HTTR includes the XXX Corps ground elements in many scenarios and COTA includes a plethora of scenarios of the ground campaign in Greece.

[simovitch]

ORIGINAL: bink
Does this mean that since all games are part of the Airborne Assault series, that they are paratroop based? How does this fit in with the new Bulge game?

Well, there are two fictional scenarios included that has Von der Hydte's group dropping behind Rocherath-Krinkelt and again at the Muese River bridge at Huy. Other than that the 5th and 3rd FJD are each included in a number of scenarios as well as the 82nd and 101st, albeit as ground troops...

[Hertston]

ORIGINAL: bink

Thanks for the clarification. I always had seen "Airborne Assault: Highway to the Reich" and thought that the "Airborne Assault" and "Highway to the Reich" meant the same thing.

Does this mean that since all games are part of the Airborne Assault series, that they are paratroop based? How does this fit in with the new Bulge game?

The first one was actually called Airborne Assault: Red Devils over Arnhem which was published by Battlefront (of Combat Mission fame). Panther moved to Matrix for the sequel, Airborne Assault: Highway to the Reich which, as has been said, is an expanded and greatly improved version of the first game which makes it obselete. The third game was Airborne Assault: Conquest of The Aegean.

The games so far have been paratroop based, CotA rather less than the Market Garden games, but there is no reason games using the engine have to have paratroops at all. 'Airborne Assault' is just a series/engine identifier, really. The new one will be 'BftB' to most whether Panther give it the AA tag or not.

[JeF]

ORIGINAL: Hertston
The first one was actually called Airborne Assault: Red Devils over Arnhem which was published by Battlefront (of Combat Mission fame). Panther moved to Matrix for the sequel, Airborne Assault: Highway to the Reich which, as has been said, is an expanded and greatly improved version of the first game which makes it obselete. The third game was Airborne Assault: Conquest of The Aegean.

To make it more confusing, if the first game of the serie was released under the name Airborne Assault: Red Devils over Arnhem by Battlefront.com, CDV, distributed it in Europe under the sole Airborne Assault name.

bink, all that information in detail can be found on my website : The Drop Zone

See you,

JeF.