Road To Moscow

[MrBoats]

I remember the Road to Moscow project some years back -- does anyone know what ever happened to it? It seemed like the release was imminent at points, but kept getting pushed back. It looked like a promising system. I'd give anything for a WIR update with larger maps and better graphics. TOAW is not bad, but I'd like a game dedicated to the Eastern Front.

[sterckxe]

ORIGINAL: MrBoats
I remember the Road to Moscow project some years back -- does anyone know what ever happened to it?

I did a review of the beta a couple of years back. It's over here :

http://tinyurl.com/27ocp7

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Terminus]

I remember ogling the thing all those years ago. Too bad they didn't actually have a shot of making a playable game out of it.

Reminds me a bit of the old PC game Patriot; a good idea, but 0/10 in implementation.

[hueglin]

ORIGINAL: Terminus

I remember ogling the thing all those years ago. Too bad they didn't actually have a shot of making a playable game out of it.

Reminds me a bit of the old PC game Patriot; a good idea, but 0/10 in implementation.

Ah yes, Patriot. An idea that sounded great, but a game that looked O.K. and played horribly.

[sullafelix]

 At least Road To Moscow was never sold. Does anyone remember UMS series. I think it was UMS 3 that I was absolutely in love with from the previews. Too bad that an intel quad was needed to run a 94? game. I tried and tried to play it. Imagine an operational Alaxander's campaigns. Oh the horror.

[MrBoats]

Ah, UMS. One of a few hundred games I bought without reading any reviews, only to wind up using the disks for table-leg wedges or drink coasters. "The War College" or whatever it was called comes to mind also. And the OLD "Art of War" game that had pasty white zombies dancing across the screen, supposedly following some sort of strategy. Also, the old ('91 or so) Waterloo game that was supposed to be a 3D simulation. Awful! I wish I had all the hundreds I spent on those damn things.

[Nemesis]

ORIGINAL: sulla05

At least Road To Moscow was never sold. Does anyone remember UMS series. I think it was UMS 3 that I was absolutely in love with from the previews. Too bad that an intel quad was needed to run a 94? game. I tried and tried to play it. Imagine an operational Alaxander's campaigns. Oh the horror.

I had UMS2, and I played it on an Amiga 500. I never got past the first turn in any scenario, since it took the AI about 45 minutes to go through its turn .

Now, if someone took UMS, modernized it and brought it back to modern times, things would get interesting. I think we finally have enough CPU-power to handle UMS .

[ravinhood]

UMS was one of the worst games I ever played on the Amiga. Another game that patterned after it "Carthage" wasn't too bad.

[pzgndr]

the RtM game concept is - apart from the over-ambitious scope - virtually identical to the Airborne Assault series games.

It would be interesting to see Panther Games try something like this. Apply their tactical game engine and AI to a larger operational conflict with division-size units and independent regt/bde units. Not real-time though, but perhaps daily or half-day time increments. It would have to be manageable for a full Russian Front wargame. It sure would be nice to give orders to corps or armies or entire army groups and then have a decent AI execute your plans, allowing players to pause the action to reorganize forces and reassign objectives as needed. [8D]

[sterckxe]

ORIGINAL: pzgndr

the RtM game concept is - apart from the over-ambitious scope - virtually identical to the Airborne Assault series games.

It would be interesting to see Panther Games try something like this. Apply their tactical game engine and AI to a larger operational conflict with division-size units and independent regt/bde units. Not real-time though, but perhaps daily or half-day time increments. It would have to be manageable for a full Russian Front wargame. It sure would be nice to give orders to corps or armies or entire army groups and then have a decent AI execute your plans, allowing players to pause the action to reorganize forces and reassign objectives as needed. [8D]

A COTA or HTTR game with a couple of hundred units each side is perfectly managable. This means that current technology and hardware can manage a Barbarossa type game at the divisional level. Such a game would be awesome.

Such a strategic level game would in fact be easier to create than the current Panther Games engine as a lot of things that come into play on the tactical level (LOS, LOF, FUP's) aren't needed in a strategic level game.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Peter Fisla]

I really liked the idea of RtM, I wonder if the developer is still working on the project on its own...from my point of view it's a very interesting project and I would like to see it making it happen - even if in a limited scope.

[sterckxe]

ORIGINAL: Peter Fisla
I really liked the idea of RtM, I wonder if the developer is still working on the project on its own...from my point of view it's a very interesting project and I would like to see it making it happen - even if in a limited scope.

"Battlefield Design Group is composed of long-time game developer Jeff Billings, formerly of MicroProse, systems guru Andy Finkel of Commodore's Amiga fame, and Phil Gardocki, designer and developer of the original ROAD TO MOSCOW game published in 1984 for the Commodore 64. Ken Maniscalco and John Caskey round out the group, bringing over fifty years of gaming, engineering, and scholarly experience to the team."

Maybe if you're interested enough you can trace one of these guys.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[leastonh1]

ORIGINAL: Nemesis
I had UMS2, and I played it on an Amiga 500. I never got past the first turn in any scenario, since it took the AI about 45 minutes to go through its turn .
Now, if someone took UMS, modernized it and brought it back to modern times, things would get interesting. I think we finally have enough CPU-power to handle UMS .

I had UMS1 on my A500 and loved it, even though it took a long time for each turn. I can still remember spending literally hours moving each individual unit on the Battle of Hastings scenario! Wow, that's a blast from the past!! Crikey, I feel old now. [:)]

It would be a good one to bring back to life though as the premise was sound. Then again, it could just be my old, failing memory playing tricks on me [:'(]

[Peter Fisla]

ORIGINAL: sterckxe

ORIGINAL: Peter Fisla
I really liked the idea of RtM, I wonder if the developer is still working on the project on its own...from my point of view it's a very interesting project and I would like to see it making it happen - even if in a limited scope.

"Battlefield Design Group is composed of long-time game developer Jeff Billings, formerly of MicroProse, systems guru Andy Finkel of Commodore's Amiga fame, and Phil Gardocki, designer and developer of the original ROAD TO MOSCOW game published in 1984 for the Commodore 64. Ken Maniscalco and John Caskey round out the group, bringing over fifty years of gaming, engineering, and scholarly experience to the team."

Maybe if you're interested enough you can trace one of these guys.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

I'm currently too busy working on my won project...but I wouldn't mind being a tester for RtM.

Eddy, got your PM and will send you the package when I get home today.

Peter

[marcusm]

UMS was one of thoe love or hate games.

Though. Spectrum had the best early days wargames (Desert Rats ftw).

marcus

[SeaMonkey]

ORIGINAL: sterckxe

ORIGINAL: pzgndr

the RtM game concept is - apart from the over-ambitious scope - virtually identical to the Airborne Assault series games.

It would be interesting to see Panther Games try something like this. Apply their tactical game engine and AI to a larger operational conflict with division-size units and independent regt/bde units. Not real-time though, but perhaps daily or half-day time increments. It would have to be manageable for a full Russian Front wargame. It sure would be nice to give orders to corps or armies or entire army groups and then have a decent AI execute your plans, allowing players to pause the action to reorganize forces and reassign objectives as needed. [8D]

A COTA or HTTR game with a couple of hundred units each side is perfectly managable. This means that current technology and hardware can manage a Barbarossa type game at the divisional level. Such a game would be awesome.

Such a strategic level game would in fact be easier to create than the current Panther Games engine as a lot of things that come into play on the tactical level (LOS, LOF, FUP's) aren't needed in a strategic level game.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

Man are you ever on ..Eddy. This is exactly where this game engine needs to go. After BftB and the patch for CotA there will be plenty of estabs and database for the modders to create anything else needed at this scale.

Time to evolve this excellent engine to the more operational-strategic scale and develop the PBEM aspects. It would serve to attract another genre of wargamers and indeed could prove to be the marketing "Coup de Grace" the Panther boys deserve, especially Dave/Arjuna.

East Front would be the perfect initiater.

[marcusm]

It would be more of a return since they started with an East Front wargame .
Great wargame for my Amiga but a tad limited scope.

Marcus

[sterckxe]

ORIGINAL: SeaMonkey
Time to evolve this excellent engine to the more operational-strategic scale and develop the PBEM aspects. It would serve to attract another genre of wargamers and indeed could prove to be the marketing "Coup de Grace" the Panther boys deserve, especially Dave/Arjuna.

No argument on the deserve part, but I'm in the IT business and have a pretty good sense of how much it would cost to create such an engine - and it would have to be created from zero as the current engine is too much linked to the operational-tactical level.

Short version : think 5 man/years minimum - that's easily 250K, at a net $25/game sold it needs to sell 10K units to break even. In other words : it needs to be a hit or you go bust .

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Peter Fisla]

A stupid question: What's this "UMC" wargame on Amiga you guys are talking about ? I still have my Atari 1040 STE (Upgraded TOS 2.06 and 4MB of RAM) any chance this game was also on Atari ST ?

[marcusm]

Yes it was. Universal Military Similuator was sort of the early attempt at a "Wargame construction Set".

Marcus