Matrix Games Forums

Rather untimely I suppose, but I just purchased Hearts if Iron and as I learn to play it I am curious as to others comments on the game. Also I am looking for some online games, any takers?

I am biased (it's well known ) but Bismark over at Wargamer is a well established voice who can lend you a lot of commentary on the game.

If you are going to play the game, I think you want to hunt down the guys doing the CORE mod for it.

I dont like the airwar. It is poorly done, "arcadely" and unfixable. Naval part is a bit "abstract" but landwar is "okay".

Absolutely brilliant idea... Absolutely atrocious vehicle.

The mods help, but this is $40 I wish I had back right now... Maybe when CORE gets done with it I'll reconsider.

I probably wouldn't be so bitter had the game not seemed like such a great concept at first... High expectations leads to high frustration sometimes.

Yes high expectations gets almost all of us.

I am desperately waiting on about hmm 5-10 games as we speak.

If conditions are like they often are, I have a mathematically reasonable chance of getting at least 1 major industry failure no matter how I try to avoid it.

Only thing I can do is suffer through not getting any of them until they have been on the market for a few months, and not volunteering to be part of the first wave.

HOI?

Great concept and it's playable..

That's about all I can say about it. On release (and still!) the techs weren't fully implemented, units were unbalanced, even the interface was jacked.

Typical SF release. Way too early. It's only achieved the point of becoming slightly interesting and yet patches have slowed to almost nothing. I figured another 1 or 2 and it'd be wonderful!

But don't get me started... I bought Strike Fighters. Before it was ever officially released. Just don't ask. Those poor bastids at Third Wire... I feel really sorry for them. They got the worst deal of the christmas release jamboree that year.


Also don't get me wrong - it's a good system, just not where it should be. I'm still waiting for those patches...

There is the SF way, and there is the Matrix Games way.

SF way you get it now whether you really want to or not.

Matrix Games way, you wait till it's actually done before you get it, and if that means they make you wait and wait and wait, then you wait.

I can only speak for myself, but 100 bucks only enters my life as expendable cash perhaps once a year.
Which explains why I have so little resistance to saying such nasty things about SF.

They earned each nasty comment I have ever made.

Talk all you want about SF

But the makers of HoI made some incredibly stupid design choices too

Research model is confusing and not accurate
i.e you have to research tank machine guns at the begining of the game even though those were standerd ohh...about 1918?
Then for production and manpower and what not you have of all things....SLIDERS!?
Whoever came up with this concept needs to be beaten with a bambo pole....its just plain dumb design
Then the game has no concept of supply
I was playing as Germany and decided to invade Poland
I left a 1 area gap in my lines...lo and behold a Polish infantry division slips thourgh and captures Berlin
Then it takes 120 days to raise a new infantry division and they are at a very low proficiency rating...not the case in wartime Britian, America and Germany
Then probably the dumbest descision was to make the game realtime
Say you set an offensive to begin at 5 am....you hit the go button and it flys by....your lucky to get it stoppedm within a few hours of 5 am
There is no way to stop the game at a preset hour

This is just scratching the surface
Not a bad idea...but unfortunatly it fell to these idiots to come through on it

But all is not lost....we have another shot with WIF

Fallschirmjager wrote:Talk all you want about SF

But the makers of HoI made some incredibly stupid design choices too.

As in it's choice of publisher? I was quite emphatic with all their earlier stuff. I was very surprised it came out when it did after following the dev news about it for awhile. I had reason for my surprise. The other 3 games I got from SF that Christmas season weren't fully realized either. The other BS can be easily fixed given much time with games that utilize numbers like that. It's just a matter of time, and that's exactly what they didn't get.

Les the Sarge wrote: There is the SF way, and there is the Matrix Games way.

Amen true believer.

Les the Sarge wrote: I can only speak for myself, but 100 bucks only enters my life as expendable cash perhaps once a year.
Which explains why I have so little resistance to saying such nasty things about SF.
They earned each nasty comment I have ever made.

Once again.. I have to say you've stated it the way I would if I'd shut the f*ck up long enough to. And I've spent plenty more than 100 bucks. Even in Canadian money! I am an idiot for buying those. Most of them came from that last christmas shopping spree when SFI was laying ppl off and dealing out a wholesome amount of despair all around. I kick myself.

If there isn't at least ONE person waiting for me to slag HoI yet again, I would be actually surprised hehe.

But to inject some contrast (I DO try to insert contrast when I can ) check this thread out.

http://www.warfarehq.com/forums/showthr ... ge=1&pp=15

It concerns my beloved ASL and it's future.
If you look, you will see, that I am not the sort that will heap praise on a company merely cause I like their game either.

I am a damnding wargamer, and never let it be said otherwise

So yes, I will say I hate something or someone if I truely feel that way, and I will say I like something or someone (businesses that is eh) if I truely do.

The game and or company has to earn my respect first, before they get it given out from me.

Strategy First has an indifferent callous business practice in my opinion.
Regardless if you have come to like HoI after all this time of it being tweaked and modded and patched, the fact remains, it was published by a company I would rather watch go out of business.

NefariousKoel wrote:HOI?



But don't get me started... I bought Strike Fighters. Before it was ever officially released. Just don't ask. Those poor bastids at Third Wire... I feel really sorry for them. They got the worst deal of the christmas release jamboree that year.

Was that the Walmart version?

Sultanofsham wrote:Was that the Walmart version?

Oh yes. I worked for a supplier and was in one of our local Wal-Mart customers dropping off some stuff when I saw it. I thought "wow, I didn't know that was released!" IIRC it was something like $55. I bought it. It ended up being an Alpha version. After the official release, I was able to scan the back of my CD case which had the CDkey on it and e-mailed it to SF in Canada. They promptly sent me the official release version. Which was still an Alpha!

Here I am approximately a year and a half after I bought the thing with one patch that barely makes it playable. The second one has been in "testing" for months. I am not happy.

HOI was a terrible load of bull, IMHO. The real-time aspect in a game of this scale (grand strategy) was completely unworkable. Out of the box, the game was hardly playable, because it crashed every other minute. The tutorial was a joke, the game interface confusing, managing your country a chore, the research model an exercise in micro...no...nano-managing (I mean in a game of this scale do I really have to make separate research orders for every component in a tank or plane), before you configure the pop-ups you'll get swamped by them in the first 5 seconds of the game...etc. etc. (IMHO, YMMV and so on, of course) Man, I really hated this game.

NefariousKoel wrote:Oh yes. I worked for a supplier and was in one of our local Wal-Mart customers dropping off some stuff when I saw it. I thought "wow, I didn't know that was released!" IIRC it was something like $55. I bought it. It ended up being an Alpha version. After the official release, I was able to scan the back of my CD case which had the CDkey on it and e-mailed it to SF in Canada. They promptly sent me the official release version. Which was still an Alpha!

Here I am approximately a year and a half after I bought the thing with one patch that barely makes it playable. The second one has been in "testing" for months. I am not happy.

Yeah I remember the lead designer saying they had no idea SF was going to pull that. He wasnt happy at all.

Any of you guys that have played HoI, how does it compare to Medieval Total War? I thought about buying HoI but wow this thread is really giving me something to think about.

Hmm well I have never heard anything negative about Medieval Total War, which automatically makes it better to some extent eh:)

ShermanM4 wrote:Any of you guys that have played HoI, how does it compare to Medieval Total War? I thought about buying HoI but wow this thread is really giving me something to think about.

I played M:TW much much more than HoI. Dont get me wrong - HoI would be a great game if it was fully realized, which doesn't seem to be happening. If you're making a decision between the two, I'd defenitely recommend Medieval Total War. It's great.

ShermanM4 wrote:Any of you guys that have played HoI, how does it compare to Medieval Total War? I thought about buying HoI but wow this thread is really giving me something to think about.

You cant compare the two



But Medieval Total War is great

Just one thing

What sort of system will you be running it on?

It takes some juice for the larger battles

About HoI. Yes, at version 1.00 it was unplayable but in version 1.05c with CORE mod it is really getting there. It is not done by any means but I know alot of people that love this game even though the game has it's faults.

If anyone only played the game in version 1.00 - 1.04 try it with 1.05c installed and CORE mod. You might like it.

Install order:
1.05
1.05c
CORE

Patch: http://www.paradoxplaza.com/downloads.asp
CORE: http://hoi.coremod.org/

Kung Karl,
I don't have it installed right now, but I might change that if it's really worth it. How many more patches are in the works right now? I haven't checked the HoI forums in months... How far has CORE really come? Last time I checked there was nothing but bickering going on - seemed like someone got kicked off the boards every other day at one point...