Wargamer Weekly: Trojan Horse By Joe Robinson

So I finally got my Men of War: Assault Squad 2 Cold War review out the door this week. Man that was a tough one to review - it seemed to have so much promise at Gamescom but you never really ‘know’ what a game’s going to be like until you can sit down with it and test for a prolonged period of time. Shame really. In other news we decided to jump on the recent Total War hype train and look at what other options there are for recreating the Trojan War and Bronze Age warfare. Finally, it was time once again to update our list of computer war games still due to release this calendar year. Spoiler alert, Panzer Corps 2 is no longer one of them.

Meanwhile, in the world of wargames...

Big Steel Division 2 Update

Not a downloadable update, but a news-based one. Eugen have been a bit silent recently as to what they’re doing with the real-time tactical WW2 game. In their latest development update, they cover a range of topics:

New Smart Orders Mechanic - The devs are working on a new mechanic - which will involve AI as well as UI improvements, that will allow you to give strategic-level orders to groups of units to cut down on the amount of micromanaging you have to do.

- The devs are working on a new mechanic - which will involve AI as well as UI improvements, that will allow you to give strategic-level orders to groups of units to cut down on the amount of micromanaging you have to do. Army General - the single-player campaign mode is also getting more TLC, with specific love being given to the Bobruisk campaign, to make it more challenging.

- the single-player campaign mode is also getting more TLC, with specific love being given to the Bobruisk campaign, to make it more challenging. Tutorials and Mod tools are still in the works, and are “coming soon”.

The team are also working on the first of their ‘History Pack’ premium DLCs. They haven’t revealed much, but it will include 4 new Divisions, 4 new Historical Battles, a new Army General Campaign and then new units. This will be available to buy individually, or you can buy the ‘History Pass’ which will give you this DLC and the next two History Packs that will come along later.

Field of Glory Empires ‘Triumph’ Update

Grand strategy game Field of Glory Empires has received another milestone update. Version 1.04 improves quite a number of things as indicated by the change-log, but highlights include:

Military Buildings overhaul.

Cavalry overhaul: in some terrains part of the battlefield is for cavalry only.

An army with a leader can attack with a 'Retaliate Expedition' order that will make them not conquer the region (and still fight the enemy).

Abandoning a region now costs legacy

We posted a guide to some basic tips and tricks for the game over on our sister website, if you’re interested.

X-Wing Huge Ship Roll-Out

I like to talk about Fantasy Flight Games every now and then because they're doing wonderful things in the table-top space. Over the past few months their plan for the second edition of the X-Wing Miniatures game has been making way for the return of 'Huge' size ships. They may be 'Huge' in the context of the game, but we're talking about vessels like the Corellian Corvette, or the Imperial Raider. Not so large by fleet standards put from the perspective of a fighter pilot, large enough. Three ships of this class exist in the game - the Tantitive IV (CR90) Corvette, the C-ROC Cruiser, and the Imperial Raider which was a brand new ship designed by FFG with the blessing of Disney, and even featured in EA's Battlefront II.

All these ships had already been released for 1st Edition before it was axed, but now they're finally all being released for second edition, with the CR90 being one of the last to show up. Anyone who already owned the 1st Edition ships can buy the Conversion Kit instead, which will allow them to use their models with 2nd Edition compliant components. Finally, FFG have also announced that they're introducing a new 'multiplayer expansion' that can handle up to eight players, with the potential for multiple large ships and masses of fighters. It even has new templates that allow for a player to move multiple fighters of the same type together as part of a wing.

I moved on from X-Wing years ago - Armada's my jam now and I don't regret it. But I can't help but feel a little jealous as to how creative FFG are being with the dogfighting game.

Close Combat Series Sale

With Close Combat: Bloody First due out next week, Matrix/Slitherine are also running a discount on the Close Combat games made by them (so not the original ones available via GOG). You can see the full list here, and you can get 65% off.

And the rest…

That’s all we have time for this week - see you Monday!