![]() The leader counters from the first game, absent in the second, have also returned, and the leaders themselves have been made more significant, as a leader's radius of command and control is now modeled in the game. The scope of the game been magnified this installment covers in snapshot fashion all of the major battles between Russian and Germany during World War II, including Stalingrad, the single most significant battle of the 20th Century. But Close Combat III is by far and away the best in the series. This game will school you in the basic principles of squad level tactical combat, as practiced in World War II.Īssuming you get the idea of the game, how does Close Combat III stack up to the other games in the series? I've reviewed all three games in this series each has been a major improvement over its predecessor and each has ended up one of my favorite games of the year. When you see puffs of white smoke popping up around your T-34 battle tank, back away. And during the battle you must learn to react instantly and correctly to everything that happens. You must spend as much time placing your men before each battle, examining lines of sight and the quality of the team's cover. You'll learn lines of fire, Those little puffs of white smoke around your tank are not good. You must also pay attention to visual cues. You will learn to pick out the whiz of a mortar shell or rumble of a tank tread, even if you can't see those units. Your first warning about a sniper or a team under fire will come over the audio. Close Combat involves a lot of skills that you probably will not have learned in other games. Well, victory is neither to the swift nor the strong, but to the experienced, cautious commander. ![]() Probably a lot of people who've played the demo simply give up at this point. And while you're trying to absorb all this information, process it, and make some decisions, the game is already over. Your tanks are smoking ruins and your soldiers are running away-yes running away!, something you've never seen in a computer game before-someone is yelling about a sniper, bombs seem to be falling out of nowhere, and now suddenly the enemy tanks are coming around the bend and machine-gunning your troops. Gunfire from you don't know where rips your men to shreds. You'll move a few men forward, run some tanks up, and then suddenly all hell breaks loose. However when you first play Close Combat III, you're likely to be overwhelmed. No, you spend your time mastering the subtleties of the battlefield, making this game a richer and more rewarding experience throughout. You don't have to spend hours learning the interface-that can be explained in a couple minutes. So yes, some time must be spent learning how to play Close Combat II, but it's time well spent. So Close Combat III is about as far away as you can get from the simplified abstractions of a C&C-type game, which tend to be very easy to learn yet still fun to play. ![]() You decide, minute by minute, how the disposition and movement of your forces can best accomplish your assigned objectives, but the time and place to fight is not really your decision. It's enough that your job is just to win today's fight, stay alive for another day. You are just an infantry commander on the ground with your troops. What this means is that you are not burdened with larger strategic commands-it is not your job to win the war. In fact, he might not fight at all, having reached the sensible conclusion that by running away, he might have a chance of living one more day.Ĭlose Combat III is also tactical. He has a squad leader, and if his leader's head is blown off by a stray tank round, that soldier probably isn't going to fight as effectively for the rest of the battle. This means every man on the field represents one real soldier. It's realistic almost to a fault.Ĭlose Combat III is also squad-based. Every bullet in every soldier's pack is tracked by the game, and everyone will run out of ammo eventually. Every weapon has its chances of hitting and penetrating its target. Weapon data is drawn from the actual arms used by the armies on the East Front, up to and including the different versions of the tanks that were produced year by year. ![]() Let's look at what that means and why it is so much fun.Ĭlose Combat III is realistic. Close Combat 3 is a realistic, squad-based, tactical wargame set during World War II.
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