See this? This is what my oldest boy and I have been staring at for hours a day the last couple of months. It’s a computer game called COMBAT MISSION. (The actual graphics are much better than what you can see above).
Yes, I may be an anti-war, bleeding-heart liberal, but…I love wargames! And this is the best one yet.
It’s been out for several years and has won award after award from various computer gaming magazines and gaming associations.
I’ve played a lot of computer games with the boys over the years–this is my favorite ever. The original COMBAT MISSION game–”Beyond Overlord”–has a small bug in it that interferes with playing online (which is what the boy and I do), so we’ve been playing the “Berlin to Barbarossa” update. Better graphics and better play.
I can’t praise it enough. There’s a free demo available for download at the link above. It’s not like the “first-person shooters” out there–it’s a very realistic simulation of what it must have been like to be an actual battlefield commander: moving your armor and soldiers forward along highways and between buildings, directing artillery, winning the high ground. You can play alone against the AI (”Artificial Intelligence” programmed into the game) or against an opponent via the Internet.
Ladies, feel free to just roll your eyes and click on. Gents, you really should check it out. We never really outgrow those toy soldiers…
[UPDATE: I’ll bet a bunch of you–even some of the ladies–played the war boardgame RISK when you were a kid. Is global domination your ultimate goal? Then you should read this RISK Advanced Strategies Guide]
