Civil War Generals 2: Grant, Lee, Sherman

"Fight the Entire Civil War, Or Decide it All on a Deserted Island"

I haven't Civil War Generals 2 in some time, but let me tell you this right now-Wow! I'm a big Civil War buff and I was simply amazed at how detailed, informational, and just plain awesome this game is.


The Gameplay:

Wow. Well first of all let me tell that this is not a Real Time Strategy game. This is a turn based game in which the units have move points and are hexagonal. You can have the various infantry, cavalry, and artillery units line up for marching or change to a battle line. Since the units are hexagonal, one unit could actually be surrounded and attacked six times as well as be pummeled by artillery. This is how you make a unit disperse or surrender. You get short Civil War re-enactment videos that show what type of action your unit is taken. This I found quite fun to watch as the videos are not all the same and vary for each action. A report will be conducted after each battle fought to show how many casualties were taken and what was lost. If you lose a commanding officer a video will play of your man getting shot along with another report asking you if want to replace the commander if he is too hurt to be moved or if he died. This can be very entertaining if you play a historical battle or campaign and have to replace your generals and officers with lesser known officers of the Civil War. The historical value of this game is just phenomenal. I was amazed not only with how many historical battles are in this game, but how well detailed they are-right down to the very units with their commanding officers. Losing a battle will result in you playing a different variant of another battle, but keep on losing and you will lose the war. You can also end a campaign on a draw or major or minor victory represented by a Mort Kunstler painting. I just simply cannot tell you how much information is packed into this game about the Civil War.

The other amazing aspect of this game is the game editor. You can "readjust" a historical map and battle or create your entire own map with your entire own armies. My favorite thing to do was to create about a hundred brigades of 9999 (the max number) naming officers A, B, C, or 1, 2, 3 and then creating a gigantic fort using all of the advanced artillery and weapons and making more casualties in one battle than of all wars combined since Ghenghis Khan. This game allows you to do a lot of fun stuff and I know I spent hours on end playing around with the simple editor and very detailed historical campaigns and battles. From waging Armageddon-like battles or seeing who can win a duel between a farmer's musket and a Whitworth sniper rifle this options are unlimited. You can also you Naval units and fight the iron clad battles or create an island and have the Civil War decided there or on a rocky mountaintop. If you look up fun in the dictionary, the editor in this game will be mentioned in the definition.


The Graphics/Sound:

It is all in the detail. The maps are designed as closely as possibly to what the actual battlefield looked like back then. The game is very simple looking, and the graphics aren't as detailed as they are representations of things. Of course you have plenty of various terrains to make with an easy to use height and water adjuster in the editor. Everything is pretty much a representation of what you have so think of this game as a Civil War version of Risk. The videos are from various re-enactments and are pretty fun to watch. Some videos may get repetitive, but a simple click gets you right to the after battle reports. There is time representation as well so the map will change from day to night. At night your units will be shown as camped out in tents. You can still move them but you can't fight at night. You also get detailed pictures and descriptions of the various weapons you can buy to re-equip your armies with. The sounds are short and quick that go along with the movements and then you have MIDI versions of all of the historical Civil War music you can think.


Final Recommendation 9/10

I didn't play Civil War Generals 2 until around 2000 and 2001. I can't believe that it has been seven years since then, but I remember playing this game like it was yesterday. It is a very engrossing game countered only by a preset calculator of your assets and casualties lost in a battle (which is always 1/3). However you get one awesome and mind blowing game that should be a part of every Civil War buff's collection. There is a lot of resourceful information as well with all of the detailed battles featured in the game. You may be thinking that there are plenty of games out there that are detailed and stay very accurate to historical battles in other Civil War games. But you will believe when I say this game is the mother of them all. Civil War Generals 2 is a great and sure to take some well spent hours to play.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/26/08

Game Release: Civil War Generals 2: Grant, Lee, Sherman (US, 10/31/97)