Iron Storm

"War is hell"

STORY/PLOTLINE: Iron Storm takes place in both European Theater of Operations (ETO) and Pacific Theater of Operations (PTO). There are two modes you can play in: Standard and Campaign. In Standard Mode, you can fight in ten selected battles. In Campaign Mode, you will take part in a number of battles to ensure your road to victory or ruin. You can fight as Germany, Japan, or the United States. You will then participate in key battles that were fought by that country. These battles range from Mongolia to the Pacific Islands. Your job then will be to achieve the victory conditions defined by the specific battle you are fighting. At your disposal are all the resources (equipment, commanders, etc.) available at that time to ensure victory. You also must not only be familiar with how to fight battles, but also all the planning, logistics, and pitfalls of how to properly plan and fight a battle to ensure maximum effect. This means, causing the enemy to commit more resources and to take more casualties then you receive at the hands of the enemy.

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GAMEPLAY: Gameplay is pretty straightforward. First you must decide whether you wish to play in Standard or Campaign mode. If you are unfamiliar with wargames, I would suggest that you play in Standard mode first to give you a little taste of the action. This game can get frustrating at times so it would be better to just fight one battle then play in a campaign and lose the whole thing due to one messed up battle. Once you feel comfortable, you should select Campaign mode. After you have selected the mode, you will be given a briefing on what that objectives of the battle will be. After that, you are ready to do battle. The menu system can seem a little complicated at first. After you have played for a while, though, most menu commands will become second nature. Since the game is turn based versus real time, you can take as long as you want to make decisions. In order to be successful at this game, you do need to be familiar not only with the menu systems, but also what all the information screens are about. All in all, I believe the gameplay is set up very well and the level of detail (even down to supplying individual units) is astounding.

SCORE: 10/10

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CONTROLS: The controls are pretty easy to use in this game. Once you learn what each button does, it will make it easy to cruise through the many menus described in GAMEPLAY. Again, since this isn't a real time sort of game, you don't have to be the fastest on the controls. Also, being able to correct mistakes is easy although every now and then you may find you ended a unit's turn prematurely since you hit the ''end'' button one too many times.

SCORE: 10/10

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GRAPHICS: Instead of punching out two bazillion little cardboard squares that represented units, you now have the unit actually displayed on the screen. Surprisingly, the units look pretty authentic. You can see the detail of the tanks like the tank treads actually moving when you move a unit. You can see the propeller or propellers on the plane spinning as you move. Other little details such as guns and country markings show up remarkably well. The battlefields are also pretty detailed. When the cursor passes over a specific hex and identifies it as a specific terrain feature, you can see that terrain feature quite clearly. Forests look like forests with their individual trees, swampland looks...well it looks swampy, and the cities look like as you would see them from about 10,000 feet in the air. You can even choose to watch the battles with an animated battle sequence. This basically works like this: You have a unit of ten tanks attack a unit of theirs with ten tanks. An animation sequence will come up showing the tanks on both sides squaring off against each other. Then both sides will let loose with an ''Iron Storm'' of shells at each other. You then get to see each side's tanks blowing up and whatnot. Then a new screen will come up to tell you what experience and training you get for making that attack. I watched a few of the sequences, but they can extend a game out to obnoxious lengths so I usually recommend watching a couple of sequences, then turn of the animation. I do think, though, a better thing would have been to have the units maneuver around and take their shots for a more realistic feeling.

SCORE: 9/10

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SOUND: There's not a whole lot to the sound in the game. To set the mood, you have your choice of background music, 18 of them, to choose from. The background music usually relates to the country that is doing the action (i.e. Germany, United States, Japan, etc.). There are also sound effects in the game. A sound effect goes with every unit whether it moves or does combat. After a while, you will probably turn off the background music. I know I did because hearing the same things over and over again just go plain annoying. Besides, I don't play wargames for the pretty sounds they make; I play them for the action and adventure that comes with each battle.

SCORE: 9/10

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PLAYTIME/REPLAYABILITY: This is a game that you can play again and again since the same battles can present different obstacles for you to overcome. Although the shortest number of battles you have to fight is nine for world domination, these battles can be very challenging. Even in Standard mode, you can have different challenges even though you only have that battle to fight with predesignated units. The most fun I've had was being able to upgrade units and also to get the newer units. It's interesting to see what different units you can get and what they do. This is why even after seven years, I still play the game and still can get frustrated by it. To me, that's a good indicator that the game hasn't lost its luster. Of course, you have to enjoy playing wargames to appreciate this. It does take time and patience to ensure you don't end up going down the losing path. With a possibility of 53 battles to be fought, the combinations can be a lot. Plus, some battles require you to fulfill conditions on previous battles such as victories and complete victories. If you fail to fulfill these conditions, then you will be going down another path of battles which could lead to you failing to achieve world domination.

SCORE: 10/10

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HISTORIC REALITY: I added this heading because I believe that a wargame that deals with historic facts should itself be historically accurate. There are four ''fantasy'' battles in Iron Storm, these battles are: Germany's invasion of the East Coast of the United States and the battle with Japan in India, Japan's invasion of the West Coast of the United States and the battle with Germany in India, and the invasion of Japan (Operation Coronet) by the United States. I will leave these battles out of this critique since I believe more literary license can be extended to these. The manual that comes with the game basically stated the programmers for Iron Storm had to translate from Japanese to English. They then had to translate again for the European place, campaign, and unit names; so far so good. Unfortunately, this seems to have led to a few problems. The first was the names of some of the German units. They got the Bismark right, but it took two campaigns to figure out what the Tiripsu was (for you history buffs, it is the Tripiz, sister ship to the Bismark). They also misnamed other German units such as the pocket battleship Scharnhorst and calling a Panzerkamphwagon (Pzkw) IVE a PzkwVIIE. Other historic anomalies abound such as calling the island of Iwo Jima Oahu (this was during the game when it shows significant events that occurred during a certain time period) and calling Operation Bagration Operation Bagrationiski, the Russian operation to destroy the German's Army Group Center. Also the naming of operations such as Burea (should be Operation Blue, invasion of the Ukarine in 1942) and Tuidadele (should be Operation Citadel or Zitadel or the Battle of Kursk) caused me to cringe. I believe if you are making a historic wargame, you should check references before committing yourself to what you put into the game. All of these problems could have been taken care of if somebody had sat down and made sure that what was being passed was accurate. This, unfortunately, was my only major heartburn with this game.

SCORE: 6/10

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FINAL RECOMMENDATION: Overall, this is a really fun game to play if you enjoy wargames. Although the menu system gets a little getting used to, once you have ''mastered'' it, you will be running battles like a pro in no time. Sound and graphics are sufficiently used in this game to convey the feeling of being on the battlefield although some sounds and graphics (i.e. background music and battle animations) can get annoying after a while. My big pet peeve is with the historical accuracy. Again, if you are going to make a historically accurate wargame, do some research to ensure that you got places, unit names, and operation names right. Although you can't rent this game anymore, I would definitely recommend buying it. There are still a lot of places and individuals who are selling it.

OVERALL SCORE: 8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 05/31/03, Updated 07/24/03