1940 Meuse Crossing v2.0 pln Review - December 2002

Welcome to the first full mod to CC5, 1940 Meuse Crossing…

1) What is it?

This mod takes place back in the early days of World War II, the Germans have taken Poland, Denmark and fighting is still going on in Norway. Britain and France have declared war on Germany but they have been waiting for the Germans to make the first move in the west. They believed they were safe with France having the Maginot line and plans to quickly reinforce Holland and Belgium in the North. In between these two forces there was a lightly defended area and as luck or fate would have it this is where the Germans planned there breakthrough. 1940 Meuse Crossing re-enacts the fighting that took place as the Germans came out of the Ardennes forest and raced to cut the allied forces in two. While as the Allies you hope to use the natural barrier of the Meuse River to hold the Germans so that reinforcements can arrive. Originality 9/10.

German forces plan there advance. Air, mortar and artillery support has yet to be assigned …

2) What do you need to install the mod?

The current version you can download is a plug-in, which makes life easier as the original seemed to cause problems for some people. You will need to download the plug-in, 13 new maps (the other maps are reused CC5 ones), and have a full install of CC5. Everything can be downloaded from http://www.close-combat.net or http://www.militarygamer.com/CCJimmyD/Meuse.htm. After downloading the files, the maps will have to be uncompressed into the maps directory and the plug-in put in the plug-in manager’s plugins directory. Now you can open the Configuration Manager and install the mod (to be safe make sure you have Configuration Manager v1.3, it is latest version I know of). Installing 8/10

3) Why DL this mod?

This mod gives CC5 a different feel as a lot of the heavy weapons that we know from WWII have not been developed yet. You will also be surprised, especially in H2H play that the Allies really were not out gunned but were out manoeuvred by German training and tactics. The German tactics called for air, infantry and tanks to be used as a combined force on a very narrow front with the goal of breaking through a line rather than pushing it back. The blitzkrieg! Can you match what the Germans did using PZII’s?

German forces come out of the Ardennes forest…

4) What is changed from the original?

The mod team changed almost everything from CC5. The Americans have been removed from the west side of the map and Germans start there. But it isn’t the same Germans as all the equipment and units have been changed. In the east the Germans have been removed and French troops, equipment, tanks, voices, etc. have been added. Thirteen new maps have been made that are very good but it would have been nice to have more (maybe some day… hint hint map makers). One thing the team didn’t change was the medals but another CC fan, Dynomite, has drawn new ones that can be downloaded from www.close-combat.net to be used in the game. Unfortunately adding them is not easy if you have not tried to mod CC files before. Overall the quality of the graphics and sound to me is very good and the mod team succeeded in making CC5 new again. Graphics 7.5/10 Sound 7.5/10

Selecting French forces to the hold the Germans…

5) Issues?

This mod does not use CC5.01a which may make it more unstable in multiplayer play (based on the fixes Atomic did for 5.01a). Based on the timing of the mod, the patch would have come out after the mod would have already been started.

Hedges in the Meuse mod and CC5 are treated like a wall thus troops and AT guns hide behind them instead of in them. While mods like Clubssi (a collection of data fixes and changes to hedges and mortars found here at www.close-combat.net in ZPlugins31.zip), Superpatch (a collection of data fixes and the Atomic’s 5.01a patch which was replaced by the Clubssi mod as people had problems installing 5.01a) and GJS treat hedges more like heavy bush. Your feelings on this will depend on what you feel is more realistic and on what you’re use to.

Some people have raised an issue with guns not fitting into buildings, which makes them very vulnerable to direct fire (they are also very vulnerable to mortars, but mortars were made less accurate in v2.0). As for the guns in buildings, an unofficial fix is available from another member of the CC community and this plug-in can be found here http://datafixes.cjb.net/. There is still some debate about how often guns were placed in buildings in 1940 and this may impact play balance as the campaigns were not designed taking this capability in account.

These items along with the high number of original CC5 maps do impact game play a bit. Game play 7/10

6) The Mod team

The mod team consisted of Luer and Moloch who worked on this mod from January to May 2001. Luer was responsible for the data changes, with a bit of graphics and historic research, while Moloch handled the rest. Both mod makers names have appeared together and individually on others mods; Afrika mod for CC3, Winter War for CC4, Finland Mod for CC3, PanzerJager mod for CC3, Real Romanians for CC3, etc. . Unfortunately the constraints of real life and time maybe taking away some of the enthusiasm for CC have made these two mod makers less active the last couple of years…. To the mod team, thank you for breaking new ground with this mod and all the extra hours of game play you added to CC5!

Originality               9.0/10
Installing                 8.0/10
Game play               7.0/10
Graphics                  7.5/10
Sound                      7.5/10
TOTAL                     78 %

PS: No 10’s cause there always something….

Disclaimer: I’m just a CC fan and not a writer of any sort. Thanks to mod makers for providing the game and Pott for the forum to talk about it. Also, thanks to BAMBAM887 as this review used your GJS review as its guide….

 

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