Wargamer: Just wanted to say thanks for doing this interview! Now Close Combat is a very popular and well-known strategy title, its titles obviously going through changes as experience and technology improved. Did it seem like the right answer to take the older titles and bring them up to spec with the current Close Combat titles?

Steve McClaire: I would say that we tried to have it both ways, as much as possible. For Wacht am Rhein, which was our “Battle of the Bulge” releases, we included both our new game and the original Close Combat 4 game, for example.The same with The Longest Day, where we expanded our version to cover the whole of the Normandy landings, while also including the original CC5 game, which was centered on the Utah Beach to Cherbourg campaign.

Jim Martin: Absolutely! Thanks for the opportunity. With Close Combat - Invasion Normandy being the last official Close Combat release quite a few years had passed by since anything serious had been done with the titles with lots of changes in computer operating systems and technology having happened during that time. The Dark Times of Close Combat if you will. With each passing year you'd have more and more problems getting those old versions of the games to run and subsequently seeing fewer and fewer folks being able to run the game at all as newer OS's came out. As a result support for Close Combat was waning during that period for those reasons. Bringing the Close Combat series up to current standards was THE primary mandate and reason for doing these remakes. Everything else was icing on the cake. The icing being the kind of stuff that as fans of the series we could not resist adding. 

WG:  For Steve, were there any big hurdles to clear in programming when doing the remakes of the older Close Combat titles?

Steve: The biggest programming challenge is the size and age of the Close Combat code base. This is a game engine that is some 15 years old now, has been through roughly a dozen major releases, and has been worked on by a lot of different developers over the years. There is a fair bit of baggage, as the engine was originally designed for Mac and Windows cross-platform development, and there are some design compromises, as it needed to perform well, in real-time, on the hardware available 15 years ago. So fitting new features into the existing structure can be a challenge, and some of the existing components can be tricky to modify. As a result it’s sometimes preferable to just re-write a whole component from scratch, and of course this takes extra time.

But one of these re-writes was probably the most satisfying programming I got to do for Last Stand Arnhem. The original Close Combat path finder was one of those components where the design had some compromises so it could run well in real-time. They couldn’t have the whole game stalling noticeably every time you gave a movement order, so it was designed to find a path, or fail to find one, quickly. The result was that you’d sometimes have a unit fail to find a path when it seemed obvious to the player, or the unit would take an odd-looking path just because that was what the path finder could come up with in the time allowed. We knew this was an occasional nuisance in the game, but the complex maps (lots of rivers with narrow bridges) in Last Stand Arnhem were aggravating it. Matrix Games gave us the go-ahead to invest in fixing this the right way. Then our volunteer testing team hammered on it for a couple of weeks. The result is a lot less frustration when moving your units around. It’s probably something players new to the series won’t even notice, but for me it felt great.

WG: For Jim, did you have to do any research for the remakes as project lead/main artist?

Jim: Yes. Development of the strategic maps has required quite a bit of research to bring as much detail and accuracy to them as possible. I can't claim all the credit for each builds research as the small team size sort of requires each of us pitch in where needed and as expertise dictates. For instance since Steve McClaire is the sole programmer on the builds he's been responsible for determining the features list and data design. By default that requires the campaign to be designed with that list and data set in mind. Although the design docs that Steve drafts are very detailed with his own set of research to support that design there's quite a bit more that is needed to be able to do the level of detail required for the strat maps and tactical maps and other art assets. I had to do considerable research for the unit icons, battlegroup icons, patches, unit silhouettes, etc.

Shane Cameron (Southernland) has been the primary tactical map artist for all three builds with myself helping out as time permitted. The team did considerable research to help Shane with his map making efforts and supplement the research we did on our own in order to draw tactical maps to a level of detail and quality that the Close Combat standards require. Lots of aerial photos, ground level photos and historical accounts that include description of the battlefields and events. Remi Fredrix (CSO_Buck Compton) had amassed a huge library of map info for Last Stand Arnhem which he provided for the project which was a tremendous help.

There's plenty of research that was also required for creation of the other art assets of the game. To capture a certain look or detail that helps place the game in the period and give it an added level of immersion. Neil Nello was an artist that worked on the projects in many capacities and has a special knack and knowledge of history and has always been indispensable for his research and knowledge. Really everyone on the team needs to be mentioned as we have all contributed to the research to varying degrees. 

WG: Do you have any personal favorites out of the Close Combat series? Why?

Steve: Personally I have always liked CC2 - “A Bridge Too Far” the best of the original releases.  Even though the campaign system was quite simple,  I think they captured the feeling of a precarious military situation, which could go either way, quite well.  Of the new releases I enjoy playing Last Stand Arnhem the most, as it’s the release where I had a chance to tweak or fix a lot of little things I’d always wanted to.

Jim: I love them all for different reasons. Close Combat - Last Stand Arnhem because of the combined features it contains as well as the depth that brings to gameplay. A very different take on Microsoft's version of that campaign but similar enough to bring back many fond memories of CC2. Close Combat - The Longest Day because I felt it did a really good job of bringing all the D-Day landing areas into one large campaign which makes for some great strategic play combined with the airborne landing features. And it is one of my favorite parts of WWII history. Close Combat - Wacht am Rhein because the campaign topic brings back fond memories of playing CCIV VetBob with the Red Devils gaming clan. 

WG: Were there any features that didn't make it into the remakes? Is there a chance that they'd be put in at another time or title?

Steve: Wow. If there’s one thing computer gamers are not shy about telling you, it’s what they would like to see in a game. So yes, there are a lot of interesting things we discussed but didn’t implement for one reason or another.  Ideas range from additions to the strategic game like artillery units, air interdiction, or choosing your own air drop locations by dragging and dropping units, and tactical combat changes like more realistic handling of indirect fire, or crews that abandon a towed gun when it is under fire, but run back to re-crew the gun later.   I am sure we’ll be reconsidering the list for any future release, but who knows, maybe we will be able to slip some in as updates to the existing games.

Jim: There's never been a lack of ideas about what can be added to the Close Combat features. The understatement of the decade. Steve's choice of features has always been based on what best supports that builds theme. e.g. Airborne drops being added to Close Combat - The Longest Day. That feature adds so much to that release and it wouldn't be the same without it and I couldn't imagine it without. Randomly throwing in features for the sake of adding features is a pointless endeavor. Additionally you have to make choices based on the time and resources available and for that reason I've always felt Steve's approach was spot on and have supported his decisions 100%. To answer the question directly after that back story any new releases would have new features based on the fact new themes would dictate it.

WG:  What was the most fun about working on the remakes for Close Combat?

Steve: As a long time Close Combat fan, it’s just fun to have the opportunity to make something new with the game you’ve always enjoyed playing.  Close Combat also has a very strong modding community, and some of those guys have been playing the game as long as there has been a Close Combat.  We were able to do quite a bit to open up the newer releases, making them easier to mod, and more flexible, and it’s been really cool to see what people come up with, in terms of things they want to do with the game themselves.

Jim: Contributing to furthering a game that has given me so many hours of enjoyment. Hoping it's provided the same level of enjoyment for others. 

WG: What has been the general reaction to the remakes themselves?

Jim: Energetic. We've gotten lots of great feedback on them. Some great suggestions on possible enhancements too. We can’t implement every suggestion, but when there is a lot of consensus on an issue, we try to find a way to address it with the time and resources available.

WG:  Are there any other titles that you play for fun? Was there any inter-office competition?

Steve: I enjoy playing war games of all types, but WW2 games are a personal favorite.  I loved the turn-based Combat Mission games.  FPS games are fun for a quick distraction – most recently Left 4 Dead 2.  I also enjoy RPGs, and have played the Mass Effect and Dragon Age series, but with work and family I rarely manage to finish one of those epics. Inter-office head-to-head can be difficult when you are a very small team and your virtual office is all over the place.  When we do manage to play, it usually ends up being a Close Combat testing session or design discussion.

Jim: I don't really have as much time for playing other games as I'd like. But I own and play several Matrix titles. Highway to the Reich, Forge of Freedom and UFO Extraterrestrials. Other publishers titles, I've got several Call of Duty releases, Blitzkreig I, D-Day and a handful of classic board games converted to computer as well as all the actual Squad Leader board games. The search for a computer based Squad Leader game is what lead me to finding Close Combat.  I'm a big Star Wars fanboy and I've got The Force Unleashed for X-Box. Pretty fun as next gen FPS games go. I'd really like to get Empire at War since it's an RTS.  Another game that I've always viewed as a next-gen game is Mass Effect. From the various reviews and clips I've seen of it, it looks pretty cool. Never had a chance to get it and try it though. Company of Heroes is another title that interests me that I'd love to get. I also have Halo 3, Madden 2010, Tekken and a few others for X-Box. 

WG: I'd like to thank you guys for giving me the chance to interview you, as a final question, are there any future plans for the Close Combat series?

Jim: Thanks for the invite and opportunity. Lots of plans but none that are ready to be announced at the moment.