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Napoleon's Campaigns

	Author: Bill Trotter Article Type: PC Game Preview Publication Date: 11/15/2007 Developer: AGEOD Publisher: AGEOD Publisher: Nobilis Related Categories: , AGEOD, Nobilis

THAT’S ALL VERY NICE, MARQUIS LE TROTTESQUE, BUT WHAT ABOUT NEW GAME FEATURES?

I thought you’d never ask!

Seriously, though, there are more of those than I expected and some of them look to be rather significant. Without having immersed myself for one-tenth as many hours as I plan to, once this ball-buster of a time-sensitive preview is off my back, I can only list them, not tell you how well they work. Which, come to think of it, is all PRE-viewers are usually expected to do. So here goes:

1. The amount of fine-grained detail is not only exponentially larger than in the ACW game, it’s downright mind-boggling. The cast of actual historical characters either on-screen or waiting in the wings, numbers 1500 (give or take the odd viscount or depot commander), and each one of them has a distinct portrait and personal performance stats/personality traits (some of which are very precisely accurate-to-history, and some of which had to be extrapolated from very meager historical data or accounts of their actions). No, OF COURSE they didn’t have to go to such absurd lengths—even the most dedicated life-long student of these campaigns probably couldn’t tell you who two-thirds of these people were or what they did, but having made an all-out commitment to this game, the designers chose to go the extra furlong and cut no corners. Such fanatical and nonessential effort has no discernable effect on game-play, in about 80 per cent of the events likely to unfold, but that’s quite beside the point. They just did it AS A MATTER OF PRINCIPLE (sort of like Grigsby giving every pilot in the Pacific Theater an individual name, rank and microscopic service dossier, it bespeaks of an adamantine refusal to compromise that is either demonstrably manic-obsessive or the quixotic devotion of a perfectionist). You can admire the achievement or mumble “That’s nice” and pay no more attention, depending on your taste, education, aesthetic priorities, or overriding haste to get on the playing the game; It’s really immaterial what your motives are, and no opprobrium will cling to you if you simply don’t care what the artwork looks like, as long as it serves its game-specific function. While I’ve never considered myself an “aesthete” (except, perhaps, when it comes to music, and most days I’m just as happy listening to my collection of The Zombies’ Greatest Hits as I am to my favorite Sibelius tone poems) I’d like to be counted, in this particular instance, as a very strong admirer. Game art just doesn’t HAVE to be this elegant, atmospheric, or as filled with significant details as the roof of the Sistine Chapel. But this particular artwork suggests deeper issues than the usual: “Is it pretty or ugly?”; “Is it historically accurate or anachronistic?”, or (so dismally common) “Boy, will you look at the way they’ve drawn those hooters!”. Not that I have any problem with a well-drawn set of meat-zeppelins, but that’s neither here nor there in a wargame.
2. The artwork found in Napoleon’s Campaigns is at least superior enough to suggest a few unorthodox notions about an element of game design we often take for granted (and, truth to tell, that usually deserves nothing more than a cursory glance), Stop and consider this for a moment: when was the last time a big international game publisher made this kind of more-than-we-really-need gesture out of IDEALISM instead of greed? Never mind scratching your head; to ask that question is to answer it—big multi-national conglomerates almost never do ANYTHING from motives of idealism or altruism, and both of those time-honored qualities used to be very common in the gaming community, if only because most game publishers were also day-in, day-out members of that community. The aloof and obscenely rich sods who control Ubi-Soft—to cite the one such corporation with which I am all-too-familiar—don’t see any real difference between selling “games” and selling toaster ovens; it’s all “product”, isn’t it? And unfortunately, that attitude is reflected in the games they chose to publish; roars of outraged criticism—assuming those unapproachable Suits are even aware of such reactions—are easily drowned out by the fat WHUMP! of quarterly earnings statements being slammed on to the Boardroom conference table in Paris);
3. Depicted with equal care and in even more statistical detail, are over ONE THOUSAND military units, each of them described and pictured as accurately as persistent research would permit. One-third of these sometimes quite exotic outfits you probably won’t ever SEE unless a confluence of rare, even freakish circumstances arises, but doesn’t it increase your confidence just to know they’re IN THERE, SOMEWHERE?
4. The AI—which was no push-over in the Civil War game—has been tweaked to provide even tougher, subtler, and more resilient opposition, and the slower, non-mechanized tempo of operations only works to its benefit;
5. Multiplayer functionality has been expanded. While PBEM still strikes me as the ideal way to maximize both the challenge and the excitement of most campaigns, you can now compete via TCP/IP connections or good old hot seat mode; this is a marginal consideration to me personally, since I’m a confirmed misanthrope with virtually no “spare time” on his hands, I am generally indifferent to most forms of multiplayer gaming (even if I found it more appealing than it is, I seldom have more than 20-minute slices of time available for discretionary investment), but it’s going to be a big attraction for almost everybody else;
6. Rules of Engagement! Strange to state, these are new additions to the tactical element of play, and I suspect they’ll add considerable zip to the combat sequences. They comprise four new buttons, grouped, logically, just below the “Force Posture” icons. Practiced use of both elements combined or in sequence will give commanders some dramatic new options as well as enhanced flexibility when devising their battle orders. ROEs can only be applied to an entire Stack (that’s the only option the mechanics of combat will permit), but you can now, for example, order an entire Stack to launch an “All-Out Attack” and the troops thus committed will really go-for-broke; no morale checks will affect them for 2, 3 or even 4 four phases, which is guaranteed to turn that fight into a bloodbath. If your units can “take it” longer than the enemy defenders, you can sometimes rupture their line wide-open, even if you’re numerically inferior; upset victories become more possible, but always at the price of an enhanced butcher’s bill. Likewise, you can order a Stack to do their best Old Guard impersonation and fight until they’re slaughtered en masse or broken into fleeing fragments. This particular ROE, however, does open up the possibility of sacrifice plays—ordering a stout-statted Stack to stand and die may cause disproportionate casualties to your opponent, or it may divert attention and manpower from other nearby sections of the front, thus buying time for you assemble the units needed to launch a killing blow against a weakened, adjacent part of his line;
7. A number of what AGEOD calls “Napoleonic-specific concepts” are now feasible. Cavalry formations (if they survive the first morale check) can now launch charges at any time, and if they succeed in penetrating the enemy line, will automatically fan out in his rear and begin hunting down and slaughtering whatever weak or disrupted formations they encounter (including gunners and supply personnel, not to mention the odd panicky general or two); very nice indeed! But if the opponent sense a charge is imminent, he also gets a morale-check (actually more of a “training and experience check”) and can try to form squares in front of the cavalry’s aiming point. When this kind of engagement is joined, it turns into a chaotic brawl that will last until one side or the other simply breaks, and it may well prove as costly to the breakee as to the broken, Another new ROE option: if the Old Guard is standing by—whether Napoleon is on hand or not—it can be launched at any perceived moment of opportunity by any general who has sufficient authority, charisma, and status. If the Guard’s legendary striking power collides with enemy units not rated to withstand it, the ensuing melee seldom lasts more than a phase or two before a devastating rout begins, one that might cause the enemy’s whole line to collapse in panic. On the other hand, if you launch the Guard at a comparably experienced stack composed of crack veterans, and that is ALSO commanded by an exceptionally qualified leader, the net effect will be like two five-mile-long freight trains colliding head on under full heads of steam. Cosmic carnage, man, just cosmic! And victory or catastrophe will be balanced on the sword’s edge;
8. Special leadership abilities and bonuses have been greatly expanded to include 24 new skills (such as “boarding attacks” for Admiral Nelson, and the modestly labeled attribute of “Genius” for both Wellington and the Emperor, an almost Super Hero power that enables both commanders to exercise between 10 and 15 “extra” abilities (the maximum enhancement any Civil War leader, even Lee, could “handle” was four!) Lesser mortals, the merely exceptional field marshal or three-star general, can also wield mighty new abilities. A “Defensive Terrain Specialist”, for instance, has a near-magical ability to deploy far more troops on a crammed ridge-summit or mountain peak than a tactician not gifted with that trait. A comparable extra bonus accrues to forces commanded by a leader with the “Offensive Terrain Specialist rating—he might be able to lead sizable forces across alpine terrain that would be impassable to an officer not so gifted. You can see the manifold possibilities of fun and drama embodied in this particular new enhancement;
9. In some battlefield situations, you have the option of deploying a host of new “3-D Sprites”. These little baubles don’t actually DO anything—they’re just a cosmetic frisson—but they are certainly cool to watch (like the ring of recoiling heavy guns emplaced around a city under siege);
10. An intriguing assortment of “special terrains”, along with “special terrain units” you can deploy on such areas: alpine raiders, skilled boat crews for launching amphibious raids, or “Colonial” experts whose presence in a wild and primitive fringe area can help maintain unit cohesion in some of the most God-forsaken regions of the map (the Sahara, the rain forests of Madagascar, the main entrance to Bloomingdale’s at the start of their Washington’s Birthday sale, etc.;
11. The option to “Auto-Garrison” less-endangered or peripheral cities that you dare not leave unprotected, but that previously could only be garrisoned by means of an annoyingly complicated shuffle and re-shuffle of your OOB. This featurette probably won’t be of major importance in most campaigns, but in some situations, it can save you a cumulative amount of hassles. Of course, such auto-generated garrisons DO soak up a percentage of your supplies and replacements, so that’s why the new rule is optional. If you don’t find it useful, don’t toggle it; if you do, you’ll be mighty grateful to the designers for including it.
12. You now have the option of displaying unit graphics in the traditional sort-of 3-D “toy soldier style” or you can eliminate a lot of visual clutter by switching to 2-D NATO icons instead. Mix and match; your choice.
13. Naval combat—which is considerably larger in scope and more important in strategic consequences here than it was in the ACW game—has been very nicely tweaked too. It’s now considerably easier to intercept enemy fleets and bring them into battle (which should be good news for Great Britain, but at the start of my one and so-far only Trafalgar campaign, playing as the French, I used that “intercept” rule, and (more by luck than skill, I assure you), managed to corner and engage a medium-sized British squadron with my larger but under-gunned and palpably less-skilled French detachment. I tore (as it were) the living tar out of the Limeys, sinking two ships to the loss of one, and crippling four in exchange for lighter damage to two of my own vessels. Admittedly, this satisfying little battle did not send tremors of dread through the Admiralty Building in London, but it did boost French morale and helped to even the odds a bit in the Med, which is, after all, the critical theater of war in that campaign. (Wish I could tell you how that business turned out, but I had to suspend playing it to write this piece; the suspense has been unnerving)