Recently purchased the 1C Complete Pack at Gamersgate. Any opinions as to the best games in the bundle?

Thanks...

King's Bounty trilogy, Cyrostasis, Death to Spies, Space Rangers 2 Reboot, and the Theatre of War series.

There is an awaful lot of dross in the colection.

I grabbed it too, at $20.

The ones (some of which I own) that I'd consider of some value:

7.62mm High Calibre - rough around the edges but there's a big mod that fixes & adds lots of stuff (a must).

Fantasy Wars - like a newer Fantasy General type game

Kings Bounty Series - Lotsa good Heroes of M&M gameplay here.  Looks good.

Men Of War Series - Dunno about this one yet, individually controllable soldiers & equipment in WW2 & Vietnam. RTS

Pacific Storm - The strategy side of it looks like it could be an interesting Pacific war grand strategy lite.

Real Warfare 2: Northern Crusades - The TW-alike with Mount & Blade type campaign.  Hoping the future brings more content, here.

Space Rangers 2: Reboot - A fun 2D open space trader campaign that's turn-based & strategy style.

Star Wolves 2 - Not played much yet but I hear it's like an open RPG-ish Homeworld type game.  The 3rd one doesn't run in WinV/7

Theatre Of War 2/3 - Not played much yet either, more WW2 strategy.  Some ppl here are familiar with the series.

UFO Aftermath/Aftershock/Afterlight - RPG & strategy in somewhat X-Com style.  Fixed resolutions but fun to be had.

I've never played any Death To Spies and I'm not terribly into first-person shooters the last few years so it may be on your list too.  AIM series is an unusual RPG that got decent reviews so I may check that out eventually, too, although I'm not sure how well it's aged.

Overall, that's a lot of gaming for $21!  Hell, Real Warfare 2:NC goes for about that much alone doesn't it?  Or the King's Bounty collection?  I couldn't pass up all that crap for such a low price, had to grab it even though I was over gaming budget.   I've played some King's Bounty the most out of all of them, thus far, but some of the others I already owned and have played more overall (like Real Warfare & Space Rangers 2 reboot, UFO Aftershock)

Theatre of War is an enjoyable set of games - but be warned, infantry are very fragile & the AI can be a little accident prone. However, one big plus (and its an enormous one IMO) is that TOW 1 has both the Polish & French campaigns - as far as I know the only serious real time game to include these - I'm a fan of many of the mainstream games but please, polease - Normandy , Battle of the Bulge & Kharkov???? - how many games do we need on these over ploughed fields? - fighting with the early panzers & Char B's is much more fun IMO.

Of the ones I have played (I review a lot of 1C games):

EXCELLENT: King's Bounty, Men of War, Real Warfare 2, Space Rangers 2

GOOD: Classic Car Racing, Death Track Resurrection, Fantasy Wars

OK: Death to Spies, Off-Road Drive, Pacific Storm, Streets of Moscow, Theatre of War, The Tomorrow War, UFO: Whatever

BAD: A.I.M. Racing, Swashbucklers, You Are Empty

Thank you one and all for the fast and valuable input! I've been trying to decide where to spend my limited play time wisely!

Originally Posted By JaguarUSF (7 MAY 2012 10:00am)

Of the ones I have played (I review a lot of 1C games):

EXCELLENT: King's Bounty, Men of War, Real Warfare 2, Space Rangers 2

GOOD: Classic Car Racing, Death Track Resurrection, Fantasy Wars

OK: Death to Spies, Off-Road Drive, Pacific Storm, Streets of Moscow, Theatre of War, The Tomorrow War, UFO: Whatever

BAD: A.I.M. Racing, Swashbucklers, You Are Empty

can't agree with ToW in the "OK" category -- I'd rate them "Good" -- original ToW with the Bulldogs mod & expaneded campaigns, etc., I'd even head toward "Excellent".

If you like WW2 RTS/wego on the more sophisticated side a la Achtung Panzer, Panzer Command, CM etc., then ToW and ToW2 are definitely worth your time.  They're flawed certainly, but what game isn't?

I'll just throw my vote in for Space Rangers 2.  The game is very well done and has a bit of everything in it. 

Originally Posted By sandman2575 (7 MAY 2012 10:29am)

can't agree with ToW in the "OK" category -- I'd rate them "Good" -- original ToW with the Bulldogs mod & expaneded campaigns, etc., I'd even head toward "Excellent".

I agree about Theatre of War 1 (which I gave a 7/8), but it's not in the bundle. Version 2 (5/8 review score) and version 3 (another 5/8 review score) are less good, which I why I slotted it where I did in my ALL IMPORTANT RANKINGS THAT ARE 100% CORRECT.

Thanks for the input all...

JaguarUSF...I follow your Out of Eight site all the time. I enjoy your reviews and have come to trust your judgement about games...thanks...

Originally Posted By JaguarUSF (7 MAY 2012 10:47am)

 

I agree about Theatre of War 1 (which I gave a 7/8), but it's not in the bundle.

 

i never let things like 'details' or 'facts' get in the way of an opinion, Jim.  

anyway, ToW2 rewards patience if one has a mind to stick with it and put up with some (or more) oddities.  Not my fav ww2 rts, but you can get a lot of enjoyment out of it --

Originally Posted By sandman2575 (7 MAY 2012 1:12pm)

i never let things like 'details' or 'facts' get in the way of an opinion, Jim.  

That's how I review games!

Love your site, Jaguar. Are you ever going to get around to reviewing CMBN? Curious to get your take. Or is it that you hestitate to dip your toes again n that turbulent stream?

Originally Posted By PeterC (7 MAY 2012 3:13pm)

Are you ever going to get around to reviewing CMBN?

Too busy when it came out, and now it's too old to care

I only do about six games a month, so I can't play everything. Plus, the publishers conspire to release multiple games on the same day right after they don't release anything of note for weeks.

Originally Posted By rwenstrup (7 MAY 2012 10:09am)

Thank you one and all for the fast and valuable input! I've been trying to decide where to spend my limited play time wisely!

For a shorter list, I suggest:

King's Bounty Crossworlds + expansion (the latest plus expansion gives like 4 campaigns IIRC, lots of content, turn-based)

Real Warfare 2: Northern Crusades (free-wheeling army commander campaign and TW-like strat battles - but tougher!)

Space Rangers 2 Reboot (if you're into a sandbox space trader/raider that's turn-based)

Fantasy Wars (if you want a lite game on the Panzer General level - once again, turn-based)

Those all have a mix of Strategy with RPG customization in them, so it's obviously what I enjoy the most on the list.  My bias.

Oddly enough, I already owned most of those before purchasing the massive sale pack.  But the whole King's Bounty catalog alone was worth the $21 and I hadn't tried the TOWs or other wargames in it.

I neglected to mention UFO: Aftershock.

Best XCOM style game since the first one.

Yeah.  Afterlight is generally considered to have the best, most refined, mechanics but it's much more cartoonish graphics detracts from the game IMO. 

Aftershock has the grittier setting, but the universal complaint in that (and the first one) is the small amount of tactical maps available for your tac battles.  They get repetitive after a bit, even if you may have slightly different objectives, because you'll be seeing the same maps after a time.

I've only dipped my toe into Afterlight, but I've owned Aftershock for quite some time, and the darker setting of Aftershock (#2 in the series) is being missed.  I wonder why they switched to the cartoonish alien planet thing, in the 3rd one?

That is an insane amount of gaming (though hardly complete as noted, even insofar as the "best" 1C games go).

If you have limited time, you should probably avoid some of the best games as they have massive amounts of content and will suck your life away. (The King's Bounty Collection; Real Warfare, for example.)

If you have any interest at all in Panzer General game mechanics plus any interest in high-fantasy wargames, Fantasy Wars is a good choice. Not monstrously huge (although if this ships with the sequel Elven Legacy and its three expansions then the content multiplies several times over), gorgeous to look at, addictive to play. The designers explicitly set out to remake Fantasy General with 3D graphics and gameplay refinements, but then lost the rights to the intellectual property somehow; so they just wrote their own storyline. Not as epic as FG (where you started with a small backwater army of cheap forces in a hind territory of Australia and saved the world from the Shadowlord who has already taken over everything), but rather more original and detailed. Highly recommended.

The input here has helped a lot...there were so many choices I really didn't know where to start. Now I've got a 'short list' to try.

As always on this site....thanks for your help!