The Russians are Coming!

I guess the big, to semi-big news yesterday was that yet another game has garnered the necessary preorders for printing. In this case the game is a personal favorite of mine, Dawn’s Early Light (DEL). Designed by Peter Bogdasarian, the title is another in his well-received Corps Command series. Peter’s first Corps Command game, Totensonntag, which takes about a month to learn to pronounce, was proclaimed game of the year in 2008 by Paper Wars magazine.

Totensonntag is World War II, by contract Dawns Early Light is World War III. In fact, it takes place in the universe inhabited by our World at War series. That’s the coolness, and it has also been the confusion. Although the game takes place in the same universe, it isn’t the same series. World at War is a micro view of the combat, whereas Dawn’s Early Light is a macro view. In WaW gamers control handfuls of tanks and infantry as they valiantly battle for bridges and cities. It’s the perspective from which I wrote Revelation. In DEL players direct formations of dozens of tanks, and hundreds of soldiers as they fight for kilometers of West German territory.

It’s loads of fun, at least if you enjoy fighting for kilometers of West German territory. The game is simple, no charts or tables. Enemy units are fought by rolling a die, adding it to a combat factor and comparing it to the enemy’s defense. If greater, the enemy is hurt, if less, the enemy laughs in your face.

Laughing aside, the game is completed (has been for the better part of a year), the orders are there, and Guy Riessen of DreamWorks’s A Christmas Story is on the art. With luck, DEL will be at the printer’s in November and shipping before Christmas. I can’t wait.

See you tomorrow.