Heroes of Stalingrad, 13 Days After the Game's Release. On Serious War Games and Fantastical Creatures

We are thirteen days into Heroes of Stalingrad (HoS) and I thought it was about time for another post. But this post is different, this post is a post about posts.

The Matrix forums have been filled with gamers' thoughts on the game. To be direct, people love it. Not all people, there are always folks who would criticize their own orgasms, but by and large those playing the game enjoy it.  There are, however, a couple of threads that make me chuckle, and it's those threads I want to discuss here.

Tank Girl, another quasi-fantastical warrior.

"Is Heroes of Stalingrad a serious war game?" one thread asks. This question cuts to the core of the Lock 'n Load experience, board or PC. Some in our hobby believe that "serious" (read "realistic") means that you need reams of Excel spreadsheets with armor thickness, rounds per minute, penetration power, and area coverage all entered into neat cells and plotted on pie charts. I say bullshit. War is a chaotic, inhuman endeavor that turns on a dime. It's the actions of individual men and women that determine a battle's outcome. It is the most improbable event, at the most unlikely time, that decides a skirmish. Sure, I did my best to model the tanks, infantry, and weapons of each side, but I also spent a good deal of time puzzling how to model that chaos, and I think HoS does a pretty good job of it. So, if you feel a serious war game consists of a bunch of spread sheets thinly veiled by a computer interface, then no, HoS isn't a serious war game, and I'm proud of that. On the other hand, if you believe a serious war game is a game that captures the feel of war's tactics, you might like HoS.

Weird War. This has drawn some comments and will no doubt draw more. The latter stages of both the Russian and German campaigns branch. If players follow the branch, they'll fight some new, interesting, and wholly fantastical enemies. No, they aren't zombies (Jeesh! You develop one zombie game and everyone associates everything that you do with zombies!). What they are is fun. A heck of a lot of fun. This bothers some people (refer to serious war game discussion) above. Folks don't want my fantastical chocolate mixed with their peanut butter-flavored reality. And I get that. In fact, that's why the branches are optional. Want to relive history? Cool, don't play the branch. Want to have fun, want to pit your Russian riflemen against a... oops, I almost gave it away. If you want to see what the Russian riflemen pit their rifles against, you'll just need to buy the game.

And be sure to post on the forums.

See you tomorrow (whenever that is).