Cuban Missile Crisis Review
21 January 2006 | By Alex Jeffreys
No-one wins a war, man. Especially not in this game
If an American U2 had been shot down over Cuba during the 1962 Missile Crisis, and the Soviets had been a tad more assertive about their desire to keep nuclear missile bases in Cuba, then perhaps the world would have gone to war again, resulting in the greatest conflict in all history. Wouldn't that have been exciting and stupid. Cuban Missile Crisis: The Aftermath answers that rhetorical question with a resounding no and yes.
This is a strategy game in which you can play out some of the battles of history that never were, and later wish that you had never bothered. In that sense, this is a lot like real warfare. CMC: TA offers the options of being China, The Soviet Union, Germany/France or America/England. Each of these different factions plays out a different campaign. To be honest, it really doesn't matter who you pick as the gameplay is going to screw you no matter who you are. There are some differences in hardware and whatnot between factions though, so pick your poison and plunge into a series of mainly random battles, which you'll probably loose.
In theory the year is 1962, however your units appear to be taking a page out of the modern day warfare book and seem to enjoy nothing better than hurling themselves to certain doom in front of enemy units with all the glee of a chicken with its head removed.
On the other hand, the enemy is an awesome fighting force with the ability to actually smell your units from a mile away. The merest hint of a pinky finger and they're all over you, destroying your army and taking your position. There are no middle grounds in these battles, it's kill and conquer all the way. Unfortunately for you, unless you spend a lot of time in this game painstakingly moving forward yard by yard, you're going to be treated to the sight of your infantry and hardware taking a fiery pounding a lot. The enemy is also better at hiding than you, though you might occasionally take a position by randomly driving over a trench filled with enemy soldiers that you couldn't see anyway.
This is due to the game being played in the same manner as many RPG’s. There is a strategic map, and you maneuver your units around it. Sounds simple enough, except you may run directly into enemy troops, in which case battle ensues. These battles are real time fought battles, spontaneously generated by the AI system which hates you. The game uses a point and click system to play these, with you clicking where you would like to move your units and, once you find the enemy, right clicking to fight them. There is an alternate option if you don't actually want to fight these battles, an auto resolve feature which fights the battle for you and lets you know the outcome. I’ll save it some time and inform you now, you lost. This is because you suck. At least, that is the conclusion I came to with this game.
In this sense CMC: TA does give you the opportunity to get a better feel for what it's like to run a war. You get to send out troops to die, who will then more than likely fail to achieve the objectives they were supposed to accomplish, probably fall over each other in the process, and in general behave like a bunch of idiots.
So gameplay wise it's a tad on the difficult and annoying side. The storytelling is not that much better either, unless of course, you like to read. There is ALOT of reading involved in the story of this game, screeds of text let you know what us going on which means that ironically this game can be played simply by reading and clicking around on your strategy map. Which makes it rather like a not very good book.
On the plus side, the interface is fairly easy to use and you'll know where you are in the game due to the “chapter” devices which break up the stages of your campaign.
Graphics and Sound wise this is nothing to write home about, both can be described as sufficient. In some sense, this game is like a pick your own adventure book that mutated into the pc gaming world. You're going to need to use your imagination in order to enjoy this game.
So there you have it, essentially this is two games in one, a turn based war game and a real time battle game. Both aspects of the game leave something to be desired, the real time aspect more than the turn based however, as the AI stacks the odds so firmly in the enemies favor. This does teach us a lesson though.
No-one wins a war, man. Especially not in this game.
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| Incoming! | Freaking Radiation! |
This is a strategy game in which you can play out some of the battles of history that never were, and later wish that you had never bothered. In that sense, this is a lot like real warfare. CMC: TA offers the options of being China, The Soviet Union, Germany/France or America/England. Each of these different factions plays out a different campaign. To be honest, it really doesn't matter who you pick as the gameplay is going to screw you no matter who you are. There are some differences in hardware and whatnot between factions though, so pick your poison and plunge into a series of mainly random battles, which you'll probably loose.
In theory the year is 1962, however your units appear to be taking a page out of the modern day warfare book and seem to enjoy nothing better than hurling themselves to certain doom in front of enemy units with all the glee of a chicken with its head removed.
On the other hand, the enemy is an awesome fighting force with the ability to actually smell your units from a mile away. The merest hint of a pinky finger and they're all over you, destroying your army and taking your position. There are no middle grounds in these battles, it's kill and conquer all the way. Unfortunately for you, unless you spend a lot of time in this game painstakingly moving forward yard by yard, you're going to be treated to the sight of your infantry and hardware taking a fiery pounding a lot. The enemy is also better at hiding than you, though you might occasionally take a position by randomly driving over a trench filled with enemy soldiers that you couldn't see anyway.
 |
 |
|
| Devastation! | We are under attack |
This is due to the game being played in the same manner as many RPG’s. There is a strategic map, and you maneuver your units around it. Sounds simple enough, except you may run directly into enemy troops, in which case battle ensues. These battles are real time fought battles, spontaneously generated by the AI system which hates you. The game uses a point and click system to play these, with you clicking where you would like to move your units and, once you find the enemy, right clicking to fight them. There is an alternate option if you don't actually want to fight these battles, an auto resolve feature which fights the battle for you and lets you know the outcome. I’ll save it some time and inform you now, you lost. This is because you suck. At least, that is the conclusion I came to with this game.
In this sense CMC: TA does give you the opportunity to get a better feel for what it's like to run a war. You get to send out troops to die, who will then more than likely fail to achieve the objectives they were supposed to accomplish, probably fall over each other in the process, and in general behave like a bunch of idiots.
So gameplay wise it's a tad on the difficult and annoying side. The storytelling is not that much better either, unless of course, you like to read. There is ALOT of reading involved in the story of this game, screeds of text let you know what us going on which means that ironically this game can be played simply by reading and clicking around on your strategy map. Which makes it rather like a not very good book.
On the plus side, the interface is fairly easy to use and you'll know where you are in the game due to the “chapter” devices which break up the stages of your campaign.
 |
 |
|
| Home Sweet Home - Not for long! | And more freakin' radiation ... |
Graphics and Sound wise this is nothing to write home about, both can be described as sufficient. In some sense, this game is like a pick your own adventure book that mutated into the pc gaming world. You're going to need to use your imagination in order to enjoy this game.
So there you have it, essentially this is two games in one, a turn based war game and a real time battle game. Both aspects of the game leave something to be desired, the real time aspect more than the turn based however, as the AI stacks the odds so firmly in the enemies favor. This does teach us a lesson though.
No-one wins a war, man. Especially not in this game.
CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS VERDICT
So there you have it, essentially this is two games in one, a turn based war game and a real time battle game. Both aspects of the game leave something to be desired, the real time aspect more than the turn based however, as the AI stacks the odds so firmly in the enemies favor. This does teach us a lesson though.No-one wins a war, man. Especially not in this game.
TOP GAME MOMENT
Walking away and leaving the auto resolve feature to loose my battle for me. Quite the time saver.
