And no, I'm not referring to all that turkey, Christmas pudding and mince pies that I've eaten.............
I've long had an interest in the Ardennes Offensive and have extensively read about it and gamed it, and long ago came to the conclusion that single map, divisional size games on the subject just are not able to depict the battle in a meaningful way.
Recently, I was given a copy of 'Battle of the Bulge' the first game from Compass in their 'WWII Commander' series, and this is a single map, area movement game with mainly division size units. It uses a pretty simple impulse system and is very easy to learn, and although it has one-or-two interesting aspects, I found it to be a very dull and uninteresting product.
The mounted map is ok albeit a little bland, and although it depicts a very basic road nett, and some of the major towns and other significant features, the scale results in the omission of all those little towns and villages that are an important feature of the region and played such a large part in the battle.
The unit counters are, frankly, boring. Black silhouettes on a coloured background may be fine for some, but I found them to be very poorly designed. In addition, the units all have a strange grey 'ghosted' version of the unit insignia which does nothing to enhance the visual appeal at all. Adding the badge in colour would have gone a long way to adding a bit of interest to the game.
I also found it a bit odd that they should class the US Cav units as 'Mechanised Infantry' and why correctly label Panzer Divisions as such but then label Panzer Grenadier Division Mechanised Infantry? Yes, alright, technically I know that's what they were, but at least refer to them correctly. This may seem like rivet-counting and nit-picking, but I found it to be annoying and...amateurish,
What proved to be a real game killer to me was that after several plays I found that it was pretty much impossible for the German player to NOT take St Vith early on the 16th December. Since each 'impulse' represents only a very short space of time, and there are many such impulses in a turn, then the German player would have to either be daft or do nothing at all to not get a panzer div into an unoccupied St Vith 'area' almost at the start of the game. When you consider that in reality the forces there held on until the 21st December, and the defence of the town caused a significant disruption to the German plan, then to my mind, there is a very real design fault somewhere.
I fully accept that these views are mine alone and others may well disagree with them. As a very easy to play game with little real reference to the actual battle, then fine, it may provide a couple of hours of entertainment, but if you are looking for a serious approach to the subject, then I would advise that you look elsewhere.
Certainly, if the games BGG forums are anything to go by, there are people who think highly of the game, but I aint one of them.
As a parting shot, I also felt that the production values of the game, despite the mounted board and large counters, were not up to the sort of standard that you would expect from Compass Games. Again, I emphasise that these are my views and mine alone, and others may well disagree, which is fine.
« Last Edit: January 13, 2022, 03:57:07 PM by bob48 »
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