Initial Review

[Sorge]

I've played this game for about an hour and a half at this point and am on mission six in the campaign. I'd say overall NWAC needs a lot of work before it could be called a good naval game.

Graphics
The graphics are, in my opinion, a step above older titles like DW and JFC. The interface is appealing and not too flashy. The 3d environment won't blow your mind, but for this type of game, it provides an appealing window into the world with some well-done weather effects.

Physics
The physics are very rudimentary and in some cases buggy. Unit course changes, in particular, are laughable. Large aircraft and submarines will practically turn on a dime, and occasionally jump from place to place. Aircraft weapon drops do weird things on the tactical map, especially at high altitude. Damage doesn't seem very realistic, nor do the paths that weapons sometimes take.

AI/Pathfinding
Things get buggy along the coastlines - I saw a sub continue driving straight into land. I'm still trying to understand how units handle launch orders and ROE, and why such a small percentage of weapons have a successful kill and others do not. Ordering a sub to launch a tomahawk on a land base resulted in the sub launching all 20 of its missiles in the space of 2 seconds!

Gameplay/Realism
NWAC gives us an impressive array of modeled units and weapon systems from a number of countries that surround the Arctic Circle. The storyline concept is an intriguing one and holds great potential.
Unfortunately, realism is lacking. As someone with a bit of knowledge of how the real stuff works, I can tell you that the amount of ordnance being carried in many of these platforms is not realistic, even considering possible capabilities 15 years into the future. Considering how unreliable and difficult to employ weapons are in this game, I guess that's a good thing. That DICASS is the only type of buoy available is also puzzling.
One of the biggest shortcomings in NWAC is the lack of coordinate, range/bearing and other navigational/tactical display tools available in the main display. This alone renders NWAC to the casual game inventory.
The quirks in the game's physics and AI leads to some very frustrating gameplay that I don't recall seeing in either DW or JFC.
While not a huge detractor, the storyline aspects of the game between missions are interesting but presented in a way that seems a bit amateurish.

I think NWAC has some potential, but the devs should've put a little more work into improving the physics and at least provided a coordinate readout for the cursor. If you're new to naval games, NWAC might be entertaining, but if you've played such games before, you might be wishing that the gameplay and physics of JFC could somehow be married to the crisp graphical presentation of NWAC.
I'm consoled by the fact that NWAC cost me only $20 bucks on Steam and was bundled with another strategy game.

[XanderF]

Originally Posted by Sorge

Ordering a sub to launch a tomahawk on a land base resulted in the sub launching all 20 of its missiles in the space of 2 seconds!

This took me a moment, too. You'll notice, when firing the weapons, you have a toggle from one of three fire patterns - one, 'enough', and 'overkill'. Something I actually like, in fact - when you tell a unit to fire on something, it fires the appropriate amount of weapons based on that setting. Makes it VERY quick to have a number of units fire dozens of weapons to overwhelm target defenses.

Rather handy!

Originally Posted by Sorge

I think NWAC has some potential, but the devs should've put a little more work into improving the physics and at least provided a coordinate readout for the cursor. If you're new to naval games, NWAC might be entertaining, but if you've played such games before, you might be wishing that the gameplay and physics of JFC could somehow be married to the crisp graphical presentation of NWAC.

IMHO, I think this game "feels" like it models the weapons systems and detection options (and CERTAINLY managing air strikes and air groups) better than "stock" JFC by a pretty big leap.

Obviously, the NWP updates to JFC have helped it a lot in that regard towards being more realistic (and modern), but you can hardly measure a just-launched-$20 game against a game that was $50 on launch and has had a decade of user work done to it.

Comparing stock NW:AS to stock JFC, NW:AS feels somewhat more realistic in many areas, it has a much more intuitive interface, looks better, sounds better, and is (although it does get tossed around as an insult) "more fun".

Originally Posted by Sorge

I'm consoled by the fact that NWAC cost me only $20 bucks on Steam and was bundled with another strategy game.

Yeah, it's definitely worth no more than $20 at present, and I particularly find "$20 and includes Conquest of America" to be a fair price for it.

It's good, better than many naval games I've purchased at that price point or higher...but not great.

Something I'm surprised you didn't mention, though, that is a peeve of mine after an hour or so playing it, myself...

...there doesn't appear to be any randomization in unit start locations* in the missions. And there is no mission builder. Not even a 'quick battle' or dynamic mission generator.

You have the ~25 or so missions the game ships with, playable basically just once or twice each*, a multiplayer component, and...that's it.

* The 'what we know' thread mentions that there is "some random variation of where exactly forces are deployed" for the missions, so...I dunno, maybe I've just been playing missions with very small start areas or been unlucky with the random generator, but I haven't seen any variances, yet.

[Foxendown]

Helpful reviews, thanks. I've been playing around a bit with the demo and have formed much the same impressions , but have to say (and this may just be personal taste) I don't like the interface, much prefer those in DW and Global Conflict Blue 2. The 3d models look a bit crude and unfinished to me (though that may be something to do with the demo only allowing me to use medium settings for some reason). On the map, without NTDS symbols, the ships take up a lot of room at low levels of zoom and that looks wrong to me.


As for realism, I like to know the depth of water ships are operating in and over, I can't see how to get that info, it may be there somewhere. But the biggest problem for me so far has been seeing one of my ships taking heavy damage but keeping all its sensors and weapons in 100% working order. Anyway, I need to give the demo a fair run which I will over the next few days.

[Arclight]

It works (mostly, few minor bugs) and I'm enjoying it, but it feels a bit gamey for me. Stuff like dropping a dozen torpedoes or launching every AMRAAM on an aircraft just to get a single hit; it feels like formulas at work (set hit %) rather than weapons being simulated.

Of course I'm comparing it in my mind to DW and FC, where you could drop a single torpedo from a helo and kill that sub you had been tracking. In NWAC, I often have 2 helos prosecuting a sub and all they manage after emptying their stores is maybe 1 hit, so I need to divert the ASW aircraft looking for other subs to come drop a few torpedoes as well.

(ASM not tracking surfaced subs is one of my major complaints btw; there's no reason they shouldn't, which adds to the feeling of "it's just a game". Seems it considers subs sub-surface units regardless of their depth).

Weapons seem rather inneffective, at least compared to what I'm used to, and I imagine I'll spend the weekend tweaking just that.

[0rpheus]

I went into it with DW in mind as well, and while some of the physics do seem to spin out occasionally (especially at high TC) it doesn't bother me too much. Having a blast with it so far, though I'm appalling at manual evasion (if that's even possible!).

[Hawk66]

There's another review http://www.outofeight.info/2012/04/n...le-review.html

Hm, what I have read so far does not convince me, although in general I want to support devs, who develop non-mainstream naval stuff.

But probably I wait for Command..

[XanderF]

Originally Posted by Foxendown

As for realism, I like to know the depth of water ships are operating in and over, I can't see how to get that info, it may be there somewhere.

The depth and altitude are handled in 'bands' (looks like 5 for altitude and 5 for depth). You can see that on the 'manuver' page for the units - helicopters only have access to the bottom 3 altitude levels, for example. Just click on the one you want to set the unit to.

[CapitanPiluso]

In my humble opinion, this is a "refreshed" Fleet Command and also the interface has something in common.
The graphic interface looks regular, you can not save a mission in the middle of the game, there is not a reference or library of all units,lacks mission editor and the way it manages detection alerts is really weird.
As I have played Harpoon series and Fleet Command with NWP mod, then this game looks like has nothing good to offer by now ( I only tried a few missions here and there).
I think they released a core of a game and wait for modders to do their job, perhaps it needs to grow and in this sense I should give it a chance for the time coming.
I really feel I lost $ 20 This is not the fact, I would happily pay $ 50 for a good game

(I got it from Steam and was bundled with "Conquest of America"...gonna try this, seems to have fair graphics indeed )

[Shearwater]

I downloaded the demo yesterday, and so far I like it.
Things that come to mind that should / should be improved in furher versions and others have mentioned:

- Performance. Maybe it's because I don't have the fastest system around, but I found it to be a bit sluggish. Especially switching between units makes the 3d window black out for a second or so - nothing that kills gameplay, but not that pretty to look at either.

- NTDS symbols would be a nice addition, plus at least a short data block next to units. Like others have mentioned, coordinates next to the cursor or anywhere on the screen would be a good addition.

- In-game saving (can't believe they left that one out)

- Mission builder / random mission generator

That said, I found the demo enjoyable. I definitely had in mind to buy this game, and the demo hasn't changed it.

I'm actually looking forward to what modders / devs will be doing with this game

[XanderF]

I have about as powerful a computer as one could build, and still notice that black fade-out/fade-in for the 3d window when switching units.

Still, otherwise, it's very fast. Can launch get into a mission in about 1/5 the time it takes Jane's Fleet Command.

[seaniam81]

Other then no mission builder and a way to view what units and their stats, I'm very much enjoying it.

[Neal Stevens]

Good reviews, Sorge.

[Sorge]

Thanks for the replies and additional reviews.

I think the black fade in/out on the 3d screen is by design. At least that's the impression I got. However, the graphics also seem a little sluggish on my laptop as well, and my laptop has decent specs.

I understand how the weapons expenditure options work, and like Xander, soon learned that you can limit it with those options. I do like the idea of having these options, but I just wish it'd be a little less ridiculous when the unit actually fires weapons. Giving an F-18 guidance to fire lots of weapons shouldn't result in the aircraft releasing five missiles at once. Just think it needs to be tweaked a little.

[wetwarev7]

Good reviews all! I'd been eyeballing this game and your reviews help me to make an informed decision.

[Seeadler]

Originally Posted by Sorge

Graphics
The graphics are, in my opinion, a step above older titles like DW and JFC. The interface is appealing and not too flashy. The 3d environment won't blow your mind, but for this type of game, it provides an appealing window into the world with some well-done weather effects.

The game was created with the Unity3D game engine, therefore cutting-edge graphics would been possible but it was probably not being the primary goal.