Sucessor to Close Combat series

[Blakenzy]

Hello.

As much as I have enjoyed the CC series and played all of them back and forth, I am tired of being stuck with graphics from a decade ago(CC hasn't evolved much since CC4). Is there any game out there that takes advantage of the leaps computing power has made, has the similar feel of CC, a real time strategy squad based (no BS resource gathering involved) where it is possible to concentrate on tactics using historically accurate modeled units?

There are games out there that would appear to be like this but really aren't such as Company of Heroes, Codemaster's Soldiers of WWII...

Basically what I am looking for is a Close Combat that looks and handles appropriate for 2010.

[AngusJS]

Combat Mission: Normandy should be coming out sometime this year.

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=91606

[CCIP]

Give Achtung Panzer: Kharkov 1943 a try. For its price you cannot go wrong, and honestly, I am superbly impressed with this game. It's much more polished than any recent Combat Mission (shock force) release, and although its scope right now is very small and it lacks multiplayer, it is a great little game. It's much more similar to Close Combat than Combat Mission in terms of game flow, although the maps are way bigger.

Here's a review for instance: http://kriegsimulation.blogspot.com/2010/02/achtung-panzer-kharkov-1943-review.html

I heartily recommend it, anyway.

[Raptor1]

Heard a lot of good things about Kharkov 1943, but haven't gotten around to buying it yet (Bought way too many games lately).

How is CM:SF, BTW? Barbarossa to Berlin was a lot of fun, but I don't know how the whole thing holds up in a modern setting...

[CCIP]

CMSF is kind of a different game, both in setting and mechanics. I like it, and at this point it's polished and enjoyable. When it came out, its state was a little miserable, but patches fixed it right up. I recommend it, if the modern setting interests you and you don't mind the expensive (assuming you get the add-ons with it) price. I like the modern setting, but it doesn't quite play the same as the WWII Combat Mission games.

AP:K'43 is only $20 so it's hard to go wrong with it. On the other hand, a big minus to it is a lack of multiplayer, and the scope of is far from "whole Eastern Front '41-'45" that CM2 had - instead here, you get units and maps from a small sector of front during one week's fighting in March 1943. That ensures a lot of good historical detail, but limits the scope/variety.

[Raptor1]

Well, I can get CMSF without the expansions right now for free due to Paradox's 200k member celebrations and leftover blue coins on GamersGate, figure that can't be a bad deal...

[CCIP]

Ah, I say go for it. I don't think it holds up to the classic status of the old CM games and the 1:1 unit implementation is sometimes problematic (read: having individual soldiers in squads sometimes causes squads to behave stupidly and get killed). But I learned a lot about modern warfare from it, and keep coming back to it every once a while. It can be a surprisingly difficult game, curse the deadliness of modern weapons (ATGMs and what have you).

[Raptor1]

Right, I'll get it, thanks for the advice.

[Egan]

CM:SF is great; I love it. I sometimes wonder whether it got judged more harshly because of the setting. I suspect that placing it in WW2 again would have blanketed some of criticism it got even if a lot of the criticism was originally deserved. It was released in a shocking state but is more than playable now. I think the two expansions are probably fairly compulsory if you like the base game - each add a very different approach to how you play as well as lots and lots of new toys.

I really like the setting, though. It's nowhere near as one sided as it seems at first, particularly in PBEM, and there are a pile of great single player campaigns and scenarios that really reduce the perceived coalition overkill.

Hope you enjoy it - if you do there is the Afghanistan game about the Soviets in the 80's coming out 'soon' and another Shock Force expansion with NATO troops hopefully before the summer.

Of course, Combat Mission: Normandy should be out by then as well...

[papa_smurf]

I loved Combat Mission 1 and 2, didnt care about the graphics, its all about strategy. You have to plan ahead guessing what the enemy will do next - adn if your screw it up, it can go FUBAR, but you've only got yourself to blame...

As for CM:Normandy - looks nice, can't wait till its out. Until then, think I will put CM: Barbarosa bak on, and re-fight the battle of Stalingrad:D