Jutland by Sofware Sorcery

[Jig]

THis is a WW1 Naval combat simulation. It's at least 10 years old but I have yet to see anything similar since come out.. Great sound and I wish I could get it to play on xp

[Sonarman]

I remember that one, that was one of if not indeed the first game to ever come out on CD-ROM. Software Sorcery went on to release the rather dire "Aegis: Guardian of the fleet" and then the actually quite good subsim "Fast Attack" under the publisher Sierra.

The company were then to release two further naval sims "Greyhounds of the Sea" a WW1 strategy/sim and "Akula Red Hunter" obviously a subsim. However the company went belly up before it could release those titles.

Commander James R Jones the CEO of Software Sorcery turned up again about three-four years ago with the online naval game "Joint Chiefs online". I think Neal posted a short blurb about it on one of the old forums. Since then nothing, not sure if anyone tried that game, unfortunately it also seems to have disappeared. Hopefully we haven't seen the last of Cmdr Jones yet.

Bes sure to look out for the forthcoming Jutland game from Storm Eagle Studios it's looking pretty good and promises to be a very deep strategy/sim currently it's in beta so should be with us in a few months.

[Raptor1]

Originally Posted by Sonarman

Bes sure to look out for the forthcoming Jutland game from Storm Eagle Studios it's looking pretty good and promises to be a very deep strategy/sim currently it's in beta so should be with us in a few months.

I'm still sticking to my May 31st release prediction (The anniversary for the actual Battle of Jutland), Because their website still says it's a "Spring 2008" release, So not a few months, But weeks

Has anyone heard of an older game called "Dreadnoughts"? Is it any good?

[Sonarman]

On Jutland

Yes, hopefully it will make the anniversary, although they are still adding new features... to quote developer Jim Rose:
"Deep in the Campaign Game, Another layer of AI, More Light Houses, More Light Ships, Zeppelin scouting' Lots of new neat things........Good food takes time to prepare

check out what's happening at the semi-official gamesquad forum for the series.


On Dreadnoughts...

Originally Posted by Raptor1

Has anyone heard of an older game called "Dreadnoughts"? Is it any good?

Dreadnoughts was a very good MS-DOS title by Dr Peter Turcan who developed some of the first 3d wargames such as Waterloo,Borodino and Armada on the Atari ST, Amiga & PC. The games would show a 3d picture view of the battlefield and you would type commands in then advance time by a certain period to see how your actions played out. The game originally shipped with cool laminated charts so that you could plot your ships positions yourself, the post patch game saw the plots integrated into the game itself.

Dreadnoughts started out in this typing manner but was upgraded to have mouse input of commands a big improvement. The level of commands in the game gave it a very realistic feel. Two addon data discs "Ironclads" & "Bismarck" were released for the game. Dr Turcan also went on to release a futher naval game "Midway" using the same system.

You can check out a 90% Amiga review for the game here


Another Jutland alternative

There is of course yet another Jutland game this time by John Tiller who did the first Age of Sail game for Talonsoft. It's less visual than those above yet, relying on a 2D top down viewpoint of the action, still worth a look check it out over at the HPS Simulations site note that if you want this you can find it cheaper than HPS sell it for, shop around!

[Raptor1]

Just played Dreadnoughts, Ouch, Gonne take a while 'till I get used to this...

Anyway, Does anyone know if it's still possible to get Software Sorcery's Jutland anywhere?

[Sonarman]

Ebay would be the place to try for Jutland, although I would caution that it's definitely not a great game, no where near as good as say Task Force 1942 and is really only for the naval-game completist (like me unfortunately). The game does run happily under DOSBox however I have been unable to get sound effects although the music track does play.

[Seeadler]

Originally Posted by Sonarman

I remember that one, that was one of if not indeed the first game to ever come out on CD-ROM.

If I remember right, Rebel Assault came first but Jutland was one of the first CD only games.

I can run Jutland today on Vista64 with a DOS emulator
Here some screens:






repair crew management similar to SH3/4

[Julian]

What DOS EMULATOR did you use to run Jutland?
How did you install it?

I have quite a few DOS games like Jutland, GNBNA- Great Naval Battles North Atlantic 1939 - 1943, Wolfpack CD, Aces of the Deep, Aces of the Pacific are just a few.

[Seeadler]

Originally Posted by Julian

What DOS EMULATOR did you use to run Jutland?

DOS box
http://www.dosbox.com/
with front-end DFend_reloaded
Edited by RDP, link to abandonware on that site listed. You may
have not seen this Seeadler

[Schnee]

If this thing comes out in the near future , it could be just what I was looking for. I'm a big fan of surface action/battleship-counter type sims (and find WWI intriguing) so this could be super cool.

One can only play so many sub sims

[Julian]

I have this game also.
The graphics were great and the sound of gunfire was better than what I heard.
But the game had its flaws.

The problem was maintaining the ship on its course.
After setting orders in the command screen, you left the screen to fire the guns, then the steering would default to port.
The ship would start to turn and the gunnery would be thrown off.
Then you had to try to steer the ship from gun position.
This was one problem the company never fixed.
Not long after the games release, Software Sorcery closed up.
And the game bugs were never fixed.
Other wise, it would have been a great naval game to play.
The sound, music and graphics were superb for that time.

[yankee-V]

Originally Posted by Julian

I have this game also.
The graphics were great and the sound of gunfire was better than what I heard.
But the game had its flaws.

The problem was maintaining the ship on its course.
After setting orders in the command screen, you left the screen to fire the guns, then the steering would default to port.
The ship would start to turn and the gunnery would be thrown off.
Then you had to try to steer the ship from gun position.
This was one problem the company never fixed.
Not long after the games release, Software Sorcery closed up.
And the game bugs were never fixed.
Other wise, it would have been a great naval game to play.
The sound, music and graphics were superb for that time.

If memory serves, the time compression feature had problems too, at least I never got it to work right. Kind of hard to play a campaign at 1X.

Still have the CD on the shelf. The DB of all the old photos and films was one of the best features.

[GerritJ9]

Found a Russian site that lists some items for Software Sorcery's Jutland, including a no-CD patch/crack and a patch (update?). Wonder whether the patch is an unofficial one developed by an enthusiast, or an official SS Jutland patch, lost in the mists of time..... and what it does- correct bugs, add content, improve graphics, mod it to run under Windows??????????
May be worth further investigation!

[Julian]

Can you sent me the link to that Russian site that lists some items for Software Sorcery's Jutland?

Sounds interesting.

Would like to check it out.

[GerritJ9]

Julian, PM sent!