2.0 First Impressions

[tula1959]

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly!

Download and install went fine!

The changes to the graphics are the most striking thing
you will notice right off the bat.
Many of these changes are NOT for the better.

1. The tool bar graphics and color should be returned to
the prior version. The monochrome white on brown for
the whole thing is very hard on the eyes and difficult
to navigate to find what you want.

2. The unit list is also difficult to see as to the unit
data - again white/yellow on brown.

3. On-map smoke hexes - can no longer see unit/terrain in
the hex - opaque was much better.

4. The night-time map - the new shade makes it very
difficult to make out the terrain features - the prior
version was much better.

5. Unit bases on map - the nationality bases looked much
better than the plain ones changed to now - looks too
elementary and unfinished.

6. Scenario list in game manual - It was much better to
arrange this list in chronological order as in prior
version. I went through each campaign playing each
scenario in order and by listing them according to
complexity makes it just about impossible to do it that way.

7. The Good! The terrain graphics look great and the
plethora of new scenarios is very welcome!!

I would be very interested to hear the thoughts of others
re the points made and on any others! Perhaps some of
these things can be addressed in future updates!?

[berto]

Thank you for your feedback.

ORIGINAL: tula1959

1. The tool bar graphics and color should be returned to
the prior version. The monochrome white on brown for
the whole thing is very hard on the eyes and difficult
to navigate to find what you want.

We will be offering a multi-colored toolbar option in CSME 2.01 (and all future games).

2. The unit list is also difficult to see as to the unit
data - again white/yellow on brown.

It's a matter of taste. This will not change.

5. Unit bases on map - the nationality bases looked much
better than the plain ones changed to now - looks too
elementary and unfinished.

Visually busy bases make it harder to see the units in some terrain. Anyway, the unit bases are moddable.

6. Scenario list in game manual - It was much better to
arrange this list in chronological order as in prior
version. I went through each campaign playing each
scenario in order and by listing them according to
complexity makes it just about impossible to do it that way.

You can sort the scenario list in chronological order by selecting the Date radio button.

Otherwise, happy that you can see some good in the new version.

[Crossroads]

Classic Unit Base is actually already there, included as a mod.

[dox44]

i've kept 1.02 and run it sometimes with 2.0 to check things out.

no issues with the color scheme (brown yellow/white) and my 'tired very old eyes'. i like the recon. i like
the night goggles. i like toolbar and the yellow/white distinction. i like the new buttons and getting use
to them very quickly. maps are great. i use NATO icons and the black graphical ones and both are excellent.
they work well with new maps. i don't use 3D maps. the 2D zoom provides relief and very easy on my eyes when
i use it. i spend about half the time in normal 2D.

the main issue i have is with the scenario selection box. sometimes its normal and sometimes its too small
to be of any use. i have no idea why that happens. i generally reboot unless playing a saved game.

all in all, i like 2.0 very much!

thanks for all work. can't wait for the other offers coming soon

[Red2112]

Among other things, It really made me happy to see the "October War" scenarios included, that was a surprise. One thing I don´t like is not knowing which side is which faction in the scenario selection window. It tell´s you who starts first, but not who is who, and if it dose, it sure is well hidden even if it´s on the manual. It should be more intuitive to see IMHO. Not everybody plays CSME every day, and your not gonna read the manual each time you go back and play CSME because you forgot were this info is. Just a though...

Maybe in the future you could add some "Sands of War" (GDW) scenarios and/or counters.

BTW, I deleted the tutorial video I did that was on my channel, as someone did here.

[tula1959]

Thanks for the comments! I should have stated in the initial post that I LOVE JTCS/CSME and have been playing them for years!! I grew up in the 1970s during the glory days of the Avalon Hill/SPI table-top era and to see Panzerblitz/Panzerleader brought to computer was/is awesome!!!! The points I made in my comments are all just small things and in no way really detract from the fantastic work done to bring CS to us!!!
All of the hard work of the developers is greatly appreciated!!!!!!!

[Jason Petho]

Review over at Wargamer

[Big Ivan]

The good, the bad and the ugly.

The good:

Recon feature, definitely a game engine changer!

New 3D graphics, superb. Addition of more terrain tiles and hex side graphics always a welcome enhancement. The desert color hues are very pleasing. Reminds me of some
3D miniature table top setups I've seen in years gone by. The addition of more industrial tiles and building hex tiles, well all I can say is keep going!

New 2D graphics, well I pulled out my old and very worn Panzerblitz game, setup the first scenario, stood up, looked down on the game, then looked at my laptop next
to the PB board with the CSME 2.0 loaded, with a scenario "Day of the Merks" in #6 zoom, with counters in black silhouette. What do you think I saw, yes heaven!! Me to,
reminded me of the golden age of board games where SPI and Avalon Hill ruled the roost. Very nice.

Editor and game tool bar. At first took a little getting use to considering I have a couple of PBEM games going on in EFII and WF. But the more I looked at it
the more I liked the color and the contrast.

The addition of the 8 mega Chinese Farm scenarios, OMG, I'm still catching my breath!

The addition of the "Event Engine". Well I believe it is a good thing but need to get my mind around it more and learn how to program it. From the comments about it thus far
it to will be a game changer.

Nationality base mod and textured 2D terrain mod, Thank you!!

New 3D and 2D zooms. The 2D is a plus. The 3D OK but the scaling has changed much from the old CSME 1.02 and EFII and WF. May take some time getting use to for my old eyes.

The bad:

3D hex side embankments, cliffs, escarpments and crests. Maybe a mod could be made available to more color contrast these gems. They seem to blend in to well with the new
desert hex color.

Battle generator. For some reason the locked default is desert terrain. Even when I choose Mediterranean I get desert 3D hex color with trees and not Mediterranean hex color.
I have to go back through the map editor and change the region and biomes to get the Mediterranean hex color.

The waiting for CSME 2.0. I understand that some issues are totally out of your control development team. The main thing now is its here and I'm like a kid in a candy store!

The ugly:

The fat old guy that's typing this impression!

Thank you in no particular order Jason, berto, Mike, Petri and anyone I forgot. You guys all did damn good!!!

John

[Crossroads]

ORIGINAL: Big Ivan

New 3D and 2D zooms. The 2D is a plus. The 3D OK but the scaling has changed much from the old CSME 1.02 and EFII and WF. May take some time getting use to for my old eyes.

The new Middle East 2.0 "3D Zoom-in View" is a combination of

[*] Previous Zoom-in view units as they are. No change to unit image, or unit base, sizes.
[*] Buildings, terrain and foliage scaled down a tad from their previous Zoom-in view. Buildings for instance are roughly 80% of their previous size.
[*] Previous Zoom-in map hex size in 150% size, 50% larger that is.


In other words: 50% larger hexes, units as they were, and somewhat smaller buildings scale. All this gives the new 3D Zoom-In such a roomier look. Imho at least [:)]

edited for clarity

[Bradley62]

Have to chime in on the wonderful job done with this title. The engine is there, but the map graphics and the plethora of views with it, fantastic. Gorgeous maps 3D and 2D. Instant toggle with the mouse wheel- glorious. So much here to like/love. The more complex the scenario, the juicier it gets. How could any wargamer not like this. Thoughts of Vietnam and WWII and what the Pacific war could be. Salivating.

[Rake]

While patiently waiting for a return to WW II, or for someone to mod a Cold War game, I d'loaded 2.0 earlier in the week... For the most part, 2.0 seems to be an exceptional modernization of my all-time favorite (computer) wargame. Congrats and thank you to the developers. [&o]

My take on the OP's comments:

ORIGINAL: tula1959

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly!

Download and install went fine!

The changes to the graphics are the most striking thing
you will notice right off the bat.
Many of these changes are NOT for the better.

Ditto, No problem with the download/install. Graphics changes are all a matter of opinion, some I like, others not so much

ORIGINAL:
1. The tool bar graphics and color should be returned to
the prior version. The monochrome white on brown for
the whole thing is very hard on the eyes and difficult
to navigate to find what you want.

Not a big fan of the changes to the tool bar. I'd used the old for nearly 20 years and knew it well; now I spend my time up in the menus trying to learn the Hot Keys. A color coded (by some sort of grouping)might make the tool bar more helpful. Not intuitive at all to this old gamer

ORIGINAL:
2. The unit list is also difficult to see as to the unit
data - again white/yellow on brown.

I don't feel the Unit List is hard to see. What IS hard to see is the currently active unit. It took me a little bit to realize the highlighting of the unit name. A highlight for the entire unit would be more apparent

ORIGINAL:
3. On-map smoke hexes - can no longer see unit/terrain in
the hex - opaque was much better.

I haven't used smoke yet, but if the smoke is indeed completely opaque, I can see that this could be annoying.

ORIGINAL:
4. The night-time map - the new shade makes it very
difficult to make out the terrain features - the prior
version was much better.

Mehhh... I don't play night scenarios, but I have looked at a couple. Agree that a more translucent color scheme might look nicer

ORIGINAL:
5. Unit bases on map - the nationality bases looked much
better than the plain ones changed to now - looks too
elementary and unfinished.

The very first mod installed was the old unit bases. The new "chips" looked like the units were standing on tiddly winks... Ugghh!

ORIGINAL:
6. Scenario list in game manual - It was much better to
arrange this list in chronological order as in prior
version. I went through each campaign playing each
scenario in order and by listing them according to
complexity makes it just about impossible to do it that way.

No comment... I thought the manual was very well put together. I don't do the game in any sort of order. I just look for a scenario that suits my mood for size, time frame and unit composition.

ORIGINAL:
7. The Good! The terrain graphics look great and the
plethora of new scenarios is very welcome!!

As I said above, the graphics are, for the most part, spectacular! I do think some things changed simply for the sake of change. 3D mines come to mind...very difficult to see those little red things when I'm playing on my 46" tv ten feet across the room. [;)]

ORIGINAL:
I would be very interested to hear the thoughts of others
re the points made and on any others! Perhaps some of
these things can be addressed in future updates!?

I tend to agree with Berto; most of the issues are a matter of taste. The things that can be modded, I'll change myself or wait for someone else to change. Those that can't, I'll get used to, or won't use. I'd much rather the Dev's use their limited time to finish up anything remaining on ME and get VN out the door so they can get on with the far more important item of returning this series back to WW II [8D]
[:D]

[fritzfarlig]

I am happy to finally see this update
But agree the toolbar is not good for my eyes
Using many time to find the features
The 3 d effects, there are some wrong
When you fire and burning wreck not working correctly

[Crossroads]

ORIGINAL: fritzfarlig

I am happy to finally see this update
But agree the toolbar is not good for my eyes
Using many time to find the features
The 3 d effects, there are some wrong
When you fire and burning wreck not working correctly

Burning wrecks are affected by Map Labels being ON. If Map Labels are OFF, burning wreck animations switch on.

[fritzfarlig]

ORIGINAL: Crossroads

ORIGINAL: fritzfarlig

I am happy to finally see this update
But agree the toolbar is not good for my eyes
Using many time to find the features
The 3 d effects, there are some wrong
When you fire and burning wreck not working correctly

Burning wrecks are affected by Map Labels being ON. If Map Labels are OFF, burning wreck animations switch on.

ok thanks I will try that

[TAIL_GUNNER]

ORIGINAL: Bradley62

Have to chime in on the wonderful job done with this title. The engine is there, but the map graphics and the plethora of views with it, fantastic. Gorgeous maps 3D and 2D. Instant toggle with the mouse wheel- glorious. So much here to like/love. The more complex the scenario, the juicier it gets. How could any wargamer not like this. Thoughts of Vietnam and WWII and what the Pacific war could be. Salivating.

I have to chime in too....played many hours of JTCS back in the day but largely ignored this game because the subject did not interest me so much.
Finally bought it with my anniversary coupon...
WOW, I cannot believe how much CS is morphing...for the better!

The Event Engine is the icing on the cake....already dreaming up fantastical Normandy scenarios.

Well done to all involved!

[Jason Petho]

Thanks guys, glad you’re happy with the improvements and direction we are going with the series! It’s a long, hard road, but you have a dedicated team behind it!

[RichG]

I'd like to pick up on one point that has been mentioned above:

2. The unit list is also difficult to see as to the unit
data - again white/yellow on brown.

It's a matter of taste. This will not change.

Unfortunately, for many of us this is most certainly not a matter of taste but one of visual accuity. For those of us who may be color blind or have other, often quite minor, visual issues, the choice of font and background colors can make an absolutely massive impact on how comfortable or not a game is to play.

For instance, I own most of the AGEOD games and from early on I've had to learn how to mod both the text colors and the graphics of nearly all of them just so I can play without squinting my eyes and getting headaches. There are many instances in these games (and others too) where the designers should be considering just how viewable their interfaces are. They might look OK to you, but we are all different and some of us struggle.

The worst instances have dark blue test against black background or light green dark green.

In fact there are some games (I won't mention what) that I have had to abandon altogether because its just too difficult to read what's on the screen and can't be improved with mods.

Any competent designer knows about this and makes their products accordingly. It's rare for me to have problems outside of wargames (and the occasional bit of specialist audio software).

Having said that, CSME seems to be not too bad at all in this regard. I've only had it a few days and I'm enjoying it a good deal so far. But I can understand tula1959's point about the unit list - it could do with some better contrast than the yellow text on light brown. I'll probably be looking into moding this at some point.

[Crossroads]

ORIGINAL: RichG

I'd like to pick up on one point that has been mentioned above:

2. The unit list is also difficult to see as to the unit
data - again white/yellow on brown.

It's a matter of taste. This will not change.

Unfortunately, for many of us this is most certainly not a matter of taste but one of visual accuity. For those of us who may be color blind or have other, often quite minor, visual issues, the choice of font and background colors can make an absolutely massive impact on how comfortable or not a game is to play.

For instance, I own most of the AGEOD games and from early on I've had to learn how to mod both the text colors and the graphics of nearly all of them just so I can play without squinting my eyes and getting headaches. There are many instances in these games (and others too) where the designers should be considering just how viewable their interfaces are. They might look OK to you, but we are all different and some of us struggle.

The worst instances have dark blue test against black background or light green dark green.

In fact there are some games (I won't mention what) that I have had to abandon altogether because its just too difficult to read what's on the screen and can't be improved with mods.

Any competent designer knows about this and makes their products accordingly. It's rare for me to have problems outside of wargames (and the occasional bit of specialist audio software).

Having said that, CSME seems to be not too bad at all in this regard. I've only had it a few days and I'm enjoying it a good deal so far. But I can understand tula1959's point about the unit list - it could do with some better contrast than the yellow text on light brown. I'll probably be looking into moding this at some point.

I am sorry to hear the chosen colors are not working for you guys. We and I took a special effort to have the game graphics work with seeing impaired, as we also have color blindness present in the development team. The reason for the new icons in Toolbar for instance were designed with that in mind, so that the players would not need to look at small colored icons to determine what's going on.

And while Berto mentioned the text colors are likely not to become adjustable by players, the user interface itself is easily modifiable. In fact, I am now uploading a mod replacing the Field Drab background on Unit list graphics, as well as with Unit Handbook dialog, with Black. See here:


Hopefully this alleviates your issues. And, hopefully, you can replace the colors in the mod with ones more to your liking, and of course, to what's working with your eyesight. No one's eyes are getting any younger, right.

In fact, here are the color hex codes I've used in CS Middle East and CS Vietnam, part of the 1970's MERDC camo pattern (edit: link updated):

[Crossroads]

Mod posted HERE. I hope it answers your concerns!

[RichG]

Crossroads, thanks for the quick response and the Mod. That's exactly what I had in mind to do myself, so you've saved me some effort. It's a noticable improvement for these aging eyes [:)]

It's good to hear that you and the team have these concerns in mind when working on your designs. Like I said, CSME is a good deal better in this regard than many other games.

Much appreciated.