Combat Mission Shock Force 2 Review

[rommel222]

Greetings to All,
Wargamer website has a review of Combat Mission Shock Force 2 today.

https://www.wargamer.com/reviews/combat ... k-force-2/

[ezzler]

Took the plunge with CMFB after x years of waiting.

it was a nine hour download for some reason.
And now it won't install properly.

Support doesn't know what the issue is yet.

[rommel222]

Greetings ezzler,
Sorry to hear that you are having problems with installing Combat Mission Final Blitzkrieg.
I purchased it four months ago and it was a large download installer (about 3+ hours) but it did install o.k.
Sometimes it can be a corrupted download of the installer and/or your anti-virus software.

Glad you put in a support desk ticket so they can assist with the problem.
Hopefully, it gets sorted out soon so you can spend time in the Ardennes with Big Tigers.

[z1812]

ORIGINAL: rommel222

Greetings to All,
Wargamer website has a review of Combat Mission Shock Force 2 today.

https://www.wargamer.com/reviews/combat ... k-force-2/

Good and fair review. Thanks for posting. I really like it that Matrix welcomes discussion of other games on their forums. It says a lot about their enjoyment and support of wargaming in general.

[rommel222]

Greetings z1812,
I own 30+ Matrix titles which is more than I have from the Combat Mission series and about the same as HPS/JTS game titles.
So I also appreciate that Matrix allows discussion of different companies games.

[ezzler]

Ok - It was the download. Redownloaded and it worked. also had to change the unzip prog. Dev recommended another. Which does seem better.
Now game all runs fine.

Looks good. Plays ok so far. But hello 1999.
No tooltips? Really? Didn't think they were necessary? Especialy as its a download and the manual is a PDf. There are not too many buttons so it won't be that hard to remeber. But it shouldn't be necessary to remeber at all.

And the tutorial. Nice intro. Good description of objectives and forces. But then 'follow the tutorial with the manual to guide you through it."
Ok. And I will put some Prince on my CD player. Maybe find an MP3 player.Rent a dvd and load my camera with some Kodak. See if any messages come up on Myspace while I listen to Crazy Frog ringtones.

Its Old Skool. I see that.

But it worked ok.

Now, why did all my force suddenly run back into the forest after they all moved up i and carefully laid FoFs and spotting targets?

Boy. This is going to take my glasses. I haven't needed to read a manual since...erm..probably Combat Mission North Africa?

[Rosseau]

As much as I enjoy all the CM2 games, there is a bit of micromanagement. I can imagine playing against a human would be too much work for me to present any kind of challenge.

Anyway, I looked on the Battlefront forums just now but couldn't find a post where a guy compiled like 800 CMSF scenarios and campaigns that work with Engine 4. You can also go to cmmods.com, but that's a lot of downloads.

If I find the URL, I will post it. Have fun!

......

As far as the review, I think A Wargamers Needful Things can do a better job. You don't start off an article with three paragraphs about your personal support experience. That comes at the end. What I did not know was that not all the add-ons have been upgraded to the Engine 4 standard yet. So I thank the author for that.

[canuckgamer]

I've been playing the Combat Mission series since they first came out and am currently playing by PBEM CMBN, CMFI, CMFB and have been checking out the CMSF2 demo. If you know how to play the WWII games you can jump right in to this one. We are playing the Alamo scenario and you certainly get an appreciation for how lethal 21st century weapons are. As the Germans I took out a Syrian tank from about 700 meters with a Milan AT missle. I've also lost two armoured troop carriers to RPGs. There are a lot of flat roof buildings and you place men on the roof. I assume the cover isn't as good as being in a building. It is the usual stellar product from Battlefront.

[Red2112]

I just picked up the CMSF2 upgrade today.

I must say that Battlefornt support has really treated me very good with the upgrade from CMSF to CMSF2. I wont get into details on what because I don´t want anybody to abuse there kindness, but as a quick note I´ll say they have proven there loyal clients a very nice "present/deal" with this upgrade for those who have the original CMSF. Personally I see goodwill in there support and a new way of doing things which remedies what was done wrong in the past, which I think is great. One might still think that the overall engine needs to be overhaulded, which might be in future plans. But the fact is that there business plan has been reconsider for the best part in the right direction, for which I for one is happy for.

We should always remeber to "ALSO" state/post when things are done right. So kudos to Battlefront![:)]

In regards to CMSF2 gameplay, it seems that it´s not just a cosmetic thing, they have tweaked (for the better) alot of things in this new edition, so you wont just simply be playing the same missions "again" in this new edition. It´s a whole new challange! [&o]

[rocketman71]

ORIGINAL: ezzler

Ok - It was the download. Redownloaded and it worked. also had to change the unzip prog. Dev recommended another. Which does seem better.
Now game all runs fine.

Looks good. Plays ok so far. But hello 1999.
No tooltips? Really? Didn't think they were necessary? Especialy as its a download and the manual is a PDf. There are not too many buttons so it won't be that hard to remeber. But it shouldn't be necessary to remeber at all.

And the tutorial. Nice intro. Good description of objectives and forces. But then 'follow the tutorial with the manual to guide you through it."
Ok. And I will put some Prince on my CD player. Maybe find an MP3 player.Rent a dvd and load my camera with some Kodak. See if any messages come up on Myspace while I listen to Crazy Frog ringtones.

Its Old Skool. I see that.

But it worked ok.

Now, why did all my force suddenly run back into the forest after they all moved up i and carefully laid FoFs and spotting targets?

Boy. This is going to take my glasses. I haven't needed to read a manual since...erm..probably Combat Mission North Africa?

Just a short reply re "running soldiers" - make sure to turn on the command lines so that you can see if your units are in command or not. Huge impact on reaction. Also check the quality of the units. Green units break much sooner. Also anticipate "human behaviour" to stress. Your units will sometimes disobey your will/commands.

[Kuokkanen]

Just 1 question: are scenarios in the game based on history?

[rocketman71]

No, interly fictitous as the conflict is hypothetical. Though with a credible backstory. Community efforts are made though to create mods and scenarios so it can be applicable on real conflicts/battles.

[rommel222]

Greetings Kuokkanen & rocketman71,
As rocketman71 indicated, CM Shock Force 1 was released in 2007 and centered on a fictional Middle East conflict between U.S. & Syria.
CM Shock Force 2 is based on the same fictional conflict but there are scenarios for Iraq, Afghanistan & even current Syrian Civil war.

Checkout the link to CMSF 1 scenarios & campaigns which can be used with CMSF 2:
http://www.thefewgoodmen.com/tsd3/shock-force/

Checkout Mord's Syrian Civil war work for CMSF 2: (work in progress but screenshots looks great)
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/ ... menu-boys/

[KOB001]

Checkout the link to CMSF 1 scenarios & campaigns which can be used with CMSF 2

On the BFC forums, in the CMSF2 maps & mods section, there is a thread for all the CMSF1 content... approximately 800 scenarios worth!

[Lobster]

ORIGINAL: Kuokkanen

Just 1 question: are scenarios in the game based on history?

This was kind of strange. When the first CMSF game was developed there was no conflict in Syria but they made Syria one of their conflict settings. I guess their thinking wasn't that far off from reality. [;)]