Reviewed: December 8, 2004
Reviewed by: John DeWeese

Publisher
Atari

Developer
TimeGate

Released: March 15, 2001
Genre: Strategy
Players: 1
ESRB: Teen

6
7
7
7
7.1

System Requirements

I must caution all die-hard fans of the Axis and Allies board game – this new computer version by Timegate Studios and Atari has little to do with the Avalon Hill classic. This game is first and foremost a real time strategy title. There is a strategic World War II map that closely mirrors the original Axis and Allies game board, but in Atari’s version there are no naval battles, no strategic bombers and no factories allowing you to build units halfway around the world. The map is an excuse to fight a series of RTS battles, with the kind of upgrades available to you being determined by whether you attack a province with infantry, tanks, air support or all three.

The game succeeds fairly well in the RTS category. Timegate Studios uses a similar model to their fantasy RTS game, Kohan II. Axis and Allies allows you to crank out full regiments instead of buying tanks and troopers one at a time, resulting in vicious battles between dozens of tanks and scores of soldiers. You can also play out course of the war in two historical campaigns or hop on the GameSpy server for multiplayer battles.

I’ll address first why I really liked the RTS part of the game. Axis and Allies forces RTS veterans to put aside their penchant for tank rush tactics and instinct to horde gold and wood. The successful player will have to know how to use combined arms, supporting throwaway units of infantry with heavier tanks and armored transports. The other game play twist is players have to carefully watch their supply lines. You can have all the uber units you want, but they’re going to die pretty quickly if you are outside your supply area, which is marked with bright green borders on the map. Players can extend those lines by building supply depots or capturing towns.

When it comes to economy, I applaud the developers for not requiring my paratroopers to go herd sheep. One of my pet peeves is games set in the modern era that require hunting and gathering techniques straight out of Age of Empires. Instead, you build supply, oil and ammo depots. Supply depots create an ever-increasing stockpile of cash, while the other two depots provide the oil and ammo needed to upkeep units. Obviously, tanks and half-tracks use more oil and ammo than infantry regiments. A player can also run a deficit in oil and ammo, but that can be costly.

Unit construction follows the same basic premise as Timegate Studio’s other RTS title, Kohan II. You start with a Corps headquarter where you can create both division headquarters and support buildings. The division headquarters is where you build each regiment. Instead of building a barracks that keeps cranking out troops, only a set number (usually 3-6) of regiments can be created at each HQ. The unit organization can be a bit confusing at first, but the obvious rule is infantry can only be created at an infantry HQ, tanks at the armor HQ, etc. You can also build motor pools and engineering and artillery brigades for researching upgrades. In theory, all these buildings can be packed and moved across the board. At the battle of Kursk, I had the Germans on the run and decided to see how long it would take to move my HQ forward. By the time I was up and running again, the battle had swung in the computer’s favor. While nice to have, I think trying to jump your entire headquarters would be suicide in a multiplayer game.

Every unit has particular strengths and weaknesses depending on what it’s fighting. Too bad there are some serious problems with unit balance. First of all, most of the fighting is ground-based. On amphibious assault maps, battleships and aircraft carriers provide little firepower but suck up huge amounts of oil and ammo to maintain. The air war is limited because it takes an incredible amount of cash to even build an airfield. Air strikes can do some damage to an advancing column, but they cost 100 dollars every time you call one. That’s the same price as two infantry regiments or half the cost of a medium tank regiment.

I should also mention one of the best units in the game is the anti-tank infantry. These bazooka-packing daddies can take out tanks, blow up bunkers and still do a good job blasting apart enemy infantry. There’s no reason to build paratroopers, mortar teams or heavy tanks when you can rush the computer’s base with rocket launching commandoes. Heh, I did say this game reminded me a lot of John Wayne movies.

I wanted to see units take cover in buildings or be given bonuses for working together, such as infantry providing a screen for moving tanks. Yet combat is a mostly a click and attack affair, with the only “tactical” orders you can give units are assault formation for added damage or marching formation for a bonus to speed.

The one wildcard is at the beginning of the battle players pick their general, who can provide “special operations” moves at key points in the battle. The commanders include such famous generals as Patton, Rommel and Montgomery, as well as relative unknowns such as Japanese General Kuribayashi or Russian Marshal Konev. Depending on which general you choose, you get four special ops that range from carpet bombing attacks to secret agents to banzai charges. You have to pay for these operations with experience points, which are earned as units engage and win battles.

If a regiment is within a supply area, units begin to automatically heal and any casualties are replaced. This means a defender can rely on bunkers and artillery guns to hold the line as units regroup, while the attacker is constantly losing regiments to take and hold a base.

The artificial intelligence builds well-fortified main bases and is ruthless at punching through the weak spots in your defenses, although it is easily distracted by feints and does little to defend secondary headquarters. Games can last 45 minute or longer as the battle ebbs and flows several times and units regroup back at base to launch a counterattack I found it a refreshing change from the frenzied 15-minutes of mayhem I’m used to playing in many RTS titles.

But here’s the rub; what works in one-off games turns the map-based campaign into an interminable slog. The beauty of the board game is how players can resolve D-Day with a few rolls of the dice. Not here. How can you truly enjoy the massive invasion of Europe when you’ve already fought an hour-long marathon against the computer for Southeast Asia? Did I mention you must kill every soldier and destroy every building to win in “world war” mode? Or that the computer likes to keep a few survivors running around the board when you’ve blown everything else up?

There is also the problem with moving troops on the board. Without naval fleets you can only move one territory at a time, which means a big headache for Britain, the U.S. and Japan. You can only attack one territory per turn, guaranteeing it will be hard to defend if a second front opens up.

Territories generate cash that can be spent on new armies, adding air support to existing armies or new technologies that give bonuses in RTS games. As I mentioned previously, the only upgrades available to you in the RTS battle are what you had on the strategic map. For example, only units with air support can build airfields. The more armies you invade a territory with, the more resources you start the battle with, but don’t expect a huge starting advantage for outnumbering the enemy. Defenders start the game with some pre-built bunkers and cannons. A shrewd player will spend money only on upgrades, since one infantry army can fight off 6 tank armies as long as you can kick butt in the tactical mode.

Playing the British, I found I was limited to sideshow battles in Africa because I was too weak to attack Europe and I had no fleet to help the Americans in the Pacific. The Americans had to spend two turns hopping across Canada just to reach England and prepare for D-Day. Invading France was the easy part since the Germans were using their one attack per turn against the Russians. As the Germans, I waltzed into Moscow in two turns, because being grossly outnumbered on the strategy map meant squat when I had anti-tank storm troopers in RTS mode. I ran rampant with the Japanese because neither the British nor the Americans could move armies quickly enough to stop me.

The historical campaign somewhat makes up for the horrible “world war” setting. Nowhere near historically accurate, the battles at least capture the flavor of such major engagements as Normandy, Stalingrad, or Iwo Jima. The Axis campaign offers a what-if scenario, including a mission where Rommel must break through in North Africa to link up with forces in Russia. The computer starts most missions with fortified positions (the beaches at Normandy are a nightmare of pillboxes and gun bunkers), which means a fast-paced and interesting fight. The game also ends when you complete all your objectives, a welcome change from playing “find the last Japanese soldier in the jungle” to win.

The game sports several nice little features that add to its look. Like in Warcraft and Starcraft, an animated commander’s face pops up in the bottom left hand corner of the screen. Another nice touch is not all infantry fire the same weapons. Some while throw grenades while others fire machine guns or load mortars depending on a regiment’s equipment. Units don’t just fall over; they sometimes explode into the air in big fireballs.

The RTS board is 2-D, yet trees can be knocked down by tanks and cities can catch on fire during bombing raids or urban assaults. The strategic map is the spitting image of the board game’s map, made to look as if it is posted at headquarters. Bordering the map are pistols, coffee cups, top-secret dossiers complete the feel of looking over Patton’s or Rommel’s shoulders.

Some critics have complained about the lack of bright color seen in Kohan II, but considering the genre I don’t feel that’s a fair criticism. What holds this game back from being a top rate title is no three-dimensional action. Warcraft III broke this barrier two years ago, and games such as Rome: Total War show it’s possible to zoom out to give commands then zoom in to get a front-row seat to watch the fight. By comparison, the Axis and Allies graphics look as dated as a bolt-action rifle.

The voiceovers range from Patton bellowing “no soldier’s ever won a war by dying from his country” to Rommel screaming “in the absence of orders kill something!” Units speak in their native language when you give them orders, and it’s quite entertaining to hear the Japanese scream “Banzai!” when they charge or German tank commanders crying “Schnell! Schnell!” on the march. The campaign narration leaves something to be desired, with the Russian narrator sounding only slightly more Russian than a Bond villain and the German narrator sounding like an Arnold Schwarzenneger impersonator. The sound effects of gunfire, screaming soldiers and exploding tank and artillery fire are appropriate and add nicely to the game’s atmosphere.

But the RTS action kept me coming back. Yes, this title is a bit of a throwback to Starcraft and Command & Conquer, but I enjoyed the fast action and the supply line system. The system works well in multiplayer, and with a human player you won’t feel frustrated at the AI’s shortcomings. I found while I could not bring myself after awhile to play the world war mode, I could still have fun replaying the campaigns or playing random maps.

The game will also make a good Christmas gift for anyone with a soft spot in their heart for watching the Duke or Telly Savalas take down Panzer tanks with one bazooka shot.