Akin to every other gaming studio right now, yours truly has been out on vacation for the last couple of weeks during the weekends in order to replenish its battle fatigue and come back to the fight with reinvigorated vitality. I might have, allegedly, spent most of my free time finishing up Mafia: Definitive Edition and sinking my teeth into the fantastic God of War (2018). So here we are, back with another weekly round-up of all the best things happening all around the Strategy and Wargaming globe. Are there a lot of things going on? Uh, not really. But Gamescom is here and so are its novelties.

Scourge of War Series Delisted

There’s not a whole lot on this as of yet, since it was announced just a couple of days ago, but the Steam Page for the Scourge of War: Waterloo has an important announcement for everyone, because, starting “From September 1st, we will be delisting all the Scourge of War games from our sites and all other 3rd party sites. The games will no longer be available for purchase, and we will consequently stop all support and assistance. You have one week to add the titles to your libraries. Once bought, the games will remain in your libraries, and you will still be able to recover purchased games from download links. Steam keys will no longer work to redeem the product, so make sure you download your copy on Steam before the end of this month.

Here’s a full list of games that will be going off sale from September 1st:

Redeemable on Steam:
Scourge of War Waterloo
Scourge of War Waterloo Collector’s Edition
Scourge of War Wavre
Scourge of War Ligny
Scourge of War Quatre Bras

Non-redeemable on Steam:
Scourge of War Gettysburg
Scourge of War Gettysburg 150th Anniversary Collection
Scourge of War Chancellorsville
Scourge of War Brandy Station
Scourge of War Antietam
Scourge of War Pipe Creek

Forum user “norb” (NorbSoftDev) stated that “After taking a few years off, we are back looking at the games and what can be done to make them better. The games will no longer be for sale for the “hopefully” short term. NSD has parted ways with Slitherine and thanks them for the many years of support.

If you don’t have the games, you’re definitely missing out and this might be the last you have to get them legitimately. However, there’s no massive sale to end this era with a bang. A shame, really.

The Great War: Western Front Revealed

Of all things announced this past week, not even in my wildest dreams I could have conjured a World War I title from Westwood titled The Great War: Western Front. Intelligence on the state of (the) Western Front is few, but we know that it’s aiming to be a game in the vein of Total War, with its “dual role-commander”, promising players they’ll “discover unparalleled levels of strategic choice as you step into the role of both Theatre Commander and Field Commander”, with the first layer being a turn-based grand-strategy with troop deployment, research, and resource gathering. The second layer will be a tactical one, as an on-the-field commander, leading your troops from the front in real-time battles.

The game is promising a living world with persistent battlefields where “artillery bombardments leave behind craters, tanks, gunfire, and trenches desolate the once lush French countryside, and any trenches (or fortifications) you build remaining in play should you return”. The weather will have an impact on the terrain and players will be able to pick between the Allied Nations or the Central Powers.

Of course, there’s no release date as of yet, but we can expect to be battling in the french countryside sometime the next year.

Homeworld 3 Gameplay Trailer

Events such as Gamescom seldom feature on this website, but fortunately, there are quite a lot of new things coming soon that so happened to be announced there. The venerable classic, Homeworld is finally getting a new entry, which technically happens to be the fourth, if we count Deserts of Kharak. It’s hard to call it anything else other than jaw-dropping and awe-inspiring. No precise release date exists, but Homeworld 3 is expected to drop sometime during the first half of 2023.

Regiments Out Now – Expect-a-Review

After my ill-received first impressions of Regiments, I’m being drafted once more to fight on the Fulda Gap in Microprose’s recent release. Expect a review sometime soon.

Pedestrians Getting Some Love in Cities Skylines

The Achilles heel of Paradox’s near-perfect city builder is finally being addressed. With multiple complaints being leveled that Cities: Skylines was too car-centric and more of a traffic simulator than a City-sim, Colossal Order is finally pivoting to what makes a city function as it should: the people with the Plazas & Promenades DLC.

They’ve become so self-aware the trailer starts with endless traffic jams prior to a low-poly seagull asking if things were always so chaotic. The pedestrian-focused new piece of DLC will equip virtual mayors with more tools to implement more walkable locations with the inclusion of pedestrian streets that “let your citizens walk freely on pedestrian-only streets! Place them in your city like any other road and create new green city centers free of most vehicles and noise pollution”. There’ll be pedestrian zones and policies and three new district specializations: offices, high-density residential areas, and high-density commercial zones. The new DLC will feature 300 new assets.

As for its release date, it’s “coming soon”.

It’s a Me, a New Hearts of Iron IV DLC

World War II’s largest grand strategy title keeps getting bigger, with the spaghetti nation finally getting the attention it deserves. The new Hearts of Iron expansion titled By Blood Alone will focus on three nations, two of which are questionably interesting picks for new focus trees. So, the Italians, of course, will have their focus tree reworked to allow for new, alternate historical paths. The other two nations are Ethiopia and Swiss, two units that didn’t contribute a whole lot to the conflict if we’re going purely on a military analysis. Of course, some historians actually pinpoint the start of the Second World War to the Italian invasion of Ethiopia but that might be a stretch, in my honest opinion.

This new DLC will have Air Marshalls arguing on the factory floors as to why a larger wing-span or a different machine gun caliber is superior, with the inclusion of a new Aircraft Designer feature. Impactful units will have their feats recognized with the introduction of Unit Medals. And a new option during Peace Conference will be made available that’s going to allow diplomats to demilitarize certain zones or entire nations. If your focus is to keep waging war, you can now seize the capital ships of the defeated powers and claim control of their resources and factories as war reparations.

Hearts of Iron IV: By Blood Alone will release on the 27th of September.

Jagged Alliance 3 – Official Gameplay Reveal

After continuously flopping for the past two decades, the Jagged Alliance franchise appears to finally be on track, if the fan reception to its most recent trailer is anything to go by. The silliness is immediately apparent by naming the nation “Grand Chien”, which is French for “big dog”. Guerilla fighters will be scouring the island in search of the President, at the behest of his family. The gameplay looks XCOM‘esque enough to pique my interest. However, there’s a clear lack of percentages on display, with every shot hitting the enemy, somehow, this doesn’t feel right, but I might be over-analyzing.

Jagged Alliance 3 is “coming soon”. How soon? Hell if I know.

Marvel’s Midnight Suns Delayed

The game from the XCOM reboot designers will miss its release date of October 7 and might just come out early next year, if things go smoothly from here on out. Not a lot of details came from Firaxis and 2K other than that ” We’ve made the decision to move back the launch timing of Marvel’s Midnight Suns to ensure we are delivering the best possible experience for our fans. We will launch later this fiscal year on Windows PC, Xbox Series X|S, and Playstation 5, with the Xbox One, Playstation 4, and Nintendo Switch versions following at a later date”.

That XCOM itch will remain unscratched for now but sigh not at the announcement of a game being delayed, it’s better to have a great game at a later date, than a terrible game early. At least it shows the development team is taking things seriously.

Radio General New DLC

Like the Normandy landings in 1944, the new Radio General DLC Water Rats arrived out of nowhere and it’s going to put desk commanders in charge of the First Canadian Army once more as they finish their journey through WW2. From Callais to Operation Veritable, we’ll be tasked with leading these forces across 7 new mission campaigns. To help you achieve this task there’s a new Air Support Units and Engineers now have the ability to construct bridges if need be.

The DLC came out on August 23rd and it will set you back 5,69€

Men of War II – Teaser Trailer

We’re nearly there, and this time the Men of War II team is teasing a new trailer reveal that’s coming out on the first day of September. I’ll just do a small friendly reminder here that Men of War II is supposed to come out this year still.

Armoured Commander II Gets Controller Support

Pretty obvious, right? If you still don’t have Armoured Commander II, it’s time to get it, now you can plug in your controller and go on a tank rampage across nearly all theatres of the Second World War from the comfort of your couch!

Armoured Commander II Review

Total War: WARHAMMER III End Game

Finally, to round this week off and help me with the SEO we have the usual Total War: WARHAMMER III video, this time with new endgame scenarios!

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