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Review

Aggression: Reign over Europe (PC)

Monday, 12 May 2008 12:01
Blow cities steeped in history to bits in Aggression: Reign over Europe
First of all, I am not a fan of games that don’t feature vocalised tutorials, especially ones such as Aggression: Reign over Europe, which expect the player to absorb substantial amounts of information in text form.

This sounds silly, I know, but studies have shown that reading text off-screen is more difficult, more likely to induce boredom and just plain not fun. Maybe it is just me, though. Anyway, as you might have guessed, Aggression features a purely text-based tutorial.

Ostensibly, the game is a hybrid of two genres. Think the Total War series, but with modern, less epic battles. You take control of one of four major nations in 1910, where you use your skill and judgement to navigate through the major conflicts and diplomatic crises of the early 20th century.

The majority of your time playing the game will be taken up on the tactical map, manoeuvring character units, twiddling with individual city settings and building up armies, garrisons and researching advanced technology. If you’ve played the Hearts of Iron series, you’ll be in your element here.

Personally, I thought the use of characters worked quite well. For some reason, hiring the likes of Rasputin and Einstein was more fun than it should have been. It was nice to have some easily identifiable historical context to fall back on during the relatively sandbox-esque campaign.

The similarities with Hearts of Iron continue, with the historical and random events popping up to move the game world along in certain directions (or not, if you refuse to accept them). Again, it adds a feeling of authenticity and historical context to the game experience, something which helps substantially in establishing atmosphere and, of course, interest.

The battle section is where the comparisons with Hearts of Iron get left behind, moving into Total War territory. Attack a territory or enemy character, fort or whatever, and you zoom in to a tactical strategy map. This bit is a squishing together of various different games, including Sudden Strike, Total War and the Xcom series.

It can also be punishingly difficult, especially when the game is played by a cack-handed gimp like me. My first taste of Aggression’s combat involved lining up a beautifully symmetrical battle line, complete with artillery support, armoured cars and cavalry backup. My infantry line was set up to hold off an initial wave of attack from the Germans, my brave Russian infantry all set up for victory.

They got totally wiped out, as I couldn’t figure out how to get my armoured car to open fire on the opponent. Not good. It is also worth mentioning that I was left completely in the dark as to how to conduct the battle, being as there is, as far as I could tell, no tutorial, text-based or otherwise, for this bit in the game. A patch could and should sort this, I think.

Having said all this, it does look the part. The environment can get blown up real good and you definitely get a good feeling of interaction with the environment, both tactically and visually.

Essentially then, if you liked Paradox’s Hearts of Iron series, you may well like Aggression: Reign over Europe. The scope is wide, the scenario intriguing and the sense of development you get as technology advances – reflected well in the battle sequences – is a nice touch. A solid strategy title that will provide a good return on monetary investment, as long as you don’t expect it to be the next Total War game.

7/10

David Brown

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