Wars and Battles: October War Reviews

Good interesting game. Very fun.

addictive and enjoyable...good use of free time.

It may not seem like much at first but this series is actually quite good. Worth checking out.

Port is kinda lazy, no manual, no turn indicator, AI is straight bad. In spite of that the game itself is quite decent and the gameplay surprisingly fun. Also, it's nice to see something else than another Normandy in '44 cookiecutter.

I bought this game today when Steam had it big Summer Sale. I didn't expect much from the game since I had bought the previous Wars and Battles: Normandy and I had problems playing that game. This game caught me off guard and actually it not a bad game once you figure out how to get into the game and how to play it. You see there is no clear guidance or instructions on how to start the game. When you first start the game up you get a popup window in the center of your monitor screen which asks you for your Screen settings. Graphics Quality, and Select Monitor settings, Fair enough I'm okay with that. But then you go into hte game's Main Menu that then asks you for an Account Name and to put what Country you are playing from. I thought wait a second why do I really need an Account set up to play a game that I just purchased. That didn't make any sense to me. So I took a wild guess and I just type my name into the account name and put in that I was playing from the United States and for some reason that did the trick and I was able to get into the game. The Main Menu is divided up into Campaign, Advanced Scenarios, and Battle. I would suggest for new players to play the Campaign first since it has a pretty good tutorial and the first few scenarios are not too hard to play. The maps and the graphics aren't too bad in the game and the units in the game don't look too bad when you zoom in close to look at them. One thing I have to say iis when you go into battle with any of your units to make sure that you have at least 3 to 1 odds if you want to win. With them odds, you will either make the enemy units retreat or you will end up destroying them. The game doesn't show you how to rotate or zoom in on the maps so I learned the hard way to hold down the right mouse button if you want to rotate on the maps and also hold the right mouse button and use the middle mouse at the same time to zoom in and out on the maps. I actually had fun playing the game and you can learn a lot about the October War in 1973 between Israel and her neighbors (Egypt, Syria, and Jordan). The game teaches you about the conflict from both sides of the war and gives you a good history lesson about that time period. I would recommend giving the game a try to see for yourself if you like it. I found out this game was actually developed and design by actual War Historians and War Veterans from different wars. That was pretty cool to find out.

I own Wars and Battles: Normandy and found that game superior to the October war. The map here is much smaller and less interesting with few tactical placements compared to the Normandy map. I played the Israeli campaign one time and had no problem to win a decisive victory over the Arabs. They where pretty passive in the late part of the game and I didn´t feel any tension or worries of the outcome. I bought this on sale for less than 6 euro but I would actually not recommend it even for that. I do however recommend you to check out the Normandy version which gave me much more enjoyment despite that the rules are pretty much the same. But I feel like the A.I in normandy was even better.

Very beautiful game in which you can learn quite a lot about the Yom Kippur war of 1973. It gives background information if you want to. I came to realize so many Arab countries supported the Syrians and Egyptians. The graphics are superb and it immerses you into believing you command the Israeli or Arab forces. Unfortunately some of the introduction texts suggest you are simply playing a game but then again, this is a great game to teach about this conflict. Thumbs up for that. Negative is the AI. I've succesfully defeated the Israeli forces as the Arab coalition only because the Israeli computer opponent didn't take any risks. That's ironic because the Israeli's won because of risk-taking, while the Egyptians lost because of their risk-aversion, at least that's one major reason. The game does show that the AA/SAM umbrella was necessary to defend against the superior Israeli air force. The graphics give you the immersion, the feeling that your Arab soldiers are being pounded from the skies and there's nothing to do about it. The Arab AI is somewhat better, it seems. I just witnessed Egyptian reinforcements cutting off my supply lines. Smart move. I can therefore recommend this game at a price of about $12. Perhaps too simplistic for the grognards and too much focus on military for those who also like the politics and diplomacy to be added, but all in all interesting and fun.

First the good. Excellent graphics - really good visuals and unit 3D detail. Easy to understand game play. Turns are smoothly transitioned from one turn to the next. As military simulations go this was excellent. Great map. Outstanding unit order of battle. Decent map size. For the two front October War this game was original in doing two separate maps, while allowing the Israeli player to prioritize air strikes on either front - good idea. Unit damage and replacement assignment (unit repair) was original and very well done. Now the bad. The AI is horrid. 4 Israeli brigades spent the first 17 turns of a 20 turn campaign game hidden in the northeast corner of the Sinai map. Units scamper around behind the lines from one aimless hex to another. Horrible AI. Lack of Fog of War is unrealistic. As the Egyptians attempted to choke off the Israeli crossing of the canal, General Adan's forces were able to ambush and obliterate the Egyptian 25th Brigade. Not possible in this game. General Sharon's forces discovered a gap in the Eqyptian lines and was able to exploit it. The canal crossing was undiscovered by the Egyptians for two days - not possible in this game. Lack of Fog of War. Panzer General had this solved 25 years ago. No two player ability. It's Israeli or Arab against the AI. Did I mention the AI was horrible? So no way for me to challenge myself with this game. Were I a mentally challenged third grader, this game may have been a challenge. The map is good, very good, but it requires two hands to move the map around. Difficult at times. Not very user friendly. Horrible customer service. I sought assistance from the designing company on how to increase the proficiency of the AI or difficulty of the opposing forces - like in SSI's Panzer General 2 in 1997. No response from the company. There are two campaign games. The first with the historical surprise, and the second with the Israelis mobilized and ready. I didn't see the difference I would have expected in the order of battle and positioning of units. This game was a visual improvement on the 1991 computer war game Conflict: Middle East, but amazingly the AI is worse. So while the game has some good points I could never recommend it. Who wants to play a game you will always easily win? Do I really want to sit out some brigades to even up the game. Do nothing for the last three turns?