Combat Mission: Battle for Normandy

« Combat Mission: Battle for Normandy is a game for history buffs and war game enthusiasts. If this is your bent, you will not find a more enthralling and historically accurate game. »

« Return of the premier tactical wargame series to World War II is marred a bit by clunky camera and some big UI issues (no grand unit list after ten years, really?). But the game beneath is solid steel, and the additions of new Combat Mission engine good. If only the game would cover more than three months of combat. [June 2011] »

« Too fiddly and unforgiving for the popular palate, but those after reality-rooted WWII challenges should clearly investigate. [Aug 2011, p.94] »

« CMBfN is a very good tactical wargame saddled with pre-alpha looks and controls. [Dec 2011, p.74] »

« Best ww2 simmulator out there, its has its problems but it doesent compare, takes time to learn though. Theres more on the series that came out and the turned bases style can make you play masive battles. »

« There is simply no better tactical war simulation game available, and I've played most all of them. I do not understand anybody who tries to discredit this game for a bunch of nit-picking factors, those are the only negatives I have seen, both personally and from others discussions. If you can find a better tactical wargame, please do tell me what it is and I'll play that. Good luck. »

« It got this game after a friend recommended it to me, but I can't help but feel disappointed after playing it for a while. I thought this was going to be a super-realistic simulation, but as a student of military history, I've found many oddities. The main gripe I have is the casualty rates and the lethality of small-arms fire and light mortars. If you look at the actual data of the effectiveness of these weapons, you'll see that they were far less effective than what is modelled in Battle for Normandy. Artillery is also way too precise and overpowered compared to what it was historically. I also can't help but laugh a little when I see some of the tanks and half-tracks in Combat Mission taking half a minute just to turn 90 degrees, when you can easily find Youtube videos of these vehicles in action showing how agile they really were. Add to this the broken TCP/IP multiplayer and issues with graphics and DRM, I don't feel like giving this game a better score than a 3, despite some its better qualities. »

« CM: BO was great. CM: BB was even greater. CM: AK was even a little bit better. CM: SF was a huge disappointment. CM: Battle for Normandy too is a huge disappointment. Good things: -Better graphics than the older games. I don't care about that though. The old ones were fine by me. Bad things: -Fewer units. And by that I mean almost no units at all. -Lacking units. Like no US Rangers, no Waffen-SS, no German Paratroopers, no Brits, no Canadians, no amphibian units, etc. So "A Tiny US-centric Part of the Battle for Normandy" would be a better title. -Cover doesn't work logically. You seem to be even worse off when inside heavy buildings than when in open ground. -Soldiers die like flies. Everybody seems to be sharpshooters, and all shrapnel seems to hit somebody. -Mortars are incredibly effective as in "too effective". -The editor is horrible compared to the one in the three first CM games. -There is no A. I. All A. I. is scripted, and if you want to make a scenario yourself you have to script the A. I. yourself. That really, really ****. If my crappy Windows 8,1 had worked for the old CM games I would have played them still. This game I uninstalled and will never play again. It was a complete waste of money. And yes: it was very expensive too... Don't buy this game. It is not good at all, and nothing like the old CM games. »

« Its not perfect but it is an excellent, high fidelity game that attempts to simulate WW2 combat in the European Theater. I could not expect more from a small, niche gaming company who's developers have a passion for this time and place in history. And it's only getting better. Try not to be too swayed by the grumpy old farts that want 100% of everything and will never be happy because they were born that way. »

« A recent posting on the official forums has caused a flood of high-value reviews to be deposited on Metacritic this week, throwing the overall rating out of whack. This rating is for not only on the original but also the two modules released to date, CW and MG. The title is a bit of a misnomer, as it covers the ETO campaign from June 6 to September 30 not just Normandy. I suppose this game is a bit of a misnomer no matter how you slice it as major bits of equipment are missing despite the game engine making its debut in 2007, and WWII coming back down the pipe 2 years ago. Flame weapons for example, multiple AA weapons in a ground role, engineering equipment, funnies. This may seem like trivia, but anyone using the mission builder and trying to recreate a historical battle from a text book or personal account will as often or not have to close the book in frustration when they come upon some type of equipment, procedure, terrain type, etc. that was present in the battle but isn't included in the game. Canuck units have strange mixes of Brit vehicles that historically they never used, and the MG module makes you purchase SS and Brit stuff twice. You can recreate a fraction of what happened in any given portion of the campaign, and the limited interface means you have a very generic way of doing it. TacOps, for example, at least gave a broad palette of SOPs for forces under command that broadened the interface and opened up the player's decision tree. Just about every palette here is very narrow forces mostly feel the same, terrain is limited to a handful of types, victory conditions are vague and unfulfilling (marketed as "realistic"). CM now has so many patches and versions some of which you have to pay for good luck figuring out which. The devs are all over the map with what they're trying to accomplish here. The original games had a clarity of purpose, with cleanly laid out interface, a complete order of battle, and logical unit actions that at least made up for the lack of SOPs, especially in the heavily abstracted environment. The move to a directly representational three-dimensional world resulted in a fragmented interface with many missing pieces. Too frustrating, and way too costly, buying module after module as the devs slowly claw their way back to a state of the art, using paying customers as alpha testers for their experiment. After 13 years, it's time to move on to at least beta. »

« Combat Mission Battle for Normandy (CMBN) is an amazing update from the original CM games. I came to this series late and only played Combat Mission: Barbarossa to Berlin and Combat Mission: Afrika Korps after CMBN was announced. I learned fast that using real tactics worked better then just throwing your guys around. I had plenty of fun waiting for CMBN. But wow CMBN is soooo much better than the original series. The modeling down to each individual soldier makes the immersion during battles amazing. Using real life tactics is even more important now. You cannot just order a platoon to cross an open field against enemy fire. They will take casualties and decide to save their lives and return to cover. But if you prepare your assault with supporting fire and suppression against the enemy you will succeed. The new spotting model is amazing I have spent plenty of time with no idea what my opponent is doing or what condition his force is in. If your guys cannot see the enemy then you see nothing. If they see and hear gun fire from behind cover all you get are contact icons. Only once your men see the enemy soldiers do you have any information about what you are facing. It creates a great effect as you try to decipher what your enemy is doing. It also means that even though the eye in the sky (i.e. you) might know information about the location of an enemy unit, you will not necessarily be able to get every unit under your command to fire on that enemy. Only those units that can see the enemy's location can fire and those of your units that have not spotted the enemy yet will only be able to fire at the general area instead of directing fire at a detected enemy. This truly is the ultimate war game. I used to play miniature table top gaming and hex based cardboard games but gave them up many years ago. The realism just was not there. CMBN has a feel to it that you just cannot get from the "I can see all your counters" games of the past. No game is perfect and neither is CMBN. Many people criticize the UI but I do not find many things that are an issue I am sure improvements can be made. There have been many defects reported and many defects have been fixed by the development team. In fact this is one of the best supported products I have ever used. There are going to be times when something happens in game that you will think is ridiculous and may be it is. Take it in stride as the fortunes of war and carry on. The great strength of this game is that it is not deterministic lets face it neither is real life. Bad luck can befall you and you might get caught in a corner case. Just treat those incidents as bad luck and go make some good luck for yourself by paying attention to real life tactics and take care of your men. The biggest short coming I find with CMBN is the scenario map editor. That could really use a UI face lift. There is no way to overlay images in the editor to help create realistic contour lines and building road positioning. Plus the AI planner is pretty difficult to follow and offers no ability to copy and paste. I tried to create a map and gave up. I still do not get how to control the AI's actions it just is not intuitive. But as far as playing the game goes I am very happy. I have been playing multiple games and multiple opponents sine the moment CMBN came out. I see no sign of my interest dropping. I am getting better a playing but still have opponents that are challenging. ---88--- When I first reviewed this game I had a few criticisms with regard to the scenario editor. They have since enhanced that part of the game taking care of most of my concerns. Scenario creating is a challenge for sure but the game's editor no longer gets in your way the way it originally did. Bravo. »

« Never before have i played a WW2 game with so much attention to detail or that was so intense, and unforgiving. The game has a steep learning curve, but once you learn it you will be rewarded. I have CMbn and both its modules (expansions) and there is no other ww2 game like them in the world. »