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Special Episode - Board and Video Games of the French and Indian War!
174 Plays24 days ago
On our way to the Battle of Fort Oswego, we're taking a brief detour to talk about some of the board/tabletop and video games we've played that are set in the period of the French and Indian War. We discuss each game's strengths, weaknesses, and how well they capture the spirit of the setting. Please share any additional games you've played and enjoyed in the comments!
Intro & outro music - "Drums and Guns" by Village Volunteers Fife & Drum Corps
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Transcript
Episode Introduction
00:00:10
Speaker
Welcome back to Tales from the French and Indian War. I'm your host Jackson and alongside me as always is Matt. Good evening Matt. Hello Jackson. How are you?
00:00:21
Speaker
I am doing very well. Thank you. Excited for this episode because it's a little different than our normal ones. Yeah, yeah. We don't have any notes. so Yeah, that was nice. that was a yeah First, if you just turned tuned into this, you're not going to get a really in-depth discussion here about any French Unity War topics, except you will find out how big of nerds that Jackson I are. I mean, you could have probably assumed that we're doing a French Unity War podcast, that we're a little nerdy, but now we'll fully dive into that.
00:00:53
Speaker
Well, I don't think there's any room for judgment here because if anyone's listening to a podcast going in-depth about the French and Indian War, I think they're right with ah right with us on that that front. Yeah, we have the right crowd here.
Exploring Games of the French and Indian War
00:01:06
Speaker
Yeah, so instead of going over the next phase or the next battle of the French and Indian War, we're taking a brief detour to talk about games set in the French and Indian War, whether that's board games, whether that is video games, just some different variety of games that we have played or have some experience with, and we're just going to kind of talk about what we think about them, if they represent the period well from like as far as we know, things that they do well, things that they do poorly, and then maybe what our ideal game would be if someone could ever you know make something exactly as we would want it. So I'm excited to get into it. Yes, it also was nice, as we said, because we don't have to take any notes for this one. But we got some great informative episodes coming up next when we hit the Battle of Oswego, which will be a really fascinating
Favorite Board Game: Muskets and Tomahawks
00:02:01
Speaker
one. So, Matt, anything you have to say before we pick our first game that we both have some experience with?
00:02:09
Speaker
No, no. I'll let you kick it off, Jackson. Tell us what it's number one. So first we're going start with some board games, some tabletop games before we move into the digital sphere. So we are going to start with, I guess we'll see what you say, but it might be my favorite game set in this period that, uh, that I've played so far. And that is muskets and tomahawks.
00:02:32
Speaker
Would you say, uh, that might be your favorite in the period? Yes, it's a very good game. And for listeners that might not be super familiar with what tabletop games are, they're usually tabletop war games. So you think of stuff like Warhammer 40,000, stuff like that. And most people, i'd say, that play muskets, tomahawks, or games like that are also into Warhammer forty k and that type of stuff but you know it's um it's uh both a game and a hobby it was something that i had got jackson into um i don't know jackson probably a little over a year ago now um i had got into it a little bit before that and then i was originally into warhammer and then i realized there was a french and indian war section of that and that piqued jackson's interest and he got into it as well um
00:03:20
Speaker
But ah yeah, no, it's it's a great game. Like I said, it's it's more of a hobby too than than just a game. So. Yeah, let me talk a little bit about that for people who haven't played these kinds of games. So our listeners, it's not like a typical board game where you like see a box in a store, you buy it, you take it home and then like you're ready to play immediately.
00:03:40
Speaker
um So when Matt is saying there's a hobby part to it, basically instead of just like little plastic pieces like you might see in Risk or something like that, you have little miniatures, miniature soldiers. They might just be maybe just a couple couple inches tall, ah typically around that size.
00:03:58
Speaker
And they start, they come either unassembled if they're made of plastic or if they're made of metal, then they're kind of like a little, they need some cleaning up. But regardless, both are unpainted. So there's that whole side of the hobby where you take the time to, you know, buy the tools, little brushes, the paints, you paint every single figure in your force,
00:04:21
Speaker
And then only then, i mean, you can play the game before that, of course, but it feels so much more immersive when you have bringing your army to the table and you've got each figure that you've painted, ah you spent time with.
Strategic Elements and Gaming Experience
00:04:36
Speaker
And then on a game board that you can make and it can change every time you play with different scenery, different terrain, maybe a cluster of muddled trees or like a hill or something like that. So this is not a typical board game where you like a risk where you have the board in the map of the world, you open up the box and you're playing in five minutes. This is more of a ah ah niche kind of like he said, like a hobby and a game as well. And we'll get into like how it plays the rules in a moment, but that's some background there.
00:05:08
Speaker
Yeah, and to add on to that, so it's like Jackson said, it's not like a typical risk game where you're playing by a, you know, a turn. I mean, it is turn based, but you know, you're not playing by a super defined set of rules where you know, you do this, or like you attack with like three soldiers here and stuff like that. It's the game is really meant to simulate an actual battle. So there's stuff like weather effects, like players will roll to see what type of weather's on the battlefield. It's just, in a way, it's a simulation of a battle at a miniature scale, which it gets really cool because then if, you know, you're building and painting your miniatures by yourself, you could decide that, hey, I want to build an entire game we'll say Highlander Army for the British. And then you can look up like what Highlander regiments were in North America in the 1750s. See like, hey, you know, I want to build the, I think the the Black Watch is one of the, one of the Highlander regiments were over there. And I know that because I think I painted of my units that that style but it gets really cool and if we turned you off from this game by telling you that you have to build and paint things i would say not don't knock it till you try it it sounds very tedious time consuming which it can be but it's also very fun um and the more time you spend with your with your little guys and make them how you want and eventually you have a full army in front of you that looks very realistic and then you get to play battles with it it's very ah
00:06:39
Speaker
Very fulfilling, i would say. Yeah, and I can say as someone who is inherently not very crafty or, you know, like that was one of the most daunting parts about getting into this game was I don't, you know, I'm not an artsy person.
00:06:53
Speaker
Don't really have much experience painting or building like my own things like that. But it is it is fun just giving it a try. And also if you really hate painting and can't get around the idea of that, you could also buy models that are already painted too. So there is that.
00:07:10
Speaker
um But yeah, I have become much more crafty just from the last year of assembling and painting and making some different terrain pieces so that the the playing area looks more immersive. but Yeah, so a little bit about how the game plays. The scale is typically, you're going to have either like about 20 to maybe 50 figures on each side, depending on if you're doing a larger battle or a smaller battle. You can go below or above that, but your soldiers on the battlefield are going to be arranged in two different squads. So there might be like a group of four to eight ah Indians, native warriors.
00:07:49
Speaker
Or you know maybe you might have a group of six Canadian militia. or it's like a little group of 12 regular French or British infantry.
00:08:01
Speaker
ah So your your troops are arranged in different squads. When you give a squad an order, all of the figures move together. They all shoot together. They all reload together. They charge the enemy together.
00:08:11
Speaker
So instead of moving... Like one piece at a time, you're moving different units, different squads at a time, and their fate is all linked as they fight against the enemy or as they withdraw from the battlefield after being routed, taking casualties, which is the shock and terror of taking a volley of concentrated fire from the enemy.
00:08:36
Speaker
So there's different objectives with the game. Sometimes it might just be eliminate the other person, like half of the other person's army. Or it might be there's objectives on the table and you have to have a unit near it.
00:08:48
Speaker
Or it could be like one of your units is carrying some kind of like supplies or like, like a I forget the the term in the in the rules book, but one of your squads has an item and has to get to like the other side of the board and and exit the field. So there's a lot of different ways to play, so many different ways you can build your force and your army.
00:09:10
Speaker
ah There's lots of replayability, and especially if you get into the terrain-making side of things, you can make really fascinating boards with a lot of unique moments.
Strengths and Limitations of Muskets and Tomahawks
00:09:21
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, completely agree. um We've had some really cool battles, you know, we part of the game too. And I always find this fun is, that you know, you're using black powder weapons. So after ah unit fires, we'll put down like cotton ball smoke under the table to represent the smoke at the visibility of that unit. And that actually, I mean, it has an effect on the game. Unit shoots, they're easier to spot because of the plume of white smoke from the the black powder. And the game is it's really well designed for what it is. And this game is made by Studio Tomahawk, and they make some other historical-based war games. They have, like, Saga, which is, like...
00:10:03
Speaker
Middle Ages and stuff like that. But it's a very well designed game. It captures a lot of elements of the war. And if you buy the rule book online, you'll be able to read through there and see that there's like scenarios that they have set in there for each like time period. And they have a specific French identity war supplement that we play, which is Redcoats and Tomahawks, which covers the French and Indian War, ah War of Independence, and then I believe the War of 1812. But in in that book, it gives you specific battles and tells you how to set them up and stuff. So it's just really cool. If you want to reenact the Battle of Fort Necessity, you totally could. And the game tells you how to do that. So it's just it's really a kind of create your own adventure type game. But if you get a dedicated play group that enjoys it, it's it's a ton of fun.
Introduction to Struggle for New France
00:10:54
Speaker
Yeah. I've got one more thing to say before perhaps we we summarize this game and its strengths and weaknesses. But my friend and I at the local game store, we have started a really fun like campaign with muskets and tomahawks. So We picked the four main fronts of the French and Indian War, the Ohio Country, Oswego, Niagara, upstate New York, Lake George and Lake Champlain, and then Acadia.
00:11:20
Speaker
And we're doing three battles in each of those theaters. So we just finished fighting for the Ohio Country, where the results of the first battle will impact the second battle.
00:11:31
Speaker
And then the results of that battle will impact what the third is. And then we see overall, like who won that theater and how does that affect the course of the war? And it's been really fun because with these kinds of games, like Matt said, it's not super rigid. You can really tweak and modify things, make your own scenarios as you will.
00:11:48
Speaker
So there's a lot of like fun ways. If you get a a fellow nerd who's on the same wavelength, you can have a lot of fun playing this, this kind of game. Yeah, so Matt, what do you think the best thing about the game is, or the strongest trait of muskets and tomloks, and what is one area that you wish could be maybe improved or fleshed out?
00:12:12
Speaker
Yeah, um I think I kind of mentioned it before, but I think the best part about the game is you can tell the game designers had you know ah a real ah passion for history, and they made everything, I don't know how to really explain this well, but they made everything make sense. You're like, hey, if this unit shoots at this other unit, obviously they're going to, I said, create smoke. They're going to be exposed. If this unit breaks into a loose formation and enters woods, then you know they're going to be hard to spot and they're going to be hard to hit with uh muskifier and it just the game makes sense where and i've seen this because play other tabletop games it's like oh you mean like my unit of huge infantrymen can just like run through this wall because it makes like the game more balanced the game i wouldn't i mean it's it's balanced enough but it it makes sense and it feels like you're actually like recreating a battle rather than playing like a super rigid set of rules so I would say that's the best part. I mean, it you get really engrossed into it. It just kind of pulls you in from the realism.
00:13:16
Speaker
I would say the weakness is that if you ever want to simulate a large battle, so we're talking like, you know, large pitch battles or anything, which you don't see a whole lot in the war, you'll see that as we go later on, more of that, but not so far. And the majority of the battles were more skirmish based, so it it makes sense to play a game like this. But if you ever do want to make like a a large line battle or something um the game system itself is just kind of limited for that because it is focused more on the skirmish side but then again there's if you have the models like if you want to create a ton of british infantrymen and have a line battle there's plenty of game systems out there designed for that One of them is Black Powder, which is made by Warlord Games, I believe. That one's more line battle based. So if you have the historical models, you can always dupe them out from one game to another. i would just say that Muskets and Tomahawks is based more around the skirmish squad type action.
00:14:17
Speaker
Yeah, pretty much any time period you're interested in, there's going to be a few different rule sets you can use depending on how you want to play. I just got another rule set called A Song of Drums and Tomahawks, I believe, for the French and Indian War period. But that is much smaller scale. So that's like you might have eight soldiers on your side or maybe up to 20 if it's like a larger one. i haven't got to play it yet, so I can't review it or anything. But um yes, just going off that.
00:14:45
Speaker
What I would say the strength for Muskets and Tomahawks, I would say as far as some tabletop games go, it is very approachable. the The rules are, aren its it doesn't get way too in the weeds, but there's enough complexity where it's interesting.
00:15:03
Speaker
And you really have to you know try to play with the terrain, with the your unit's strengths and weaknesses. um i think it it covers the period pretty well with some of the different units you can bring, and they' their different traits, their positives or negatives.
00:15:21
Speaker
you know You've got units as specific as like the the French, the Marines, the Troop de la Marine. You have like British Rangers that you can bring. um lot of different units like that. like ah The Canadian militia is, they're rated, their stats are higher than like their counterparts in the British colonial militia because...
00:15:44
Speaker
Every fighting a man from 16 to 60 in New France was enrolled in the militia and was has was much more likely to have seen action and played a ah role in military maneuvers than there their peers over in the British colonies. So stuff like that is reflected in the the unit stats, and I think that's definitely a strength. As far as weaknesses would go with things that could be improved, I would just say that there's ah native forces. There's like the French, the British, and then, well, and Americans if you're playing Revolutionary War. And then there's a native warrior unit list.
00:16:21
Speaker
But all it is is like an Indian chief and Indian warriors. Like there's not much variety. Now you can get different upgrades for like your Indian units to customize them a little more, make them like,
00:16:33
Speaker
more disciplined warriors or young braves or like have ah contraband weapons and stuff like that. So there's a little bit of variety you can bring if you're making like an Indian focused army.
00:16:44
Speaker
But in general, like nothing representing different like the the Iroquois League or the Great Lakes tribes and all their confederacies or, you know, nothing like region specific going deeper into the category of Native American rather than just that.
00:17:00
Speaker
So. yeah Yeah, that's a good point. You know, thinking about that too, it Studio Tomahawk, I believe, is a European company. And maybe that has something to do with it. I don't know. Maybe, you if they just ah yeah you know, they're more familiar, obviously, with the English and the British troops at that time, but maybe less familiar with what native troops and stuff were involved. Matt, are you saying that just like the French and Indian War, this is another case of European snobbery looking down on the Americans?
00:17:30
Speaker
some euro centricism going on possibly i mean i love studio tomahawk so please if you're listening don't take this as slander i'm just saying it's a possible reason also another reason would be that they just wanted to simplify the game and not make a million uh native tribes and confuse players but there yeah All right, well, let's move on to our second game, also a board game, although this is just more a a traditional board game, not a tabletop game where you have to invest all this time and effort to get the game ready.
Game Mechanics and Educational Value
00:17:59
Speaker
This is a game Matt and I have played together once, and I've played a few other times. It's called The Struggle for New France.
00:18:07
Speaker
I believe the creator is a local to like Western PA, I think. He's made a number of like French and Indian War and colonial-specific board games. um but yeah this one is called the struggle for new france it cover you know there's a big map you unfurl of northeastern north america one player takes the french one player takes the british and it is an asymmetrical game so that meaning like unlike chess for example where both sides come to the battlefield with the exact same pieces
00:18:38
Speaker
ah Exact same like rules. This is a game where sure, like the soldiers you have are going to almost the exact same, but it is deck based game where there's a British deck and and in a French deck.
00:18:56
Speaker
And the different cards that you get in those in your hand determine what you can do. And the cards are not the same for the French and the British. so And they also have different goals. The French just have to last till the end of the war once you get to, I think it's 1760, the winter of 1760. If you can hold on to Quebec, Montreal, or Louisbourg at the end of that, all the different seasons, then you win.
00:19:20
Speaker
And you have to have a certain amount of points as well, victory points. For the British, they need to capture all of those locations. So... France doesn't need to invade all of the colonies and take over Boston and New York. They just have to survive and then Britain has to conquer those three main areas.
00:19:37
Speaker
In the decks, as far as what the different factions do is different as well. You'll notice that while France starts with more mobilized troops at the beginning, representing all the different like native tribes that they have and their quick raids and readiness at the beginning of the war,
00:19:54
Speaker
The British, their cards that bring in reinforcements to the port cities, they're going to bring in a lot more troops in over the course of the game than the French have in their cards. Additionally, representing the British naval power,
00:20:08
Speaker
The British have the ability to interrupt French reinforcement cards and basically cancel them out with blockades. So that's a taste of the kind of asymmetry in this game.
00:20:18
Speaker
But it's really fascinating. the The map has all of these interconnected territories, forts, and villages, and cities that you can travel troops across. The combat is like one step above risk. you know It's not just rolling a die. like The amount of troops that you have will matter. If you have more troops, you're going to have a like a ah minimum amount of damage you're going to deal, regardless of what you roll. And there's also leaders in play who can support your forces and give them bonuses as well.
00:20:49
Speaker
I've played a few times. was going to say all the leaders special and they have their own cards and stuff and they're historical leaders that came over. If I remember right, I believe that certain leaders are available at certain points in the game. that right? Each leader has a card. You might, on your opening hand, if you're the French, draw Montcalm.
00:21:11
Speaker
and you'll He's the the French's like strongest leader in the game. and You might get him right at the beginning, which is great. or it might be at the very end of the deck. So you're going through the entire game without having your strongest general like there on the field. So that can vary.
00:21:26
Speaker
um And it can lead to some interesting encounters because your leaders can die in combat as was fairly common for the period. um like you can have oh i remember playing a game where George Washington who's like one of the minor the minor leaders for the British he got killed very early on and we we're just like oh well that's gonna change the future what does this mean for the future and we just start dissolving Yeah. But no, it's a pretty fun fun game. There's only two players required and no extra setup. So it's a little bit easier and ah to find a game. It's about an hour and a half, I think maybe two hours probably.
00:22:06
Speaker
um But yeah, any any more notes on that, Matt, before we summarize it? If you remember from when we played a few years ago. Yeah, I think I've actually, i think I've played it a couple times with you. and it's nice. Yeah.
00:22:19
Speaker
it's made by and i know you mentioned a small uh creator game designer i'm trying to remember his name think bill molyneau molyneau molyneau yeah that's right yep bill molyneau yeah you're right yeah i mean it's a it's a great design game it's uh it doesn't feel like it was made by ah a small game uh creator it it feels like it like a you know a mainline title board game but yeah it's so it's a lot of fun i think it does a good job of simulating and uh the different effects that you know hampered the french and helped the british throughout the war and I will say that like when you're playing as the French, you feel like the underdog the whole time because you're not really getting a whole lot of help. And when you win a battle against the British, it's all that more sweet because you know they're bringing in tons of reinforcements while you're just you know relying on some native help here and there. but
00:23:13
Speaker
uh yeah it's it's really cool and i think like playing it if you knew nothing about the french and indian war you would be like oh i know why the british won this war oh spoiler i guess but i think our listeners know who won yeah yeah you yeah um but yeah you would figure out why the british won uh just by playing the game and it would tell the story pretty accurately so i think that's pretty cool Yeah, I think that is a strength of the game for sure. The educational aspect, not like like on the nose, but just by playing the game and the different mechanics, it does kind of mirror the war pretty well. There's a lot of nice little nods like... ah
00:23:55
Speaker
There's ah the game separated by a year and by season. So in spring, summer and fall, that's when you can do troop movements and play cards. And then winter, you can't do any of that. You just kind of like, re like draw up your hand and like reset some things just as in the, in this time period, armies would go into winter quarters and there wouldn't be any like large scale action.
00:24:16
Speaker
Additionally, ah France, which has the majority of the native allies in this, whenever you have native troops in a battle, regardless of the outcome of the battle, you have to remove those troops and put them in the nearest Native American village on the map.
00:24:32
Speaker
which is emblematic of how, as we've seen in some of the episodes we've discussed and will continue to go throughout throughout the war, when these natives would fight and they would win, they would be like, okay, we're taking our scalps and our booty and we got to bring this back to the village. you know See you next season, French.
00:24:49
Speaker
nice ah Nice fighting with you. And then they would go and then the French would be like a little irritated because they're like, but no, we got to gotta keep fighting. we You can't just leave after one battle. What are you talking about?
00:25:00
Speaker
So there's game mechanics that really represent the period well, which is definitely
Video Game Spotlight: Empire Total War
00:25:05
Speaker
strength. As far as weakness or thing that could be improved, I think all I would say really is just the map is on like a not a piece of paper, that's not the right term, like like poster material. And if it was a board that folded, then there wouldn't be any creases ah you know after it's been stored for a while. And so sometimes like I've had a piece slide off from like the middle of the crease where there was a territory.
00:25:34
Speaker
But that's really that's really minor. That's not game mechanic. That's just small local creator not being able to get a nice fancy board like Risk. i Honestly, I completely forgot that it was on like a piece of poster paper. i thought there was a board. so Any differing strength or weakness for struggle for New France? france I mean, not really. I kind of touched on it. think the strength really is that it does a good job of simulating the war and how it played out. Of course, the French can win this time, even though super rough. I've both the French and the British win in the game, so it seems to be balanced.
00:26:16
Speaker
Yeah, it's balanced enough. But again, like I said, I think it does a good job of assuming the different factors at play. As far as a weakness goes, you know the the combat's a little on the simple side, but you know that's just because it's more of a grand strategy game than it is a war game, like Muskets and Topmahawks. So I think the the combat makes sense. It's just ah more of a simple of like, hey, I have...
00:26:43
Speaker
certain number of troops more than you do so i'm gonna win this battle and of course we talked about how leaders get involved as well and stuff that plays a role but um but outside of that it's a fantastic game i would highly recommend it especially because i think you can pick it up for pretty cheap and um certainly a ah fun game to have if you're interested in this time period Yeah, i I played it first at the Braddix Battlefield Museum. Every month or so they have like a strategy games day. And so I made the drive over there, played it, really liked it. And then they had it for sale in the gift shop too. So if you're in the area and you're checking out the Braddix Battlefield Museum, perhaps they'll still have it in stock and you can also pick it up there.
00:27:23
Speaker
But yeah. All right. So we are leaving board and table games and going into video games now. And we'll start off with a game many of you probably would have heard of, at least the series it's in, and that is Empire Total War.
00:27:41
Speaker
So Matt, why don't you you lead off on this one? Yeah, Dax and Nethis is like one of my favorite Total War games of all time. Despite the fact that there's a know massive bug in the game where you can trick the AI into selling its property to you and then Just keep repeating that until you win every time. So if you don't exploit that, it's a really good game. But yeah, Empire Total War, it's set in the same time period. It's on a global scale, so you can really play as any country you want. You don't have to play as the French or the British.
00:28:14
Speaker
And if I remember right, I haven't played this game in a long time, but I do remember that there were some, I believe, DLCs for it. I know there was one for like the American Revolution. Jackson, was there one specifically for the French and Indian War?
00:28:27
Speaker
So in I think the tutorial or one of like the main campaigns there is like a real brief there's like ah i think it's the tutorial like the first part is like you're playing as the first British colonists fighting against some Native Americans then the second part of the tutorial is technically like a French and Indian War set but it's pretty short and limited and then I think the third part of the tutorial or that storyline might have been like the American Revolution but Yeah, the game's set in general from between 1700 and 1800. So it encompasses a period with lots of different wars all around the globe. And you can fight in Europe, in North America, in Middle East and North Africa, and also in India as well.
00:29:10
Speaker
So it's truly a global scale game. Yeah, um and I think the game kind of combines the two previous games we were talking about, Missions of Tomahawks and Struggle for New France, where you have, if you're not familiar with the Total War series, if you are, you already know this, but if you're not, there's two components to the game, one being a 4X type strategy game where you're moving pieces around on a map and trying to capture different capitals and stuff like that. And then the other half of it is the battle aspect, which I'd say Total War is probably more known for. um you know You have your units on the battlefield and then it turns into ah an RTS game, a real time strategy where you're moving. Yeah, it's like more or less to scale. like You'll actually have thousands of like little soldiers or hundreds hundreds or thousands depending on the size of your army. And each like soldier is modeled out technically. So you can zoom in and like see all your troops with the muskets lined up and everything.
00:30:07
Speaker
So very large scale that you can get with this game. Yeah. So Jackson, what are your strengths and weaknesses for this game? I'm interested here. before we get into strengths and weaknesses, I have one funny story. Well, no, two quick funny stories with this game. So I played this not too far, not too long ago. I think like a year or two ago was the last campaign I did. So obviously you guys know I'm kind of biased towards Fran, so that is usually where I gravitate to. What? So one game and with my interest in the period, I was like, going to play as France and I'm going to make sure they don't lose new France. I'm going to I'm going to hit the British colonies hard over there. going to make sure North America becomes French.
Strengths and Challenges of Empire Total War
00:30:47
Speaker
And so I managed to win over the over course of a few decades in the game. against the British. However, since I was so focused on that, I neglected India entirely and the Maranatha Confederacy or whatever the official name is, they had taken over the entire subcontinent and in the game, they just got so freakishly powerful that they ended up sending an armada from India all the way around the world into the Caribbean, took one of my islands and then moved the fleet towards the Mississippi River
00:31:22
Speaker
Landed the the army, which was full. I had like war elephants with cannons on them and stuff. Marched it up the Mississippi to St. Louis or what would become St. Louis, like the French fort there. So I had like a tiny little garrison of like 300 militiamen and they're just sitting out in the middle of the Great Plains. You know, nothing happens out here.
00:31:42
Speaker
Then an army from India just shows up because they're at war with me so for some reason with elephants, which they probably never seen. and then Very bravely, but vainly, they fight and they die. And then the Maranatha Confederacy took Fort Deschartres in what is now Missouri.
00:32:03
Speaker
so that one was hard So you're you're talking about a recreation, the Maranatha Battle for St. Louis then, right? i think Oh, yeah that yeah, that historical battle. Yeah, I remember reading about it in sixth grade. We learned about when India invaded Missouri in 1750. Yeah.
00:32:19
Speaker
and So I had to mention that if we're talking about Empire Total War. That's awesome. One other quick story I was playing as Sweden once. And because of that encounter with France and India, I was like, okay, I'm going to make sure I send an army over to India earlier in the game so I can kind of check their power. They were already extremely powerful. I only took like one city and they just generated like ah an entire army every turn and attacked my beleaguered fort. So just all I could do every turn was a full scale battle where my beleaguered Swedes who I couldn't replenish slowly got whittled down as they fought in a ruined Indian fort out in the
00:32:57
Speaker
the highlands in the middle of nowhere so if uh if you're playing the game keep an eye on india that's it's important yeah very rich that's that's what it sounds like oh my gosh yeah so so yeah those are some very fun stories whenever you play any of the total war games as you go through campaigns uh strengths uh grand scale it's not just confined to north america it's not just confined to europe it i mean you can fight and multiple regions all around the world so it's very ambitious in scale there's a lot of like good empire-wide management you know you're managing your economy trading your military you can your your armies are made of specific units that you can unlock there's technologies you can research diplomacy you know it's
Unique Gameplay of Master of Command
00:33:46
Speaker
There's a lot in it. Weakness definitely has to be the AI and some of the bugs. So for example, in the in the like the Sweden campaign, all i had to do was just like set up my cannons and all my troops huddled in like one corner.
00:34:02
Speaker
And then invariably the enemy would just kind of walk slowly all across the field while I got my cannons and everything could light them up. Or it's like if you move a soldier up to the middle of the battlefield and then back,
00:34:14
Speaker
even if the enemy is like defending that like triggers the entire enemy army to come towards you. So you really just have to like get a defensive position and some cannons and you're going to win most of the battles just because the enemy battle AI just isn't quite good.
00:34:30
Speaker
So that's definitely the weakness I would say for this game. sure um yeah i think the strength the game for me is that um it's really the only 4x strategy game in this time period and i think it does it pretty well um jackson said you know you get the global scale of it and i think you know my favorite part of that game was always like having a total war game that simulated the black powder of warfare and i know like total war napoleon came after that but that's not the same scale as what an empire is and um i'm just praying to god one day they make a total war empire 2 that would be now that would be cool that would be amazing so creative assembly if you hear me make that happen um
00:35:19
Speaker
Yeah, so that's the strength. I mean, it's just, it does it does what it does wonderfully, and it's it's a fun game to really get engrossed into. A weakness, Jackson, you kind of took mine. i was going to say the AI, as I mentioned before, but both the campaign and the battle AI just isn't great. As I mentioned, you know, you can...
00:35:40
Speaker
keep reselling a property the ai and make infinite money and get your get your uh they keep just building and buying their properties and stuff and it never ends and uh and that's what this game has faced a lot of criticism for the ai um i think as long as you don't exploit it it's fine but in battles and stuff it can be a little frustrating and Total War series has been criticized for their AI for as long as I've been alive. so this isn't anything new, but it's still a very fun game and I would highly recommend it. You'll spend thousands of hours. Yeah, you can pick it up for real cheap. now I think my friend bought it for me for like five bucks on a sale and I've definitely got more than ah five hours of entertainment from it. So that's definitely a a a well worth purchase there.
00:36:32
Speaker
Mm-hmm. All right. ah Let's go to a game you mentioned, think, last episode at the very end, Master of Command, a much more recent game release than all of the others we've talked about so far. So Master of Command...
00:36:49
Speaker
Doesn't technically count as a French and Indian war game because is set exclusively in Europe and it's looking at the Seven Years' War, which is just the European focused or more global focus of what we call the French and Indian War. So same conflict, but it's not going to be, it's not connected to Braddock. It's not connected to Mon Calme, Vaudry, Washington. None of these people are in the game. North America is not in the game.
00:37:21
Speaker
So that's a little sad because had remember seeing trailers for this game before it was released at the end of last year. And I could see like the combat and I saw the setting and I was like, oh, I really hope they have a North American theater. This game looks awesome.
00:37:37
Speaker
As of now, they do not. Maybe in the future. We'll see. That dang Eurocentricism. It strikes again. but or maybe it's American centricism for expecting that the North American theater of this massive global war would be worth all of the developers focus. So maybe it's um i'll leave that to listener American Euro centricism centricism. These are multiple levels of centricism that would deal with people. You're losing me.
00:38:06
Speaker
But yeah, so this game is a little different from some of the others. so it's different from Total War because it's you're not playing as like an omniscient leader of a country managing every aspect of everything. no you are just the head of your army.
00:38:20
Speaker
And it starts out as just a few different, what is it? Is it battalions or regiments or ah that unit? yeah Yeah, I think it's... You like one battalion at a time and you make up a few different brigades. Is that it?
00:38:33
Speaker
I think so. Yeah, I forget the org structure, but yeah, you can like you have each I think we'll say battalion has like four units in it. And then you can create multiple battalions as you go along. So then you keep growing your army.
00:38:48
Speaker
Yeah, so you can so you start the the campaign with maybe 2,000 soldiers or 3,000 soldiers split up in a couple different units. Like each unit has 1,000 or if it's cavalry, they might have like 500. And as you play, you can like acquire, buy or otherwise collect more regiments into your army and expand, like get more brigades with different officers leading them who have different abilities.
00:39:14
Speaker
One of the things that makes this game much more unique from something like Empire Total War is that it is one of the, what was it, roguelite games, I think is the term, where you you kind of like make a run every time you play. Like you're not picking up where you left off necessarily every time you play.
00:39:35
Speaker
um and the thing like how far you get or the the things you achieve in one game can like unlock units for you later on in other attempts, other runs. So the the game is split into three acts.
00:39:50
Speaker
like Act 1, Act 2, Act 3, you need to make it to the end of the third one and defeat the boss army. At the end of each act, there's a boss army. So you you get like a campaign map based on a theater of the the European front of the war.
00:40:03
Speaker
You like lead your army through it. There's different all sorts of different encounters. There's enemy patrol armies. So you're trying to better equip your army and grow and gain more regiments. Build up your army so that when you face the boss battles where there's a highly experienced and large enemy force waiting for you at the end of the act that you can take them out. And then you bring that same army into the next act where you can further flesh them out and develop them.
00:40:31
Speaker
ah And you try to get to the of three. the end of act three So I've had maybe a 50% success rate. I've won with a few different nations, but my last challenge when I was playing it, I was really trying to get a win with Britain, but, and each faction has different, you know, overarching abilities, but I've lost like three times in a row with Britain. So then I ended up taking a break from the game, but I put in quite a few hours in there before. Matt, what is ah your experience with the game been?
00:41:02
Speaker
I have not, I'm been embarrassed to admit this, I have not completed a run through that game. I want to, i haven't had a chance to. I've played like half of a run or so. And Jackson, when you were talking about it being a road-like game, were you talking, does it mean like, so if you do one run, like let's say it is a British, then the next run you do is a different empire, does that change anything? Or does it like, do you mean like from act to act, you get stronger?
00:41:28
Speaker
So act to act, you definitely get stronger. But even like, so for example, when you just complete act one with any nation, you'll unlock like a new starting force for that nation. So there's like three different starting armies for each nation that you can you can start out with. So that will really kind of direct the kind of army you end up making. Yeah.
00:41:48
Speaker
And then if you get to act two and beat that, I think you might get like a special unit, like a renowned unit of the war that you can now encounter in the game or there's something like that.
00:42:01
Speaker
Like I'm sure the black watch regiment or the cold stream guards, I think are in there. So like you can unlock them through doing things in a run. And then after that, they'll might start appearing in the game and you can like recruit them or have them join your force if you encounter them.
Strengths and Weaknesses of Master of Command
00:42:18
Speaker
So there's some of those elements where depending on what you do in a run, that might give you like one more tool later on in a ah separate run. Gotcha. Okay. That's cool. I actually didn't even know that element of the game existed. um I would say that my, if we're talking about strengths and weaknesses, don't know if we got onto that, but I can dive into line.
00:42:39
Speaker
Strength of the game, I think, is the scale of the battles. It doesn't, so it's kind of weird. And if you look it up online, the art style is like, I don't want to say cartoony, but it's like animated. And if you've ever watched- It's like a tasteful cartoon style, I guess. like Yeah.
00:42:58
Speaker
It's like a a realistic cartoon somehow. I don't know how to explain it. You'd have to look up some of the materials from the game if you're listening. Yeah, like the people look like real people. It's not like cartoon people, if that makes sense. But regardless, so the game is made by the Armchair Historian who has a big YouTube channel and he does a lot of videos. and His videos are often animated as well. And it's in the same animation style. So if you're familiar with that, you'll know what I'm talking about. um the battles are kind of at a they're in a like a 3d 2d perspective so the like the game runs so well because it doesn't render like 3d models of trees it just shows you a 2d model and your camera is a little restricted from like going around that tree to see that's a 2d model so like the end result is that the battlefield looks super realistic and you have like hills and stuff And the way yeah, it's just it's it's really cool. And like you can have units of 200 men, and they like are full out, stretched. And you just can simulate gigantic battles with it.
00:44:05
Speaker
It's really cool. It's just like an excellent game to design. um weakness of it you know i really i don't think i played enough to really give it to know the full weakness of it just because i i've really enjoyed everything that i've seen i think if i had a weakness you know it would just be like it it's so has a decent amount of like an rpg element where you know you can equip your uh regiments with different items and it gives them different like morale boosts or speed boosts and stuff which like
00:44:37
Speaker
it kind of makes sense in a way. It also is a little bit more like video gamey than, don't know. I don't know how explain that. example, for our listeners, like you can pick one of your regiments of like general ah regular infantry and you could equip them with a pair of boots that increases their that unit's move speed and then like a...
00:45:00
Speaker
um certain like clothing that protects them in melee. And then you could give them like a third item that gives them a, like maybe a stronger bayonet so that they're better charged. And then you can be like, well, this is my melee preferred regular unit.
00:45:17
Speaker
But sometimes there's different levels, like you can get a legendary item, for example. And so if you like really optimize those items, it can probably, to your point, Matt, yeah look little comical where you have like two regular red coat infantries, same thing, but because of the items you give to one versus the other, the one can be like kind of speeding across the map because you like maxed out their move speed with everything you could while the other is like just lumbering or along like normal.
00:45:46
Speaker
Yeah, and I think like, even though I said that's a weakness and I'm really nitpicking here, I don't really think it is in a way because while that does take away from the realism part of it, it also makes the game a lot of fun where you can say like, as Jackson did, hey, I want this unit to be melee.
00:46:04
Speaker
So I'm going to give them all melee stuff and then I want this unit to be like sharpshooters. I'm going to give yeah them really good rifles and scopes and good bullets. And it's just it's a lot of fun. You can customize everything. And in a way, it's kind of realistic because it's like, oh, how do I want to supply this army to be the most efficient as possible? So. Yeah.
A Noteworthy Yet Outdated Game
00:46:20
Speaker
Yeah. Um, yeah, it's good. Not really a negative. That's like one in a job interview when you give a positive or you give a yeah negative, what's really positive. Like, Oh, like I work too hard. pun Yeah. Uh, Jackson, what are your strengths of weaknesses?
00:46:36
Speaker
I will start with weakness so that I don't forget what I was thinking of. My weakness for this game would be lack of a line of sight or elevation mechanic. So Matt, you mentioned this a little bit how everything's like 2D technically when you look at it.
00:46:52
Speaker
So that means like for hills, those are just, flat it's still technically flat. And for forests, like there's nothing actually like there, like it it impacts, you know, movement and melee and and shooting and stuff like that. But If you have one unit in front of a dense patch of woods shooting at a unit on the other side, like the bullets don't get caught in the trees. like It's still firing at full effect. Or if you have a unit behind a hill, the enemy's cannon on the other side of the map can still shoot at that unit and start whittling it away, even though technically you should be safe from any cannon fire if if there was some kind of line of sight mechanic.
00:47:34
Speaker
But there is not. So that can be a little frustrating when the enemy army ends up having a lot of artillery, for example, because you can get into cover, which protects you a little bit more, but you cannot you cannot hide. You cannot get out of it out of its sight.
00:47:49
Speaker
There's no hiding. Yes. So that would be my weakness, I think, to be improved. And the game is still pretty recent. Just a few months ago it came out. So hopefully there's a it it only goes up from here. But strength, definitely very engaging gameplay, both on the like campaign map and in the battles themselves. And it is challenging, too.
00:48:11
Speaker
um but not, it's a, it's a good challenge where like, if you're playing for the first time, it's likely you're not going to get too far as you're going to get familiar with everything.
00:48:23
Speaker
But you know, as you learn some things, as you optimize your, your runs, you start to get further and further. ah And it's it's pretty rewarding. it's It's not too unfair, but it's not too easy or either for sure.
00:48:36
Speaker
Yeah, completely agree. It's a great game, and I hope they add a DLC for the French and Indian War. French and Indian Yes, I hope so. I hope so. um Yeah, so I had one more game I was going to talk about.
00:48:50
Speaker
It's a game that Matt has not played, so it would have just been me talking. However, um when I was looking, i was pulling up the tab so I could make sure to get like the name right and the who made it.
00:49:02
Speaker
I think it's actually no longer available for sale. Like that's how outdated it was getting. ah So the game is by war game design studio. And I think before that they had acquired it from like I think it was John Tiller studios or something like that. I don't know the whole history, but this war game design studio, they have ah video games for tons and tons of different wars. Some I've never even heard of. So if you want to find a really niche, like computer game representing,
00:49:32
Speaker
a very specific war, they probably have one for it. The thing is, at least with the French and Indian War game that I have from them, it i mean it looks like it was made in 1990 or 1995. The UI looks like it.
00:49:46
Speaker
um So it's it's very, the UI is clunky. It's hard to learn. And there's not a lot of like support materials or like tutorial stuff that like teaches you like what everything does that you can do and all the different status effects and stuff.
00:50:05
Speaker
So i'm already like getting into the weakness right there. It doesn't look very pretty, and
Episode Conclusion and Listener Engagement
00:50:10
Speaker
apparently you can't even buy it anymore. I bought it like last year or two years ago, but I guess their website isn't offering it anymore.
00:50:17
Speaker
So that's a big weakness. As far as strength goes, it does seem to be... There's a lot of content, like pretty much any battle we've talked about, including the smaller ones like Fort Boal and Catanning. Those are represented in the game, so there's like a map.
00:50:31
Speaker
It's like a hexagonal based map, French versus British. and So there's a lot of content and they also have like what if scenarios where they might take like the Battle of Oswego, for example, which we'll be talking about soon.
00:50:44
Speaker
And they'll do one that is like the the canon one, but then they might have a couple different what ifs where like, what if British reinforcements arrive from the south right when Montcalm arrives or what if you know this or that.
00:50:58
Speaker
So there's a lot of variability even within just the main battles of the war. So that is a strength, but um it's very... This would be that it's not available. Yeah, sorry if you wanted to play it, if that was like piquing your interest. It also seems to be pretty well historically researched, which would be a strength. at least like the the unit count seems to be very accurate for the most part with like how many soldiers were actually there. And they have like the different officers like by name in there like leading the squads.
00:51:35
Speaker
So it it seems to be, if not very historically accurate, at least very historically plausible with its like scale and everything. but Yeah, it's very retro, clunky UI, and i I don't think you can find it anymore. So that it was the French Indian War Wargame Design Studio.
00:51:57
Speaker
um that's So that's a shame. But yeah, so those are the the games we wanted to talk through. I'm curious to see if any of you listeners have played any board or video games set in this period that were not mentioned here because I'm always looking for a new game.
00:52:12
Speaker
um And I love this period so much. So being able to play games in it is such an immersive and fun way to experience that time. So if you know of any other games, feel free to comment them.
00:52:25
Speaker
um yeah But yeah, hopefully this was interesting or entertaining. Hopefully you might want to pick up one or two of these games if anything has piqued your interest. But ah yeah, Matt, anything to add?
00:52:39
Speaker
No, I didn't. Well, actually, I do have one thing to add. um There is an iOS game that I just found right before we started this. It's called The French and Indian War. um So it's pretty direct to the point. I definitely haven't been playing it as Jackson's been talking during this episode, but no it's actually pretty cool. it's ah I haven't really played too much of it yet, but it it looks like it's kind of a great strategy game that you know you're playing on the North American continent and moving troops around attacking like British forts with French troops and stuff might be pretty simple, but it's pretty cool. So check that out. If you have an iPhone, I don't know if it's on Android, but yeah, it might be worth it.
00:53:22
Speaker
Well, yeah. Well, I see we already have talked for 50 minutes about games. If anyone is still listening, wow. Thanks. Glad you you stuck around for all this. But yeah, we'll be back pretty soon. Hopefully just next week, if possible, talking about the Battle of Oswego. we will be back to regular programming very soon.
00:53:44
Speaker
Looking forward to it. See ya.