military and historical

The game is excellent, if your into the whole turn based strategy game elements. The historical accuracy is one of the highest aspects of this game, ranging from different values of armour depending on years and months as well as equipment for different nations and dates.

There are mainly two different play types. A scenerio, and an operation. A scenerio can have up to 10 to 40 turns of combat, meaning while a Operation can have between 1 and 100 battles! It is truly excellent for those who wish to play for days, or even half an hour depending on what you want.

Custom scenerio building is very excellent, giving even the most simple of you gamers out there the power to build an entire battlefield within the game itself. No extra programs, no extra hassles, just pure fun.

The action is intense and sometimes even scary when you watch your defense line crumble under a computers, or another players, attack. Or exciting when your chasing the enemy's troops back towards their own.

The manual is excellent, giving you a massive outlook on all of the hard work and dedication the designers put into the research. All of the pages are filled with detailed info and helpful hints. AS well, it explains some of the games concepts in a clear manner.

The graphics, while not on par with such high rest super games, are great for what the game is about. The main focus on this game is gameplay, not graphics. But even so, the graphics are still really good when you watch a battle between 40 soldiers and several tanks crashing into eachother.

It gives you so many options, and the skins for soldiers and tanks are very editable, as well as the sounds. Meaning that uniform nuts and bolt-heads will go nuts trying to reskin every detail into a simple .bmp.

If your still unsure, try the demo at www.battlefront.com.

The Combat Mission series is the best turn-based tactical level WWII simulation out there, hands down. What makes the game engine unique is the "we-go" design, where each side plots orders for their units and then the turn is resolved simultaneously, which can be viewed as a movie. The game has a tactical level artificial intelligence that allows for units to make intelligent decisions during the course of turn based on input from their environment. For instance, if you order a T34 tank to advance over the crest of hill and during the course of the turn the T-34 spots a Tiger tank in the distance, chances are the T-34 will quickly reverse behind the crest to save itself.

The level of technical detail is truely top notch and Battlefront took a lot of input from military experts and hard-core wargamers to develop accurate models.

The graphics are good, but not comparable to some real-time games on the market. But the emphasis of this game is realism, strategy and tactics - not arcade psuedo history shoot em up.

An excellent scenario editor provides longevity to the game and hundres of customers publish custom scenarios. Buying this game is money well spent!

This is the best tactical level wargame for the modern period on the market. The only close rivals are East Front and the Close Combat series and CCBB is a huge advance over either of these.

My criteria for judging what purports to be a serious wargame is whether you can learn anything useful from it and whether what you do know about the tactics of the period can be employed to advantage. CCMB gets top marks in both areas.

Others have commented on how well armored conflict is captured.

I'm mainly into infantry myself, and here infantry and artillery get equally realistic and thoughtful treatment.

On the defense, fortications are available including bunkers, pillboxes, wire, and mines. Siting your heavy machine guns to fire across the front instead of straight ahead pays off. Platoon size counterattacks are often rewarded. Ambushes can be realistically constructed. You can impose fire discipline on your troops such that they wait until the enemy is very close instead of burning all their limited ammunition at 500 yards.

When attacking, you had better have flank security. You will appreciate the importance of having certain units "take the point" to avoid ambush. Fresh reserves can tip the balance for the attacker. There is a time to have some units provide covering fire while others cautiously advance. There is a time to flood the enemy's position with your troops in a headlong rush.

Realistic artillery tactics apply. You want to rush the enemy's positions before they can recover from a barrage. Go in too quick and you will catch friendly fire. Artillery can be bore-sighted (pre-registered)for instant delivery instead of waiting 2 to 10 minutes for the request to go up the chain of command.
Use your mortars to cover a gap in the defense the infantry can't reach.

On and on it goes. Strongpoint defense or continuous line ala Marine Corps in WWII? Watch green crews abandon otherwise functioning tanks. Shouldn't the captain be placed near the conscripts to steady them?

Advanced squad leader computerized with animation.

This is it. At last.