Close Combat: Modern Tactics

Close Combat is a series of real-time tactical war games. The player commands small units of troops, usually just a few platoons, and leads them into battle from a top down perspective.

The series first began in 1996 and has since released 8 further titles. Most of these deal with various WWII battles, and they are arguably the most popular. I was a late comer to this series but I remember being interested in it when I first saw a review in a magazine. This was back in the late 90’s and another kid who was reading the magazine said “eeerrr, that looks crap.” Then again he was into games like Counter-strike, TFC, Star Wars Racer and Red Alert.

The latest installment, named Modern Tactics, is an enhanced commercial version of Close Combat: Marines, which is a training tool used by the USMC. The battles take place sometime within the last decade. There are two main armies you can control; the USMC and the generic OPFOR (opposing force.)

Controlling of your units is essentially the same as in Close Combat V: Invasion Normandy. Right clicking on a unit, or group of units, will bring up a list of commands such as: Move, Fire, Defend, Ambush, Smoke, Dig In and a few others. Each of these is useful in the right situation.

One of the big differences in this version is the lack of a campaign. Your troops don’t gain experience, and you won’t get the feeling of accomplishment that comes with completing a campaign in the other games. Instead, there are about 30 individual scenarios, and you also have the ability to create your own battles thanks to the editor.

There is one last thing that has disappointed me. On the games web page, there is a list of features in the game, and this is one of them:

• Multiple nationalities with varying capabilities available to both sides.

To me, this means the ability to control various Coalition forces as well as forces from other countries. But as I said previously, you only get two sides, One called “Army” and the other called OPFOR. It is this reviewers opinion that a statement like that is very misleading. Unless by multiple nationalities, they mean being able to change the OPFOR voices from Russian to English. Errrrrm, no.

In summary, this would be a good buy for someone looking to get into the CC series, or who has some money to blow. It only costs about $40, which is not bad for a game released just a few months ago.

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