If I recall rightly that game has Africa as 1 bloc with loads of nuclear bombs, and nothing going over the poles. It bears very little resemblance to "cold war gone hot" or anything vaguely plausible, so could not be described as a world war 3 game at all if you refer to wars happening on Earth.
A modern Hearts of Iron.
- Thread starter Mabzie555
- Start date
-
We will be taking the forums down for scheduled maintenance on Tuesday, May 22nd 2023 at around 8:00 CDT / 13:00 UTC for up to an hour hour.
-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
- Status
If I recall rightly that game has Africa as 1 bloc with loads of nuclear bombs, and nothing going over the poles. It bears very little resemblance to "cold war gone hot" or anything vaguely plausible, so could not be described as a world war 3 game at all if you refer to wars happening on Earth.
History was probably not their aim, and I accept that. What I do not accept is that the world seems to be a cylinder and nothing can fly over the poles. That is just lazy - do you hear me, Paradox?
lol, keep in mind that Introversion Software was very small back then (probably they're still very small)
No, Prison Architect has been quite a success, and they are generally sensible enough now to fix stupid stuff (the last update fixed a bug where food teleported around the prison so 1 kitchen could feed prisoners several kilometres away). I bought the game a while ago and think it is a good purchase - better than Defcon, anyway.
The constant news flow, even in the mainstream has laid bare that we live in a Realpolitik world where the 'Grand Game' of nations competing against each other is still very much alive. And there has been and likely to continue to be medium and even lengthy wars, that also involve the majors.
The recent past, present and near future is ripe for a great game. With the right mechanics, low intensity wars could be fun, but there is also the possibility of the majors fighting limited wars, in RL and obviously mores so in a game (just have a turn of nukes option).
I will buy and enjoy HoI4 but Modern is neglected, and some of us always wanted game covering more contemporary settings, some want a break from WW2, and there are many younger people for whom WW2 doesn't hold the same draw as the previous generation of gamers.
The recent past, present and near future is ripe for a great game. With the right mechanics, low intensity wars could be fun, but there is also the possibility of the majors fighting limited wars, in RL and obviously mores so in a game (just have a turn of nukes option).
I will buy and enjoy HoI4 but Modern is neglected, and some of us always wanted game covering more contemporary settings, some want a break from WW2, and there are many younger people for whom WW2 doesn't hold the same draw as the previous generation of gamers.
Turn of nukes...
I guess you meant "turn off nukes", right? I am going to stupidly assume that you did, because I am about to launch a diatribe against you.
So you want to see the weapons which have defined the politics of the last 69 years, the weapons which have generally deterred a third world war and made a cold one, the weapons which have caused crises from Cuba to Iran and back again, prevented some wars from escalating and started others, cost billions of dollars/rubles of taxpayers' money in arms racing and driven the formation of the modern power blocs "turned of (sic)" just so players can have fun smashing Russia as the USA/smashing USA as Russia without worrying about the consequences for their little simulated pops (if pops would even be simulated in this game). That world would not be the modern day, it would be massively alternate history which would have changed the course of everything from 1945 on so much that the world might be fairly unrecognisable. I am fine with this existing as an alternate history mode, maybe one of Paradox's beloved DLC which I would not buy along with the rest of the game, but not as an option in an otherwise normal start. Imagine if all the nukes "turned of" today. North Korea would become a lot less worrying for everyone, as would Iran, and Israel would be utterly horrified that their Samson option had gone. If anything, it would make conflict with Iran or North Korea less likely, since there would be 1 fewer thing to fight about. Russia might become more aggressive, or it might not. The game would have to represent the geopolitical effects of the great atomic "turn of", and this would be a difficult job indeed, and not one more important than representing the historical situation with them turned on.
And I know I have said this too many times already, but why does every grand strategy game have to be centred on the great powers slaughtering huge numbers of each other's young men?
Thank you.
They don't (and they're not all predicated on this), but the vast majority are, because warfare is a far, far easier type of gameplay to get into than understanding complex economic models (most of which aren't terribly accurate, as we don't understand economics that well as a species), or far more complex social models (which we understand even less!)
That, combined with the fact that warfare (hot or proxy) has dominated human history up until the Vietnam War at least, and arguably forever, and it's not hard to see how these things happen.
While I think it would be great if PDS could come up with a game where warfare was less central to gameplay (one of the reasons I'm such a fan of Vicky is that it's not as central a point, but still there as it should be to be historically appropriate) would involve surmounting a range of gameplay challenges that the studio has barely dipped its toe into (again, primarily in Vicky) so far, so expecting something like this as DLC for what is arguably the studios most war-centred game (which is appropriate for a game about WW2) is probably a bit much.
That said, I also agree that a 'turn off the nukes' option would be an odd way to go about it. A better approach for some kind of modern conflict between great powers, imo, would be short-duration limited wars (probably better handled in tactical games than GSGs) followed by peace negotiations when the stakes of the war got too high for anyone to risk going any further (ie, if the US/Russia/China/Euro zone advanced any further, someone would start using tactical nukes and there goes civilisation).
I have heard it be said that games in general, not just grand strategy games, are centered on combat because it is far, far easier to make a combat system than to make, for example, deep puzzles or intriguing plots.
I'd want to play with nukes turned on to add to the tension. However, it's just making point. A modern grand strategy game could have diplomacy, economy, equally strong as the ware side. And the is nothing written in stone that the next major war will necessarily go nuke. It's conceivable that majors could have a limited war over somewhere and keep it limited to a region.
[video=youtube;APuYyfq12ts]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APuYyfq12ts[/video]
And for some of us the kit, and geopolitics of the current times would be fun and very immersive.
[video=youtube;APuYyfq12ts]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APuYyfq12ts[/video]
And for some of us the kit, and geopolitics of the current times would be fun and very immersive.
Majors could have a conventional war, but why? It would cost billions of dollars, be hugely costly in materiel if not in lives and achieve very little other than death, destruction and economic ruin. The only way it could really start is by accident or miscalculation, like this very unlikely scenario:
After tensions in Ukraine, the Russian population of Latvia is subject to discrimination and occasional violence. Protests ensue on both sides.
During a major protest in Riga, a nervous policeman loses control of himself and shoots a protester throwing stones at him. Protests turn to riots, with Russians being blamed for the incident.
Russians across the border unofficially cross into Latvia to help their comrades.
Some of these Russians are captured and found with Russian equipment. Outcry ensues, and police and armed forces investigate the situation.
The investigation finds large numbers of armed Russian "self defence militias", who are rounded up and imprisoned. This causes more Russians to cross the border to resist the alleged crimes against their people.
Skirmishes break out in regions of eastern Latvia between Latvian soldiers and Russian militias.
Russia sends in Spetsnaz GRU to assist the militias.
Latvia discovers this. Though war is not officially declared, other Baltic states and Poland send troops to help Latvia, and the rest of NATO goes on standby...
If the game could somehow simulate this or something similar, without railroading, I would accept wars between major powers. Otherwise, no.
After tensions in Ukraine, the Russian population of Latvia is subject to discrimination and occasional violence. Protests ensue on both sides.
During a major protest in Riga, a nervous policeman loses control of himself and shoots a protester throwing stones at him. Protests turn to riots, with Russians being blamed for the incident.
Russians across the border unofficially cross into Latvia to help their comrades.
Some of these Russians are captured and found with Russian equipment. Outcry ensues, and police and armed forces investigate the situation.
The investigation finds large numbers of armed Russian "self defence militias", who are rounded up and imprisoned. This causes more Russians to cross the border to resist the alleged crimes against their people.
Skirmishes break out in regions of eastern Latvia between Latvian soldiers and Russian militias.
Russia sends in Spetsnaz GRU to assist the militias.
Latvia discovers this. Though war is not officially declared, other Baltic states and Poland send troops to help Latvia, and the rest of NATO goes on standby...
If the game could somehow simulate this or something similar, without railroading, I would accept wars between major powers. Otherwise, no.
Hearts of IRON is a good game but it models the World War 2 period and thus has constraints that model that period well but don't translate well into modern time.
I think a modern game would need to model several things very well.
1: Economy: There needs to be a variety of resources in the game, then some resources to turn into manufactured goods, and a tree similar to Victoria series to model building an economy. It should allow for foreign countries to invest and help process natural resources as well as funding industries/factories in countries to help simulate global economy. I think modding Victoria type features could be a great way of accomplishing this.
2: Military: This is tricky. Modern military forces are vast and there is an absolute ton of information and functionality that needs to be in the game to properly model modern warfare. We need the ability to send in planes to non allied territory without sparking war, we need abilities to launch missile strikes from subs and long range bombers, we need the ability to force project. Some of hte features are already in the Hearts of Iron series. I think we can take what we have there and expand on them to utilize new technologies, like Satellites, recon, more amphibious invasions and better anti air units.
3: Diplomacy: We would need things to do in the game that don't just involve building up our military and invading other countries just cuz. A robust diplomacy functionality that would allow us to negotiate with the AI and other players for trade deals, increase diplomatic relations, build alliances, forge economic unions, political unions, condemn or support actions, and similar activities.
4: Functional UN and world bodies like IMF and WTO. There should be random events that the UN responds to, as well as the UN responding to events as they happen in game. It should bring them up inteligently, so nations with interests that are threatened would be the first to bring up things to the UN and be vocal in supporting one way or the other. We should be able to form and join world organizations that would have various benefits, like the WTO would have trade benefits. THis would give players more things to do other than just build military and take over the world with their military.
5: Inteligence/spying. This is more to do with the Cold War side of things, but intelligence gthering is important even today so it woud have to be modelled somewhat in the game. I think an expanded HOI system could work for this.
And then things that I would personally like to see, like having programs like Space Program cost money, you could design rockets and spaec stations and even launch a space station (either solo like USSR did or work on an international space station with allies). A military unit system that works like in RL, where only certain countries have domestic arms industries so the game would force you to interact with the international arms market, allowing players to sell weapons to other nations or rebel groups for better relations, covert actions, or to assist allies. As your economy grows you could invest in domestic arms industries and eventually be self relient, but most countries in the world are not self relient on all their miltiary supplies so I would want a game to model this.
I think such a game could work with some sort of Victoria/HOI hybrid game with some new features to simulate modern technologies, like missile shields and missile strikes and satellites and the like.
Right. If I had a voice in how a modern "grand strategy" game would be, I would want there to be a good workable combat system that utilizes modern doctrines and technologies and units (and gives players the ability to make new units if they have the technology for it), but also have a strong economic and diplomatic options to give players more to do than just play with their military.
Personally I would love there to be like a slider for how realistic you want it, so on unrealistic you could do world conquest, but on more realistic you would face bad relations with other nations if you go military all the time, conquered areas would need to be built up and defended to protect against unrest, and it should be much harder to actual conquer the world militarily.
One thing I would love to see is the ability to design your own units based on the tech you have so we wouldn't just be stuck with existing units or whatever units the devs put in the game, but rather we would have existing/announced units in the game with those stats and tech requirements but also the ability to make your own units or alter existing designs.
I have thought about the features I would want to see in such a game for a long time. I have pages and pages of ideas, but I'm not a game designer so I'm just hoping that something is announced and that it is similar to what I want.
I know it's been mentioned once before but check out the Modern Warfare mod for HOI3
A modern day scenario would need the ability to break down large units into smaller component units and use them as stealth guerilla units moving and running smaller non-conventional guerilla missions. Conventional forces running counter insurgency would have to make successful discovery rolls to initiate combat, unless the owner has them go unstealth and/or recombine into larger units with higher attack values.
It seems to me that a grand strategy war game scenario's upper time limit is demarcated by the proliferation of nuclear weapons. That's the end. Anything after that is primarily a political game, the generals have bowed out, as military is merely one means of influence in most circumstances. Focus placed upon divisions and naval groups and axis of advance and doctrines is a distraction, just a drop of the actual strategies at play. I can't get enthusiastic about modern grand strategy war games due to this dissonance.
What I'd like to see is more Hearts of Iron gameplay and era, but removed from the confines of the real WWII. I'd like to see maps and politics mixed up and randomized. Perhaps one day India is the aggressor, whose armored onslaught can only be stopped by the mobilization of Australia's production base. Perhaps Peru's naval grip on the west coast of America is unshakable, requiring a punishing and destructive land campaign down the continents, leaving the United States and Mexico a crater-pocked wasteland. All the technology range would be the same, and this is key. Tanks and infantry and air support is, I think, the apex of a warfare strategy game experience. Technology, and perhaps even doctrines, past this era only undermines the tactical and strategic experience.
What I'd like to see is more Hearts of Iron gameplay and era, but removed from the confines of the real WWII. I'd like to see maps and politics mixed up and randomized. Perhaps one day India is the aggressor, whose armored onslaught can only be stopped by the mobilization of Australia's production base. Perhaps Peru's naval grip on the west coast of America is unshakable, requiring a punishing and destructive land campaign down the continents, leaving the United States and Mexico a crater-pocked wasteland. All the technology range would be the same, and this is key. Tanks and infantry and air support is, I think, the apex of a warfare strategy game experience. Technology, and perhaps even doctrines, past this era only undermines the tactical and strategic experience.
A modern day/Cold War grand strategy would have to have a lot more complex and robust avenues for advancing your position than your typical HOI WWII game, along with an intricate diplomatic system to keep MAD from happening, and likely a defeat condition for when the other side decides to nuke the players country off the world stage. That's probably never going to happen in a game of that era and style.
I would support a modernday era game based on the new hoi4 engine.
Albiethe following modules would need to be included.
Politics and political warfare
Economic warfare
some type of espionage and espionage warfare.
the focus of the game would be in the above modules, with the military aspetc being secondary or supplemental to the above. In that indirect military movements and threats could impact the above.
likewise direct military action and engagements could also be incorporated, and impact the above.
Additionally, a diplomacy module would also be critical in such a game as well.
The game would thus be more of a geopolitical wargame, where much of the warfare and conflict is done with indirect actions in order to manipulate world affairs.
Albiethe following modules would need to be included.
Politics and political warfare
Economic warfare
some type of espionage and espionage warfare.
the focus of the game would be in the above modules, with the military aspetc being secondary or supplemental to the above. In that indirect military movements and threats could impact the above.
likewise direct military action and engagements could also be incorporated, and impact the above.
Additionally, a diplomacy module would also be critical in such a game as well.
The game would thus be more of a geopolitical wargame, where much of the warfare and conflict is done with indirect actions in order to manipulate world affairs.
How would this "realism slider" affect things? Stupidity goes in all directions. Unrealistic mode could include everybody deciding to start World War 3 on day 1 and civilisation falling as a result. If you are going to add stupid mode to the game, it would have to be a custom sandbox to avoid the player having to play in one world of stupid but not another (see EU4 for an example of this gone badly wrong - only 1 particular slant of ahistoricality is available, and there is no "sensible mode for players who aren't in the mood for dumb stuff today").
A modern game would not be a "war game" primarily at all. This is one of the least violent times in history. Why is everybody so fixed on the idea of world conquests that would just end in massive coalitions and/or MAD?
- Status