First, a tip o’ the hat to nameless, for linkylink, over here in this thread.
If I’m waayyy behind the curve in hearing about this, well, what new?
The object of this real-time (no pause) game is to destroy your enemy through thermonuclear warfare, while protecting as many of your own cities as possible. You position you silos, radar installations, airbases and fleets as you see fit, and the game advances through the various levels of Defcon according to its own timer. Fleets collide, fighters scramble, landbased fighters and bombers join in, and then, it happens: someone lets a nuke fly, and then it’s :eek: “game on!”
Play the seven game tutorial, first. It’s a really simple game to learn, but surprisingly complex when all your assets are used together.
Your missile silos work in ADA mode and missile mode, with some time lag between modes, so time your “switchovers” carefully, lest an enemy incoming strike slide by unopposed because you opened a window in your defense network by switching modes at an inopportune moment.
The demo alone rocks. I’ve blown up everyone several times over (Africa, surprisingly, was the hardest to take down; who knew they had a fleet of SSBNs?)
The soundtrack music is eerily apropos, as it’s just about the only sound effect to the game.
Use your subs as “eyes and ears,” until the enemy is spotted. Retreat your fleets far enough back for land-based fighters and bombers to support them. Have the subs pick off enemy units in “wolfpacks” (a two- or four-sub fleet is about right for this). Use some care in positioning your subs; surface units might outrun them.
I used this to some effect on several occasions; the real tripper is when the bad guys split their fleet when I concentrate (and vice versa). If you can pick off enough of their fleet, switch your carriers to ASW mode and begin hunting down the SSBN fleet. As far as I can tell, you can take out an entire sub fleet by depth charging them, which is why I tend to disperse them tactically, and then concentrate them for the strategic “bomb” (typically with some battleships covering them against enemy ground-based fighters who want to come out and play).
The real trick is timing your missile strikes in such a way as to saturate their defenses.
From what I gather, subs can’t see anything in passive mode, and in active mode, everything else sees them - so they’re not much good as scouts. I prefer to have them avoid combat all together and use them as a nuclear strike force. Timing two groups of subs to launch with ICBMs can do bad things to enemy air defenses.
By the way, if anyone wants to hit me up for a match in the demo (I’m gonna play it a bit to see if the novelty wears off before I buy it, although I feel like a cheap bastard since it’s only $15… but I’ve bought a lot of games that I then never played) you can IM me at the same name as my board name on yahoo messenger.
I LOVE Defcon. I’ve got the full version of the game. I’m absolutely terrible at it, but that never stopped me from enjoying most RTS’ and Fighting games, so it’s not going to stop me from enjoying this either.
If anyone wants to beat my ass at it, I always play as H3Knuckles, and often host games calling my “server” Blue Max.
That’s why you only put one sub in any give group in Active Mode, and as soon as he detects something, go back passive. Or, station them at the edge of the Carrier’s radar coverage, and have them start picking off ships as soon as they come within radar range.
Or, if you place your ground-based radars effectively, station them at the edge of their coverage envelope.
I played the old “Nuclear War” game from about 15 years ago. Had a very twisted sense of
humor-the “winner” would be seen dancing in front of a ruined wasteland saying “I won! I
won!”. My fave leader moniker was “Infidel Castro”.
Question: am I missing something? Does this game have a zoom mode, or do I have to randomly pick teensy eensy tiny ships in combat furball and hope for the best?
Cause if it’s the latter, it’s really frustrating and nearly unplayable for me.
Oh, my. I love strategy games like this, this sounds jolly fun. I’m downloading the demo right now and will let you know what I think later. “The only winning move is not to play?” Yeah, right!
I keep getting the crap bombed out of me. I need to work on better utilizing my Navy, placement of radar and switching back and forth between ICBM and AD modes at my silos.
That said, I really should get the full version.
Yeah, it’s pretty difficult for me, too- but fun to try and figure out. I suggest playing as Europe against the Soviet Union in either Genocide or (possbily) Survivor mode- since Europe borders the Soviet Union, you don’t have to go too far out, and since most of the USSR’s population is in Moscow or Leningrad, you can easily nuke these two cities and kill a lot of people quite easily. I play with the radiation on- by the time World War III was finished, the diamond representing Moscow’s population was teeny-tiny, and the entire west coast of the Soviet Union was glowing bright green. Creepy and cool at the same time.
Keep your fleets within range of land-based air cover, and let the enemy come to you; then, concentrate fighters and bombers from carriers and land bases to annihlate the enemy fleet.
You can use sub as “eyes and ears” for fleets as well.
Once the enemy fleet is disposed of, go sub-hunting with your carriers to take out the enemy sub fleet (as much as you can find and kill).
Work your subs close enough to strike deep into enemy territory, and when they begin launching from silos, task your subs as counter force to try to take out the enemy silos before they sorty all of their nukes. With the enemy silos firing off nukes, they can’t shoot down your subs nukes. Watch out for land-based air assets (and any surviving fleet assets): they can beat the hell out of your subs!
Leave your silos on ADA mode until the enemy’s nukes are exhausted; if your subs have done their jobs, you will have a largely undefended enemy to rain nukes down upon at will. Hopefully, your silos will have neutralized a hefty chunk of the enemy’s incoming nukes, and you’re not too beat up.
Random thought occured to me. Music dramatically affects how we perceive what’s in front of us… when I played this game, it was … creepy, with that music, and “7.3 million dead” and such. But imagine if it was set to an 80s hair rock soundtrack. It’d have a completely different feel.
(I’m itching to play a game, and random people are unreliable - if anyone wants to play soon, hit me up with an IM on yahoo messenger (same name).