SpaceChem

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly why one keeps returning to this game. It is not exactly unpleasant, merely very taxing on the brain. Indeed, describing Spacechem as ‘fun’ may be pushing the use of the word to the very limit. It is more akin to the satisfaction one gains from solving a particularly complicated maths puzzle, or successfully hoiking out an errant breadcrumb from your keyboard using a modified paper-clip fashioned into a complex grabbing tool.

The blue and red widgets, showing the layout of two simple atoms paths - confused yet?

This game is difficult. It may well be a cliché, but it is fiendishly difficult, in that one might imagine an actual fiend, one of the demons from the nine circles of hell, rubbing his scaly hands together in glee and drooling unspeakable drool at the thought of unleashing this creation upon unsuspecting humanity.

The objective of this so called ‘game’ is to manipulate and control atoms and molecules within a graphical representation of a chemical factory. One is given various tasks along the lines of creating certain types of bonds, or molecules, then delivering them out of the reactor. Atoms are moved around using a ‘widget’, which is essentially a type of railway which can travel in only one direction. The player must place this ‘railway’ in a certain way so as to guide the atoms and molecules around the screen in the correct orientation to ensure the right reactions take place. And fuck me, that sounds boring when I write it, but makes for very engaging puzzle shenanigans.

This is as exciting as the screenshots get I'm afraid

Being a science graduate I was mildly pleased to see the correct types of bonds and molecules that are formed – all in line with what is actually possible in the real world. Expert planning is required to send the atoms around your railway track with the right timing – various tools such as synchronised gates help with this.

The game starts out merely difficult at first, but rapidly rises through the ranks, reaching brain-teasing, confounding, puzzling and nigh-impossible in a very short space of time. You will frequently shut the game down in disgust, swearing under your breath, only to cogitate the answer subconsciously, while asleep, or in the bath, or have it spring into your mind like the theory of gravity to Newton, before leaping back to the monitor and completing the puzzle with a satisfactory smirk. It is a fool’s errand however – the only reward that awaits is an even more difficult puzzle beyond. Such is mans folly in his own knowledge.

This 3rd one is totally off the hook

Eventually one graduates to using multiple reactors at once to create larger and larger molecules. You will soon find yourself staring at the screen with the same sort of empty, confounded expression that a young boy from the countryside might have after being introduced to some artwork of Escher by a creepy old uncle.

In conclusion, this game is one of the most mentally challenging I have ever played, and while not to everyone’s taste, if you consider yourself a human of above-average intelligence, it will provide a worthy challenge. If you consider yourself a human of only average intelligence, then the warm grey slop that drips out of your ears while you try this game is in fact liquified brain.

Spacechem scores – Alarmed Goat

Airborne Assault - Highway To The Reich

This game is a guilty pleasure. It is drinking alone on a Friday night in your flat. It is stuffing your big fat face with profiterole after profiterole until your lips are smeared in chocolate and cream and shame. It is the slightly chubby girl you took back home after the club and who did unspeakable things to you.

You do not boast to your friends about this game. You do not shout its praises from the rooftops. Instead, you close your curtains, lock your door, turn down the lights and bask in its utterly evil joy.

And why the curious silence regarding how good this game is? Because it is a tactical real-time war game simulation. I feel dirty for even typing those words. That’s right. A full-on, hard-core, nerd-boner simulation, with objectives and waypoints and all manner of geekish delights.

SIMULATE ME 'TILL I SQUIRT!

The above screenshot illustrates a typical engagement - a battalion of American Paratroopers (green units) have landed in Holland and are attempting to storm a German hill position. One gains an idea of the size and scale of this game when told that each grid represents 1 square km, and each icon represents a unit of 100 men or more.

The setting is September 1944, during the Allied airborne invasion of Holland – a truly remarkable operation involving over 30,000 airborne troops, the largest operation of its type ever attempted. The plan was for three divisions to grab vital bridges deep behind German lines, quickly followed by a massive armoured thrust up through Holland along a single road, over the bridges, and into the industrial heart of Germany. The operation failed, for a variety of reasons, but it makes for a classic and inspiring basis for a game. (For an excellent read, I recommend Cornelius Ryan’s outstanding work, ‘A Bridge Too Far’)

Not for you the pretty graphics and sounds from any game of the last ten or fifteen years, oh no. You get a top-down 2D map-like view. Your soldiers? Square blocks of inanimate colour that move around like migrating jellyfish. That is the key selling point of this wonderful game – the real time movement. The game play is completely different to any hex/turn-based wargame you’ve previously played. You can pause the action of course, but a critical component is forward planning. There is a punishing, realistic orders delay on any command you issue. Sending your paratroop battalion forward into assault positions can take an hour or two (of game time), and there is no way to instantly stop them should a group of panzers appear out of the nearby woods – you scrabble to issue defence orders, but it takes time for the instructions to get through.

Planning a complex set of maneuvers to flank the enemy gives me nerd-boners

The sounds? There's no music, no ambient noises, but who cares? That stuff just gets in the way. You get the crack of rifles, the thunk of AT rounds, the explosion of artillery and the thump of mortars, and that's about it. Even gunfire is portrayed only with simple red and yellow lines. Despite this childish simplicity, it is perversely satisfying to watch the enemy stumble blindly into your ambush, watching the beautiful thick red lines of anti-tank fire smash his precious vehicles, then seeing their status change first to yellow, then to red, as their retreat turns to a chaotic rout.

The in-game menus are almost neo-artistic in their minimilism. They are bare, basic, unanimated, stripped down to simple graphics and plain text. But it doesn't matter. Because this game is so smooth you would rub your naked belly on it.

The brave British boys in red rush a bridge, before dastardly Jerry can blow it up

Planning for the hours and days ahead is crucial – how long will it take your forces to march to the next town? When will reinforcements arrive? Will I get there before nightfall and how far will the enemy have advanced in that time? The tactical and strategic depths of questions that you must pose yourself are outstanding in their realism - you must hold roads for your tanks, and high ground for your artillery, and decent excuses for why you are not going out on a Friday night. Explaining the joys of WWII war-gaming simulation does not always cut the mustard.

In the wide variety of missions (of which you choose to play either the Allies or the Germans) you will command a great deal of troops. The smaller missions will have you in charge of a battalion or two (1000-1500 men) while the larger scenarios will place you in charge of whole divisions (10,000 plus!). The smallest unit represented by the game is generally the ‘company’, 100 to 150 soldiers strong. With this is mind, how on earth would the budding armchair general control so many forces in real time?

An enormous map, featuring a bowel-busting 26,000 allied troops

The answer is with the amazing A.I. and command structure. Without going in to too much detail, you do not have to dally at all in the dirty, lower aspects of your troops unless you wish to. You delegate a lot of the mundane tasks to your A.I. Captains and Majors. You can merely issue orders to HQ sections, who then interpret them in their own way, and carry out the missions assigned to them. For example, you direct a whole battalion consisting of 3 companies, an HQ and 2 mortar platoons to attack a town by issuing a single order to its Headquarters. This HQ unit will then direct and control the entire operation – it will put the troops in formation, assign jobs, locate the best firing positions for the mortars, and even hold some troops in reserve should an emergency occur. However, should you wish to get involved in the nitty gritty, you can directly command each company yourself.

Each unit is subordinate to a higher HQ – so should you wish, you can move every single unit on a map by issuing only a single order to your divisional HQ, who will then conduct the entire task for you.

An attack order is issued for the brave meat-heads of the American 82nd Division

The attack hammers home, sending Germans scattering. That yellow line of gun-fire is about as special as the effects get.

The maps themselves can be huge, up to 100km², and the missions can run from hours to weeks. The scale of some missions is enormous and requires detailed planning. The units themselves, despite appearing as simple coloured blocks, are fully simulated and alive, each with their own characteristics of morale, aggression, commander skill and so forth. Weapons, ammo and men are tracked, right down to the last bullet – a critical factor to know. Should your AT guns run out of ammo or your machine gun section fire its last round, their effectiveness is going to be severely reduced until they get resupplied during the day/night cycle. I have yet to play a more 'hard-core' war simulation game in this respect.

The game accurately models terrain, line of sight and cover, providing you with tools to judge any situation. But the best innovation in the game? It is the fiendishly clever enemy A.I. It will mercilessly crush you to begin with, it will appear from unexpected directions, flank your carefully planned defences, and laugh as your attack is brutally bombarded by artillery strikes before you even get into assault range.

This game is wonderful, satisfying, deep and challenging. If you can overcome the initial learning curve, you will spend many quiet, precious hours planning your invasion of the Reich.

Final Verdict – Cute & Curious Owl