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[Stealtharcadia]

necro

So is have they patched HOI3 enough to have it match up with HOI2 at all?

/necro

[Ampersand]

I haven't played Hearts of Iron 2 much enough to say, but I can say with the addition of the Semper Fi expansion back, the game is Faaaarrrr more enjoyable, once you learn the ropes of the game well enough to be able to play without relying on the AI as much.

Generally, the opinion of most people is HoI2 and Arsenal of Democracy are still superior, but I find HoI3 to be a solid game in it's own right, now.

[Lap]

I've never played a HoI game that HASN'T been gone something like this...

1. Pick any nation
2. Do pretty awesome against my neighbors.
3. US eventually comes in with 50+ carriers. wtf man

Step 3 is also sometimes changed with 1000 planes.

Due to terrible production bonuses they give the AI I can't find any balance between having a challenging and exciting fight without end game foolish large AI armies coming at me. I really don't feel like trying to rush the US every single game I'm not Allied.

[Ampersand]

That's weird man, because I've never had anything like that happen in HOI3 ever. In my Italy game, I managed to conquer Yugoslavia, Greece, Spain, Vichy France, Turkey, Iraq and Kick the United Kingdom out of Egypt, Judea, and Gibraltar, Malta, and Cyprus. Yes, I have remade Mare Nostrum. When the United States finally joined the Allies, their main route of attack, with the UK, was to make landings in Spain and Northern France, and the Netherlands.

Containing the landings has been hellishly difficult, but far from impossible. If you are prepared to deal with the United States, that is cut off any foothold in Europe that they gain, you're set and ready to go, no problem. The only way they're getting in is if you're caught unawares. Even if they do, if you cut off their access to ports, their armies will starve and will be easy pickings.

Say what you want about the supply system in HoI3 and how it ties your hands, but it does make things equally difficult on the AI. Once the States made a huge landing of thousands of infantry and several medium tank brigades in Gibraltar, and I was able to hold, and eventually defeat them with only 5 brigades of Paratroopers, because I was able to bomb the port in Gibraltar to hell, ensuring they could never resupply or reinforce the army.

[sneakey pete]

HoI3 is nothing like HoI2. Its like trying to compare a semi trailer with a train. both have thier uses, plusses, minuses etc. The small provinces in HoI3 and smaller units seem to put a bigger focus on more tactical gameplay than HoI2. Naval and air still need a bit of work though, in my opinion. AI is passable. Quite an enjoyable game, sank over 250 hours into it pre SF.

[Puck]

dunno... i dont trust paradox one friggin bit.

HoI2 is ALMOST completely playable by now, and this is because of the community and not because of the devs. (Multiplayer is still a bit shakey btw). the devs gave up on tryin to fix it and decided to release spinoffs and "upgrades" based on their buggy game. The anthology installer for the non vanilla hoi2 variants were so bugged, it aint acceptable, at all.

Unless they manage to produce a game which they manage to fix in a timely manner, and repeat that feat a few times, I wouldnt waste any money on them.

Good games, no question. But those guys are horrible slackers. and I _like_ slackers. normally.

[Rakonas]

dunno... i dont trust paradox one friggin bit.

HoI2 is ALMOST completely playable by now, and this is because of the community and not because of the devs. (Multiplayer is still a bit shakey btw). the devs gave up on tryin to fix it and decided to release spinoffs and "upgrades" based on their buggy game. The anthology installer for the non vanilla hoi2 variants were so bugged, it aint acceptable, at all.

Unless they manage to produce a game which they manage to fix in a timely manner, and repeat that feat a few times, I wouldnt waste any money on them.

Good games, no question. But those guys are horrible slackers. and I _like_ slackers. normally.

Have you tried Arsenal of Democracy? Fans took the HoI2 engine and did some stuff with it, I think it's better personally.

[a1s]

HoI2 is ALMOST completely playable by now, and this is because of the community and not because of the devs.

Have you tried Arsenal of Democracy? Fans took the HoI2 engine and did some stuff with it, I think it's better personally.

That is more or less he point: the fans took it. Before AoD you would usually install some AI improvement mod ( like DAIM) and probably some tech/units/combat tweaks (like CORE). The Vanilla game, while hardly excrement, was not at all the game you think it HOI2 to be.

[Puck]

My complaint isnt any (theoretical) blandness or even a lack of balance or ANYTHING gameplaywise. I know, the hoi series isnt perfect in that regard, but I dont care. I like it for what it is.

What REALLY REALLY REALLY pisses me off (majorly) is... it takes them YEARS to patch their games, and they are still buggy as fuck. They make you pay for alpha versions, basically. AoD has the same problem.

Right now, if I can be arsed, I play Hoi2 Armageddon 1.3beta3 (I think its the final community patch) and they THINK they got all the bugs now. It was released about 1 or 2 months ago, and heck, how long was that after the initial HOI2 release? (Don't count armageddon release, because it was nothing more than bugfixes and some small new features for vanilla).

As I said I'm a slacker myself. But releasing such a nice game and then giving all the customers the finger that is a pretty dick move, and I will pay attention those assholes will never see a cent from me (the devs, not their customers ).

Seriously, a friend gave the HoI anthology to me, on some rainy friday, we played it together over the weekend, and I was all like "DUDE I have to run to the store, first thing on monday and support them by buying a copy or two!" Then came the bugs, and my usual reaction, namely digging through forums to see what I can find.

By sunday night I was sick and cured at the same time... I mean the anthology goes for what over here? 9 Euros or somehting. But I'm still glad I didnt buy. Fo realz, the anthology installers for non vanilla hoi2 are so borked, you get crashes because the game looks in the wrong folders for certain event messages... Or you cannot patch, because of the same buggy installers. (unless you do some dark computer vodoo which cannot expected from the average users) And that is not even beginning to describe the TRUE problems.

Sad thing really, because HoI actually could roxxor the big un.

[Anvilfolk]

Hey guys - sorry to rez this, but I didn't find any other thread, surprisingly.

Hearts of Iron 3 Collection is now up for $12 on Steam. I think it includes all the expansions so far, plus graphical DLC (which I don't much care for...). How is the game? I played Darkest Hour, and it as pretty good but used the old engine, and carriers were simply modelled as warships with really long range. For $12, I could get the engine update, plus the new features seem neat. More territories, more complex battlefield management, more complex naval warfare.

What do you guys think?

[Hiiri]

Hey guys - sorry to rez this, but I didn't find any other thread, surprisingly.

Hearts of Iron 3 Collection is now up for $12 on Steam. I think it includes all the expansions so far, plus graphical DLC (which I don't much care for...). How is the game? I played Darkest Hour, and it as pretty good but used the old engine, and carriers were simply modelled as warships with really long range. For $12, I could get the engine update, plus the new features seem neat. More territories, more complex battlefield management, more complex naval warfare.

What do you guys think?

Go for it. 12 is a bargain, if you like this sort of games. And yes, the collection contains everything.

[Sirus]

My impression is that this is a very slow-paced game, not focused on epic battles but on grand strategy. Is that right?

[Dwarf]

Yes. You can't even watch the battles. You're just moving symbols around.

[snelg]

My impression is that this is a very slow-paced game, not focused on epic battles but on grand strategy. Is that right?

I guess it depends on what exactly you mean by "epic battles". There's no total war style battles (and really there will be hundreds of battles so that would shortly become a pain), but fighting Soviet, Germany or invading the US is pretty epic.

There's a lot of AAR's and developement diaries on the official forums if you're interested. There's also a few youtube let's plays around if you'd rather see how the game actually plays. Though I haven't watched any so I can't really comment on the quality. 

Yes. You can't even watch the battles. You're just moving symbols around.

Yeah, what you can see is the efficiency modifiers you get for things like terrain, encirclement, digging in etc (there's a lot). And then try to poke the numbers as much in your favour as possible. There ARE sprites, if you prefer those rather than the counters. I exclusively used them back in HoI2, but the sprites are really hard to see in HoI3 for some reason. Not sure if it's the size or view angle, I'd love to use them, but just. . . it doesn't work for me.

[Anvilfolk]

I got it, just because... tried out a game as Portugal (home country go go), aligned myself with the Allies, declared war on Nationalist Spain, war was going well until the Germans conquered France and then a German and Italian army came along and pounded me to smithereens

HoI3 uses counters until you get really up close. Up high it doesn't even show the unit stack. I'm having a hard time adjusting to it, but I haven't played that much (or with a decent country). I'll need to get some proper tutorials, I guess, to explain exactly what stuff does. The tech system is fairly different, as is battlefield organisation and the way information is presented.

So far so good though