Schlachtfeld 2

Title           Schlachtfeld 2
Game Type       Combat Sim
Publisher       Peter Weigoldt, http://home.t-online.de/home/peter.weigoldt
Players         1-4
Compatibility   ECS, PAL only
HD Installable  Yes
Available	Aminet (game/think)
Submission      Thomas M. Beck, tbeck@BACon.de

Review
Schlachtfeld is a Mechforce type of game, that is; a top down, turn based,
military strategy game. Instead of mechs though, it uses more than 30
different tanks and helicopters (classified: Long-range, support, light,
standard, heavy, giant, air), but apart from that it's very much the same
as Mechforce. Your tanks are equipped with lots of cannons, lasers,
missiles, and other special weapons (about 50 weapon systems are
available) and have armour and internal structure like a mech. The terrain
types are similar to Mechforce, but it uses no hex full screen map,
instead it uses a map composed of squares that can be scrolled very fast
and smoothly. The aim of the game is either to capture the enemy's
headquarter (beware as of version 2 the headquarter defends itself with
lasers and a heavy turret is situated nearby) or to destroy all enemy
tanks and helis.

There are up to 4 teams that can be controlled by humans or the computer,
and each side controls up to 10 tanks. There can be alliances and
alliances can even be made and changed during a running game.

Your team starts with a limited amount of money, that's enough to buy 4-5
smaller tanks. For every battle won, you, as the commander of your tanks
might be promoted to a higher rank and get some money to repair the
damage and to buy new tanks. Repairs are done automatically when loading
a team and if you haven't the money, you might get credit to do at least
the repairs and some minor reinforcements. On some game maps there are
even some repair facilities. So you can do in-game repairs without having
to waste one or two of your 10 tank slots for expensive support vehicles.

What tanks are available for selection depends on your commander's rank.
Unfortunately, tanks cannot be captured and recovered from the enemy.
So you cannot use the enemy technology before your rank allows buying a
similar (according to the docs some tanks are only available to the enemy)
or the same tank.

Gameplay is based on rounds and every action needs time and might produce
some heat. However to speed things up, up to 5 moves for a tank can be
given in advance. If a tank gets too hot, chances are quite good that it is
shut down for a while to cool down. If you treat a hot enemy tank the right
way you might even get to see one of those famous mass explosions we all
loved to see in Mechforce :-) By the way, it is possible to destroy a light
tank or heli with a direct hit into its cockpit. That's similar to get a
mech's head blown off in Mechforce but occurs less often.

For attacking, probabilities are influenced by the terrain and the
experience points you have "spent" on improving your attacking skill. A
tank gains experience for scoring hits on enemy tanks. Experience can also
be used to improve camouflage or movement. To advance even faster but with
the disadvantage of producing more heat, you can enable a so-called
Marschmodus. A unit with activated Marschmodus is also not able to fire.
If a target is selected and you are tired of firing the guns manually and
keeping an eye on the heat, you can even select an auto-fire mode. If you
think that the battles are too easy, there are 3 difficulty levels that
can be selected in a separate preferences program.

What's missing compared to Mechforce:

You cannot build your own tank or helicopter.
Enemy tanks cannot be captured and recovered.
Tanks can only be removed from a unit, if they are destroyed
(at least one can give the order for self destruction in the game,
but you won't get the money back)
There are no missions.
There are no commanders per tank, but one commander for the whole team.

Unfortunately, the docs and the game are in German only, but knowing
Mechforce it should not be too difficult to figure out what's going on.
Despite that, some of the in-game namings are done in English.

Up to V1.1 Schlachtfeld is freeware (Aminet Set CD 7c game/think).
From V2 on (current version is V2.04 14.08.1999) it is shareware.
If you play it so often that you reach the rank of an Oberst (Colonel)
the author requests 20DM.

To sum it up, this is a 'must have game' for Mechforce fans that have
a basic knowledge of the German language or are willing to figure out
by themselves what to do.

Alphabetical list.