Jutland - WW1 naval combat sim

[Cubit]

Jutland

Anyone familiar with this? I stumbled upon it while trying to satisfy my desire for WW1 era combat sims. It was released late in December, and looks really good. A nice, detailed WW1 naval combat sim with a fair amount of content including a campaign, multiplayer, scenario editor + random scenario editor, ect...

I downloaded the demo, and played around with it a bit. Very impressed by the solid graphics, especially considering it was made by a pretty small crew. They are almost as good as Silent Hunter IV, especially the ship models. I tried playing a scenario, but didn't do much besides learn how to turn a group of ships. I'd have to put a lot of time into learning this, but it could worth it. I'm not the brightest sim gamer. Here is a positive review:

http://www.gamesquad.com/index.php?o...s&id=8&aid=210

Only big downside is there is some pretty heavy phoning-home DRM included, but thats almost to be expected with sims like this. We all know how that debate goes.

Jutland is only available as a digital download in a couple flavors, so I'll definitely play around some more and see if its worth a purchase.

[Ezdaar]

I've only fiddled with the demo a little. I have their previous title, Distant Guns. It's a very solid naval sim and they have been great with support. The only drawbacks are the somewhat draconian DRM and the steep cost.

[salwon]

I really like Distant Guns, but the developers have been dicks on the DRM issue for Jutland. If they ever drop the price to something humans can afford I'll probably pick it up.

Oh, and learning how to turn ships individually and in formation is pretty much all you need to know. The AI is very good at picking targets and using the right gun for the job.

[Cubit]

I just noticed that they have discounted the Standard and Pro versions of Jutland down to 39.95 and 54.95 respectively. Thats still a little steep though, imo.

[Alan Dunkin]

Is it? HPS games still go for $50 at list so I'm not sure how that's a huge price point difference.

--- Alan

[Cubit]

Is it? HPS games still go for $50 at list so I'm not sure how that's a huge price point difference.

--- Alan

Good point, Alan. I guess as military sims go, its not too bad. From my time spend w/ the demo, the game seems pretty fun. Its not overwhelming to play, as the pace is fairly slow and much of the complexity is behind the scenes.

[CSL]

Someone just released the best aproximation of the Battle of Dogger Bank the other day. I've been playing through it at real time against the British AI.

I've got three modern battlecruisers and an Armoured Cruiser because the fourth German BC was destroyed in the battle and not represented in Jutland. Anyways the enemy has five BCs. Both sides have a few divisions of destroyers with light cruisers as their divisional leaders.

At the start I order my BCs to attack the light cruisers leading the enemy destroyer divisions, but we only land one hit on the light cruiser in about five minutes and during this time the enemy light divisions are making their way back out of the range of my big guns. I'm keeping my fleet in its default positioning with destroyer divisions covering my sides and rear in case the AI orders a destroyer torpedo attack. By now though the British BCs have come up and we start a running battle as I order my BC division to attack the enemy line. This goes on for about fifteen minutes with little result. Over that period I hit the Princess Royal around her A Turret once with two shells, apparently knocking it out, and land one hit on the Lion but then my gunnery goes back to its shitty standards. At the same time the enemy lands a few hits on the AC Defence in my line turning it into a burning hulk with more than a little flooding but I keep her at the end of the line as a convenient target for the enemy instead of letting them shift their fire onto my better modern BCs. Derfflinger also suffers some hits, but not many and to non-critical areas.

The same cannot be said for the Lion a few salvoes later.



Looks like a critical magazine explosion, though I can't exactly be sure as there is no tell-tale half-mile high cloud of smoke to denote such an event as there were historically. That said the BC's sure do go down nice.

Edit: It looks like after that I neatly ranged in the enemy battlecruisers. I ordered the armoured cruiser in the van of my line to disengage and all the meanwhile shifted my fire down the enemy line when about three minutes later and a few salvoes after the Lion was destroyed the first salvo I landed on the New zealand triggered another magazine explosion and look at that - two less battlecruisers and I'm at even odds.

We continue to fight for about another twenty minutes. Almost immediately after the New Zealand sinks the three remaining battlecruisers turn away and start a run away, covered by three large destroyer divisions screening their lines of retreat. I attempt to follow for a few minutes, getting off another dozen or so salvos but getting nothing in return. Two of my destroyer divisions come with and we get a small destroyer action, but nothing major so I end the battle there having withdrawn myself as the enemy destroyers begin to launch torpedos.

End Statistics

British

Lion and New Zealand sunk
Princess Royal, Tiger, and Indomitable lightly damaged (each hit roughly three to ten times)
1 Destroyer and 1 Light Cruiser also lightly damaged

German

Moltke and Derfflinger lightly damaged
Armoured Cruiser Defence (stand in for Blucher) moderately damaged when I disengaged. Over the long term though the damage caused in the battle, in the form of fire and persistance flooding on the port side were enough to eventually force the crew to abandon ship. I'm going to guess though that had this been the Blucher the ship probably wouldn't have been sunk and only heavily damaged.
1 Destroyer lightly damaged

[krise madsen]

I ought to buy this game, what with me living in Jutland and all, and I'm gay for a little old-school battleship action. I'll wait until the DRM silliness goes away though.

Respectfully

krise madsen

[Soapyfrog]

That looks extremely cool; no giant explosions though? Seems odd, given what happened at Jutland.

"Chatfield, there seems to be something wrong with our bloody ships today." -Beatty

[scharmers]

I'll wait until the DRM silliness goes away though.

You'll be waiting until Stormeagle shuts down, then :(

[Woolen Horde]

Man, that reminds me, has anyone else read The Rules of the Game? Best book about Jutland ever.

[scharmers]

I like Massey's "Castles of Steel".

[None]

(stand in for Blucher)

[Woolen Horde]

I like Massey's "Castles of Steel".

Castles of Steel is a good history of the entire naval war, but Rules of the Game focuses on Jutland and the tactical philosophies that led to the letdown the British experienced. Decades earlier, the RN was on the verge of breaking out of its rigid thinking when Camperdown rammed Tryon's Victoria during exercises. After that, any attempt at battle initiative was thrown out the window.

[Preachy Preach]

Yes, Rules of the Game comes highly recommended. Not just as a work of naval history, but also as a valuable lesson about the illusion of control, and the futility of pursuing this control, that technology provides to the unwary leader.

[Lakedaimon]

just downloaded the demo. have pretty much zero idea what I should be doing - and it feels a bit like there isnt a whole lot to do. finally figured out how to watch shell cam. models/damage remind me very much of Sturmovik. Looks alright, but is definitely dated.

[jpinard]

CSL, love you write-ups. How's the realism in this? I thought Midway had something coming out (was released?) that's similar to this?

[Calistas]

Requesting formal AAR! And requesting that the developers read what Mr Steam said about game prices. Grog games could be impulse buys too!

[Deadbuffalo]

After starting to read Castles of Steel during vacation, I figured i'd give this game another shot since I remember liking it, but was put off by the price and phone home drm. Oh wow, it's on sale for 20% off 2 years after release, what a bargain, right? Oh, now you have to install storm eagle studio's steam imitation to purchase it... Alright I guess, although it's a bit odd for such a small studio to make their own digital distribution platform... Hmm, what's this on the official forums about how the game is broken since the last patch and that the devs or PR person aren't responding to anyone anymore? And how the DRM server went down for months in the past?

I have no idea why a niche war game dev would put such awful drm on their product. There's just no way I'd buy a game that requires a tiny studio to be around forever. And frankly, their "orphan patch" promise in the event they close is much less convincing than Valve's.

Does anyone know what happened here? Is this game playable today?

[RichVR]

I keep looking at the website and hoping that the price will drop a bit more. And each time I think, "Well, it isn't that much."

Someone tell me how bad this game is and why I should not buy it.

[Dave47]

Man, that reminds me, has anyone else read The Rules of the Game? Best book about Jutland ever.

Bad news for readers: Copies of The Rules of the Game seem to be prohibitively expensive. I'm a big fan of Dreadnought and Castles of Steel, so I would reccomend either of those as consolation prizes.

[Deadbuffalo]

Wow! And i thought it was expensive when I paid $15 for it in paperback.

[Fishbreath]

You can find it for a lot less if you know where to look. AbeBooks is a way better source for rare/out-of-print stuff than Amazon is.

[Defcon One]

I'd love to play this game, but I won't reward a company for using DRM that makes Ubisoft look lenient by comparison, sorry.

[tiohn]

The DRM scheme and the monthly "If you don't buy our game, naval wargaming will die AND IT WILL BE ALL YOUR FAULT" emails have also killed any interest I had in the game.

[Woolen Horde]

Bad news for readers: Copies of The Rules of the Game seem to be prohibitively expensive. I'm a big fan of Dreadnought and Castles of Steel, so I would reccomend either of those as consolation prizes.

Jeezus, the hell? I got mine for like $15. But even Amazon UK has it for 55 pounds, which is like $100+.

Definitely hit the button on the Amazon page where you request it as a Kindle book and they bug the publisher. Rules of the Game deserves to be read by any naval history geek, or anyone interested in how organizations tend to surpress innovative thinking.

[Scotten]

I can't find another thread about Storm Eagle, but has anyone else tried their site lately? It redirects to http://stormpowered.com/stormcloud/store/index.asp. The screens there remind me vaguely of Steam Powered... Storm is now a digital download service for more than just their few naval sims?

[TheWombat]

I can't find another thread about Storm Eagle, but has anyone else tried their site lately? It redirects to http://stormpowered.com/stormcloud/store/index.asp. The screens there remind me vaguely of Steam Powered... Storm is now a digital download service for more than just their few naval sims?

Based on the emails I've gotten from them, yes. I think I downloaded a demo once, and now I get spam for all sorts of crap.

[vyshka]

Jeezus, the hell? I got mine for like $15. But even Amazon UK has it for 55 pounds, which is like $100+.

Definitely hit the button on the Amazon page where you request it as a Kindle book and they bug the publisher. Rules of the Game deserves to be read by any naval history geek, or anyone interested in how organizations tend to surpress innovative thinking.

Looks like it is back in print now in paperback. Amazon is listing it for about $23.

[Dave47]

Looks like it is back in print now in paperback. Amazon is listing it for about $23.

Thanks for the heads up, I just ordered a copy!