Iron Storm

[Adam Parsons]

Anyone here played this? The gist of the story is that around about 1920, a certain Baron Ugenberg of Russia defeated the Bolshiveks, and begin a drive to the Atlantic, with the help of the peoples of Central Asia. The cash-strapped Western governments could only keep their armies funded by floating them on the stock exchange (don't ask me how). Anyhoo, no one seems to have come up with any bright ideas on how to fight a war quickly, so the whole bloody mess seems to have dragged on for about 50 years. Thoughts?

[Torqumada]

I played the demo, but I thought it was a bit much that there was a 50+ year old modern war going on in Europe.

Torqumada

[Linkwerk]

It's a pretty fun game, though.

[Adam Parsons]

The thing I find odd is that, while tanks have been invented, no one appears to have tried using them in mass formations. Also, I've haven't seen any airplanes, but plenty of those weird fat Russian helicopters.

Oh yes, and can anyone translate the phrase "Deutsch-Russische Tageschau"? Looking at a 30-year old German-English dictionary, I got "German-Russian Daily Show", but I'm not too sure about that.

[sikitu]

The "Tagesschau" is the most traditional German TV news broadcast. So the best free translation would be "daily news".

Hope this helps you!

SiKitu

[Adam Parsons]

Thanks, Sikitu.

Say, am I the only one to find the ending depressing. I don't know about the rest of you, but finding out that the entire war is essentially being run by corporations against which world leaders cannot stand against simply to make money is, to put it mildly, very depressing indeed. Fortunately, nothing like that could have happened in the real world. Right?

Mind you, this does explain why tanks aren't that popular in this world, and also might explain why I didn't see a lot of aircraft either.

[Ivan Druzhkov]

Like Ignatieff in The Peshawar Lancers, the character of Baron Nikolai Alexandrovich Ugenberg is based on a real person. The man in question is Baron Roman Fydorovich Ungern von Sternburg, a big White general/independent warlord in Mongolia during the Russian Civil War. Appearantly, the developers were gorning to make the villain this man, as seen here, but changed their minds for some reason.

Personally, I doubt the real Ungern von Sternberg was a Buddhist. That's just my opinion.

[lope3328]

I thought it was a great game but a really implausible chance for that to happen.

[Ivan Druzhkov]

Originally Posted by Ivan Druzhkov

Personally, I doubt the real Ungern von Sternberg was a Buddhist. That's just my opinion.

Well, I'm wrong. He converted during the RCW (or around then), and he mixed Buddhism (or his interpretation thereof) with apocalyptic Christianity (a can't-miss combination!). His basic goal was to found a new Mongolian kingdom (he being a pan-Mongolist) and reconquer Russia, building, in his words, "a road of gallows from Urga (Ulanbaatar) to Moscow from which I will hang Jew and Bolshevik alike". He failed, of course, but not after killings as many people he didn't like as he could get hold of.

Now that I know something about him, I think he just might rival Hong Xiuquan in terms of "batsh*t insanity".

[Thande]

Actually sounds quite a lot like Hitler, that mix of Eastern mysticism and anti-Semitism and -Bolshevism.

[Matt]

and the batsh*t insanity?

[NapoleonXIV]

As for massed tanks, their use in that fashion was IIRC, a minority opinion, held by Fuller and Guderian but few others. Most, I think, thought like the French theorists that infantry attacked by tanks would go to ground 'like mice', then rise back up behind the armor to cut it off, catching it between them and long range artillery.

Of course this does fail to take into account tanks heavy enough to crush even buried shelters of reinforced concrete and the German tactic of stopping every few yards when they saw lots of infantry around and braking one tread whiler running the other so as to spin the tank on its axis; the idea being to clear the undercarriage, as it were.

[Constantinople]

So wait, did they end the war?
You can SPOIL it for me.

[Ivan Druzhkov]

Originally Posted by Constantinople

So wait, did they end the war?
You can SPOIL it for me.

Okay, here goes.

Alas, when you get to the end, it's revealed that the war has been manipulated to continue indefinitely by an organization of weapons manufacturers called the Consortium to keep the profits coming in. In fact, a Consortium agent murders Baron Ugenberg when he tries to throw them off by announcing plans to declare peace with the USWE (United States of Western Europe).

Say, did anyone notice an icon surrounded by several skulls on stakes in the second level? Cheery stuff.

[Constantinople]

so it never ends?

[NFR]

Originally Posted by Ivan Druzhkov

Well, I'm wrong. He converted during the RCW (or around then), and he mixed Buddhism (or his interpretation thereof) with apocalyptic Christianity (a can't-miss combination!). His basic goal was to found a new Mongolian kingdom (he being a pan-Mongolist) and reconquer Russia, building, in his words, "a road of gallows from Urga (Ulanbaatar) to Moscow from which I will hang Jew and Bolshevik alike". He failed, of course, but not after killings as many people he didn't like as he could get hold of.

Now that I know something about him, I think he just might rival Hong Xiuquan in terms of "batsh*t insanity".

That's the amazing thing. The Whites were actually worse than the Reds. Nobody saw what was coming, of course, but then nobody knows what would have happened if some other nut like von S came to power, either.

[Ivan Druzhkov]

Originally Posted by Constantinople

so it never ends?

It would appear not, though the ending is a little ambiguous.

Just at the end, in the final movie, your character walks onto the Consortium chopper, then a nasty "uh!" noise is heard, as if someone has just been killed. As the chopper takes off, there's a news announcement from the German-Russian news agency, declaring that the war will go on.

[Constantinople]

How? Does our hero die?

[Ivan Druzhkov]

Originally Posted by Constantinople

How? Does our hero die?

They don't tell you that. Sorry.

[Adam]

So it is... Eternal War.