carlton@apollo.HP.COM (Carlton B. Hommel) (09/15/90)
jcoper@ccu.umanitoba.ca (D. Joseph Creighton) sez: >Anyone know why tanks in your formation will *not* follow you down the >assigned route? This is a bug, not a feature, and has been fixed in the next release for the Mac. Call 360 computing at (408) 879-9144. Tell them the version number from the Get Info box, and you should be able to arrange for the newer release. [ Editorial comment - the first thing I do after buying a game is to call the company, and see what their latest version is. You don't know how long it's been sitting on that shelf...] Sands of Fire is a tank simulation. You have a driver view, with engine controls, a commander/gunner view, and a senario map. There is a poor attempt at a Hall of Fame, with medals. Even with all your tanks in the correct formation, I found the game rather boring. (My 5 yr old likes it, though.) To much arcade shoot-em-up, and not enough thinking required. It is realistic; shooting at the frontal armor of a Tiger is pretty futile, the Matilda tank is pitiful, and PzIIIs die easy. However, the computer opponent is stupid. The game crawls on a Plus, and is slow on an SE. It was fast enough on a IIci, but was still B&W with a small screen. You control one of four tank speeds, which way the turret moves, a main gun with AP, HP, and WP shells, a machine gun, and the platoon formation. You drive for a while, shoot a bunch of German units that generally ignore you, and then drive to the next bunch. There is no ability to modify or create new senarios, and the existing ones get repetitious after a while. The fellow on phone support agreed that the difficulty level menu didn't seem to do anything. But then, I hate flight simulators, too. If you want to drive around in your tank, machine gunning jeeps and soldiers, and hear enemy tanks explode, this might be for you. Carl Hommel carlton@apollo.hp.com