Quite simply, the best PC wargame I've ever played

[[JiF]Uncle Stinky]

The heavy snow meant I got an unexpected day off from work today, and I spent a lot of it playing a new game I downloaded from Matrix Games called Heroes of Stalingrad. It's a very direct port of a WWII squad-level board game called Lock 'n Load. And it is freaking fantastic. If you ever played games like Panzer Blitz or Squad Leader and then wanted to get the same experience on a computer, then this is the game you've been waiting for. There are 33 scenarios, mixed between solo vs AI and multi-player as well as two campaigns, one for each side. The graphics are excellent and each scenario has some random elements in it so no two should play exactly the same. I'm repeating below a post I made on the Matrix forums which describes my last experience with the game. I'm also posting two end-game pics from a scenario I played that had a mixed force of partisans and Soviet Guards try to secure a bridge.

If anyone else gets it, let me know as I'd love to try a multi-player scenario.

http://www.matrixgames.com/products/349 ... Stalingrad" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

"I've played three scenarios so far, and it finally dawned on me what it is about this game that separates it from other computer wargames I've played: each scenario creates its own narrative. Case in point: my last scenario, Ramushevo Corridor, started off with my T-34s proving they had the worst gunners on the Eastern Front. For several straight turns they could not land a hit. But the funny thing was, neither could the German tanks or the AT gun. The German squads in the center quickly knocked out my armored car, and made for the exit hexes. I advanced on a single SS squad in a wooden building in the northeast and then saw two entire stacks wiped out one by one in melee by those fantatics. What's worse, one of my squads dropped an AT rifle, and the SS squad picked it up and knocked out one of my T-34s with a lucky shot. I began to think there was no way I could win by eliminating the 6 squads needed for victory, but then another T-34 showed up who had much better aim. I was able to kill the two German tanks. And remember that T-34 killed by the SS fanatics? Well, the crew survived, and tormented that squad by hunkering down next to them and, against all odds, surviving multiple attacks. The diversion allowed another stack to move up and finally kill the SSers. Then I raced a Soviet leader whose own squads had been killed south to pick up two cowering and shaken squads that had been sitting out most of the firefight. He moved this rallied group up towards the action, and by the last turn I had somehow managed to get my 6th squad kill (helped by a panicked move by one half squad out of cover and right into my opp fire)."