Customer Reviews

Close Combat: Invasion Normandy

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Firstly, I'm a regular gamer and I say: BUY IT. We return to the hedgerow fighting of CC2, but with better graphics, this time. Die hard fans will notice small features like ambient sounds such as machine gun fire, and faint explosions on the edges of maps -- makes you feel like you're there...very nice addition. In this edition, the armies fall back on their infantry. This is not a huge tank battle like the Bulge or the Russian Front. It's nice to get some soldier action going on, finally.

In short, this is the most "realistic", and probably most fun, real time strategy game you're going to find.

This is a game that you will probably find yourself playing many, many times, depending on whether or not your intentions for purchasing the game are for action or strategy.
Historically, I felt it did a great job of duplicating the scenarios of the real invasion of Normandy. Hedgerows were a major nuisance for the Allied forces and it was that way in Close Combat 5, as well. It makes it hard to put the tanks into some sort of effective use, without the help of supporting infantry. Sometimes the amount of troops allowed to fight in a battle were actually too large to be historically accurate, when considering the scattered drops of the U.S. airborne, and that made offensive moves in this game too easy, but it really didn't take away much from the game. In all honesty, it wouldn't have been much fun to lead an attack with only a group of men the size of a few squads.
Strangely enough, an entire division is lost if it's involved force, in a battle, loses every man. Although not the entire division participates in the battle, the entire division will no longer exist, as if the rest of it is disbanded.
Overall, the game was much fun for me. I was interested in learning more about Operation Overlord, and the involvement of the U.S. in World War 2, and found this game to be very helpful, although I could still tell which historical aspects were true, and which were inaccuracies due to the game itself.
I read a review that described that, in the beach landings, there weren't enough bullets whizzing in the air and that it basically seemed too tame. But this game focuses on Utah Beach, not Omaha. Utah WAS much tamer, and had much fewer casualties, so don't expect a slaughter. Besides that, the "Atlantic Wall" that the reviewer talked about being climbed was not the Atlantic Wall, but a simple sea wall. This game is much more realistic than you may have been led to believe. And, yes, sometimes the aim of the soldiers was horrible and humorous at the same time, but the cons are outweighed by the pros. Strategy is definitely the way to go in this game. Don't expect to win battles by charging the enemy head on.

I got the demo of this game, and it looks and plays like the previous four titles. Although feeling a little like a Close Combat: Battle Of The Bulge, that's definately not a bad thing. The graphics are getting a skoch old, (It looks a lot like CC3: The Russian Front) but, again, they still shine as compared to some other RTSs. The sound is better than ever, and the mission I played was fun, exciting, and intense. The tutorial will get a newbie off to a good start, and the highest difficulty level will challenge even the most fire-hardened grognard. A good pick for all wargames and fans of the Close Combat series.

I wrote a review for CCIV (The battle of the bulge) stating it was the best real time strategy game ever, I have been proven wrong. Normandy has fixed several of the minor bugs in CCIV and the units, graphics, and especially the sounds are much better. The distant artillery, machinegun fire and aircraft sounds really fill in the environment well!

The battlefield is very fluid on the strategic level, with multiple levels of deployment options. Not only can you choose your own "big picture" strategy, but you can re-equip your units for the coming fight out of a force pool. Literally allowing "Task force" or "kamphgruppe" structuring to the fight.

The AI is relatively easy to beat (but still fun), but I imagine it would challenge a new player. Also, for the experienced player, you can edit the enemy taskforce to make them tougher to challenge yourself. Go head to head against another human and this game is phenomenal!

The tanks still have some trouble with path finding, but there aren't near as many so it isn't as big of a deal.

The mortar and Naval barrages are awesome and squad level mortars are greatly improved as well. These things are now deadly! In CCIV, artillery strikes were almost useless, even against exposed infantry in a field. Now, you can decimate an enemy squad or two with a well placed artillery strike.

The interface is virtually unchanged (a big plus for those of us already familiar with it). I haven't tried the scenario editor yet, but I am looking forward to it.

Buy this game! You won't be disappointed!

Finally, a Close Combat game that features the invasion of normandy. I snatched this game up so fast, I couldn't wait, and once I got into it I wasn't disappointed. The first thing I noticed is that I can actually pass some of the missions. Close Combat IV was so incredibly difficult it almost made me hesitant to get this latest installment. Thank goodness, the easiest setting really means easy in this one. The game itself really isn't any different than the last couple CC games, and really could be considered an addon if it were any other game. Basically just has new missions, maps and various other minor features. That doesn't mean I don't like it. I love it. The missions involving taking the beach are just a blast, and so is basically everything else. This is definetly the best Close Combat yet.

Being the Close Combat fanatic that I am, I purchased it the first day. As usual, CC did not disappoint giving me the same intense action of past titles, with better sound effects. The map is huge and the grand campaign seems like it could be endless. This is a must have for any CC fan or any war gamer in general.

One quirk however, was during the initial load screen, the game would crash saying "unable to stream". I know this usually means that Media player is not installed or your video card sucks. However, I know this isn't the case here because I have a PIII and Voodoo3 card and run every other game including other SSI's titles with no problem. Also CC doesn't take much CPU power to play. However once I turned the video's off in the options screen I was good to go. A bug I am sure they will fix!

Close Combat: Invasion Normandy is overall an excellent game. If you are like me, sick of real-time strategy games that focus on how fast you can build troops and tanks to swarm the enemy, than CCV is for you. Most other games in the genre focus on who can build technology faster and kill the other teams ore trucks with greater effectiveness. Not CCV. This game focuses on tactics and realism. Your soldiers react realistically to situations. If a soldier sees his squad wiped out by a flamethrower, he'll likely break down and be useless. This adds alot of depth to the game and pushes it head and shoulders above the rest. The maps look superb and they are affected by mortar barrages etc. The intro music is pretty poor. It doesn't give the game the right feel, but this is minor. The real problem with the game is that it is too easy. The AI is just really poor sometimes. I've seen 3 whole squads crawl down a road and be mowed down by machine gun fire, and then the AI will send another squad down the same road to meet the same fate. This makes the game far too easy. likewise, the AI doesn't use tanks effectively at all. A tank can be the best weapon of all, but it can also be scrap metal. The computer AI prefers scrap metal. The expolsions look great, as do the animations. All in all, 4 stars. Great fun, and graphics, really poor AI.

This probably the best game I've bought in a long time. The graphics are good enough (not impressive), but the sound effects are outstanding. The best feature is the different levels of difficulty, they allow begginners to handle the game without getting frustrated and experienced gamers can get a powerful match. The AI in some phases can be a little dumb with grenadiers running into your machine gun nests, tanks tend to get stuck or stay like sitting ducks in front of AT guns, and sometimes there is a lack of initiative from your soldiers. But these are just minor flaws that don't affect gameplay that much. If you are interested in a strategy wargame this is the best you can get.

Close Combat: Invasion Normandy may be the best game in the CC series. Thanks to more balanced gameplay (i.e. armor doesn't overpower the game as in previous versions), each battle is interesting and different -- even against the computer! In previous versions, it seemed the computer would put the same units in the same places in the same battles -- very boring. The AI has been upgraded for this edition.

The Battlemaker option has been fixed -- you can now pick and choose individual squads instead of picking unchangeable battlegroups. This feature allows you to design your own campaigns, battles and operations -- great when the preset battles get boring. To be honest, I haven't gotten bored of the preset battles (I've had the game the day after its release)!

Also, online gameplay is incredibly smooth -- this adds another dimension to those gamers who tire of the computer's AI.

Great game!

After paying two online Grand Campaigns with two very worthy opponents, I have come to respect this game for what it is - a fun H2H game, but it is not much more.

The graphics out of the box are cartoon cutouts that look like they belong on a kids television show. Tank and AT guns simply look like they were copy and pasted from a comic book, which is horribly ugly to look at when you have the gorgeous maps you play on. Fortunatly, this can be solved with graphics mods for the game that greatly help and make the vehicles and guns look as they should, realistic.

As for gameplay, it is safe to say that any experienced player will have no challenge at all on single player. The AI is atrocious, and no mod can help this. The only wayto get any enoyment whatsoever out of this game is to find a good, reliable opponent online, and play the grand campaign, that is where this game is fun.

WWII grogs like myself will love this game, however, being a serious gamer the bugs detract from the simple play this gives. Since Atomic went out of business, the CC community now has to rely on third party patches and fixes to an extremely buggy game out of the box. If the CC series had actually evolved from its first installment, to now its fifth, then Atomic games might actually still be in business. This is a cheap knock-off of CC4, which was the absolute worst in the series, but can be fun when you find a very good opponent to play who is honest. Why?

Reenforcement bug in GC - unlimited reinforcements for American player... In my first GC, I had to go up about three times the American armor is should have, which ruined the game. Fix this by keeping a paper chart with your opponent so as not to ruin the game, because there wont be any patch for this.