4 – Arma 3

Yes, I am aware that some people don’t consider Arma 3 to be a traditional wargame, but I do, and that’s because if you’re on the market looking for a game that’s both realistic and can pretty much simulate every aspect of tactical warfare under the sun, there’s no other alternative, and that’s essentiatlly because of the astonding amount and quality of the available mods. Chances are, if you want to simulate a battle from the 20th and 21st centuries, Arma 3 has got you covered. I use Arma often to try out tactics, replicate real-world combat situations, and just have fun creating my own scenarios and messing with its real-time editor, which is a feature that every wargame should have.

3 – Ultimate General: Civil War

Here’s a confession: It wasn’t until I played Ultimate General: Gettysburg that I understood how complex and how fascinating the American Civil War was. While that was mostly out of not caring as much about that conflict as I did for others (namely WW2 and Medieval), it was also because, in my head, I just thought of it as a boring conflict of similarly equipped forces fighting in lines. Ultimate General: Gettysburg completely changed my view on it, by being one of those rare games that had me looking at a battle to learn more about its details, and it was only then that I understood just how massive and complex the whole affair really was.

Now, enter Ultimate General: Civil War, a game that was released after I was already enthralled by learning more about the conflict, and how, instead of just going over one single battle, it promised to take on the whole conflict in the form of a semi-linear campaign. One of the best UIs in all of wargaming history, beautiful graphics, a perfect mix between authentic strategy and arcade controls, as well as a very replayable campaign, make Civil War my top 3 favorite wargames of all time.

2 – Burden of Command

Burden of Command is the newest entry on this list. Having been released in 2025, this semi-historical role-playing wargame puts players at the head of an infantry Company during World War 2. While the idea of commanding infantry in World War 2 is far from being a novel one (in fact, it has been done to exhaustion), it’s the particular angle that Burden of Command covers it from that makes it so special to me.

You’re the actual commander of the company, fighting on the field alongside your men, and your job is to make sure that they all come out of it alive. Deep down, you know some of them won’t, but you still have to try. The fact that each decision has real consequences to the story of the game, and each unit lost means losing all that experience and battle prowess, is getting replaced with a couple of fresh-out-of-bootcamp recruits, is also a great gameplay incentive to keep your guys alive. By shifting the focus from pure strategic prowess and building a combat system that’s based around the role of field officers, Burden of Command built a unique experience in wargaming that no other game even comes close to replicating.

Pages: 1 2 3 4