4- Civil War 2
There aren’t a whole lot of grand-strategy American Civil War games. My podcast co-host Al says it’s because the American Civil War is boring, but since he’s British, that might be the sore loser in him talking. Civil War 2 is the rare exception that proves the rule.
This simultaneous turn-based grand-strategy title, released in 2013 and created by AGEOD has since become a cult classic by offering an in-depth experience of grand-strategy military management. You’ll be in charge of building, organizing, and commanding your armies either for the Confederates, or the Union. The game has 2 weeks long turns, with 14 phases each – 1 per day. Since the moves happen simultaneously, there’s a need to anticipate your enemy’s next move and plan accordingly. If your reinforcements arrive just one day too late for an ongoing 3-day battle, the war might be lost.
Civil War 2 isn’t just impressive, it’s also massive, with its map being divided into 3000 regions, and having over 1000 historical units. This just comes with one caveat: even on modern computers the game isn’t going to run smoothly.
3- Wargame Design Studios: Civil War Battles
I don’t think there’s a best-of of list historical games that don’t feature some game from Wargame Design Studios. Their series of turn-based strategy games offer such a deep and complex simulation of every period they put their hands on, and the American Civil War is no exception.
Each game in their Civil War Battles series focuses on a specific campaign (with several battles), allowing players to experience these historical events in astounding detail. Moreso, there are a lot of what-if scenarios, and each game in the series offers between 200 to 400 scenarios depending on the title. That’s a lot of content. Multiply that for the 16 games in the series and you would be fighting scenarios for longer than the war lasted.
2- Scourge of War: Gettysburg
If you’re looking for the most detailed representation of a battle in videogames, the Scourge of War series is where it’s at. Before their work on one of the best Napoleonic Strategy videogames ever made, Scourge of War: Waterloo, the Norbsoft team created the most expansive and realistic representation of the Battle of Gettysburg.
Scourge of War: Gettysburg is a real-time strategy game that offers a highly detailed and immersive experience of the iconic Battle of Gettysburg. Players command vast armies, tactical strategic decisions in real-time to outmaneuver their opponents, always having in mind that communication wasn’t instantaneous, and that orders took their time to arrive, messengers could be killed, and commanders had some degree of autonomy. Even the smallest of scenarios feels larger than any Total War battle you can put together, despite its sprite-based units, I love the charm of it, and the massive battles are really awe-inspiring stuff, and the graphical fidelity quickly fades from your mind when the compromise is controlling armies whose battle lines extend for miles.
With its focus on tactical combat and historical detail, Scourge of War: Gettysburg is a must-play for fans of both the Civil War and real-time strategy games. My only hope is that Scourge of War – Gettysburg gets the same treatment Scourge of War: Waterloo got and we will see it being remastered sometime soon. There are also the Pipe Creek, Antietam, Chancellorsville, and Brandasdy Station battles as DLC.
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