SOW WATERLOO VS HISTWAR2 Napoleon - differences and comparisons

[Destraex]

I can see why some might be disappointed in a hiatus in SOW as far as the ACW goes. I would love more battles and maps etc. But the news that the engine is going to tackle Napoleonics, specifically Waterloo more than makes up for it.

Before I got SOW I only had a passing interest in the ACW. I bought the game though because of my frustration with titles like NTW. I was looking for a realistic period game and SOW delivered that in bucket loads. As a result my background knowledge and interest in the AWC grew as I read around the battles I was fighting in the game.

There is a massive gap in the market for a decent Napoleonics Tactical Game. Histwar is great but has its issues and whilst I admire its originality it isnt a patch on the current SOW system. Even Histwar 2 looks like it will be more of the same.

For those that dont have an interest in Napoleonics I would encourage them to look at it as a tactical challenge. The men might have different uniforms, weapons and languages but the tactics (and gameplay) wont be massively different to what you have now. The fringe benefits are that all the enhancements that get put into SOW-W will be passed back down to SOWGB. The biggest to my mind would be the map SDK, which if we are honest with ourselves is the biggest hinderance to us getting (insert favourite civil war action) into the game.

In all I am incredibly excited, not just because its Napoleonics, but as a side effect the Civil war franchise will explode too.

Squid_UK: With regard to histwar can you tell me how the scourge of war engine and features differ or are better?
Histwar2 napoleon is currently in early access and in july intend to release new unit models that make the game look like this:


I do not own histwar or gettysburg but was an early adopter of 2nd mannassas and have played the january 2014 demo of histwar 2 napoleon once I got word of SOW waterloo. I wanted to see which one was going to be best.

So far it's looking like HW2 will have far superior graphics but one of the worst interfaces I have ever used. Perhaps no coop mode either which is a must for me.

Actually I will start a new thread.

Here is the new thread.
Now histwar2 and SOWW are looking like they will be released within 6 months of each other.
So this is a very valid discussion that may even help the SOWW devs make design decisions.
Competition is also a good rather than a bad thing for the players.

I am certainly no expert, in fact since I have only paddled in each demo for 30mins I am almost completely ignorant.

Differences I can see so far. I will add to them as we get more information from those who know better than I.

SOWW:
(i) Is sprite based rather and Histwar is 3D model based. This means that in the long run everything is either going to stay really ugly in histwar or become a real work of beauty.
SOWG sprites look very jaggy (like bad Anti Aliasing)
SOWG sprite animations look like they are missing many frames making them look like a slide show as they play.
SOWG sprites seem to be very floaty like they are not really on the terrain. This would probably be because of the lack of physics?
Histwar animations are absolutely atrocious when compared to the likes of total war. The animations are missing frames and generally do not look natural or even match the events in play.
I would really like to know if there will be better looking sprites in SWW. I love to zoom in and see a scrap. It's the most rewarding part of the game.

(ii) Terrain. SOWG in game terrain is better than histwar terrain by a country mile. I believe that terrain is much more important than troop graphics. But tend to find developers look to spend more time and energy on the soldiers simply because it is less boring. Histwars terrain feels like it is back in the 80s. Things look like placeholders especially buildings. The buildings are literally just stuck on a plain green flat terrain texture. Histwar terrain for the most part just looks like a very cheaply painted flat green tabletop wargaming map.
SOWG terrain is very good but is lacking the ability to have troops fortify and enter buildings.

(iii) Representation of couriers. If I am correct histwar does not physically depict couriers. Just order delays? SOWW will have a huge advantage here.

(iv) COOP play. Another area where I think SOWW will have a huge advantage.

(v)Troop ratio: I think histwar may have the advantage here but am unsure. There is an option in the menu which changes the troop ratio and I think the lowest is 1:2. This may not be the actual ratio of troops on the field but rather a way of increasing performance by making regiments smaller. It would be great to see an answer to this one from somebody who owns it.

(vi)Supply - iirc SOWG depicts supply with wagons? But histwar I think just depicts ammo with no chance of re-supply.

(vii) Zoom. Histwar at least at the moment has a nice seemless soom from 3D to a 3D map and then 2D map. I believe this is planned for SOWW.

(viii)

P.S. My son loves mount and blade napoleon which is a FPS with sword fighting, cannons etc which you can have hundreds in. It may interest people who like napoleonics.

[Marching Thru Georgia]

I own both. Of the two, I spend 95% of my time playing SOW. Indeed Histwar's gui gets the award for the worst interface ever built. But what I consider far worse is the poor AI. Although I am reluctant to speak ill of a small indy game, Histwar is essentially a one man show, it has been years of promising an improved AI with negligible results. An upgrade is always 6 months in the future. By contrast, the SOW AI is without peer. If you play from saddle level as I do, you will find the AI is able to beat you on a regular basis. What's even better, is it does so with a different strategy each time.

Personally I prefer the SOW sprites. At ground level they are fairly realistic. They appear to move a bit better in some circumstances. Histwar figures seem to be wearing skates as they glide over the ground. The SOW movement does have problems when they change direction. They look as if they form a conga line. Histwar does not suffer from that. I don't know how much improved the figures will be in SOWW, but even if they stay as they are, I'd be quite happy.

Troop ratios are fully adjustable in SOW. Stock play is at 4:1, but it can be set to whatever value the player chooses. However, a battalion or regiment is limited to 125 sprites. This will be increased in SOWW. Also, the Histwar army size is limited to 100 units. SOW is limited by the horsepower of your computer.

Currently, towns and farms cannot be fortified in SOW unlike Histwar. But according to the podcast, the next version will have that capability. It will have to since the capture of structures was a prominent feature in many Nappy battles.

Zoom is far superior in SOW. I find that function, although smooth, to be essentially nonexistent in Histwar. There is very little magnification.

SOW allows the player to take any size command, from brigade to army. Histwar allows only army command. So after giving the initial disposition orders there is not a lot to do for most of the battle. However, a future release is suppose to allow corps and division command.

The one place where Histwar is far superior is in the representation of troop movement on the battlefield. Histwar accurately shows adequate space between units with no interference from neighbors. It also uses maneuver columns when battalions are marching into position in line. By contrast SOW tends to severely bunch the units together marching them in line formation over and through each other in an attempt to reach the front line. It reminds me of Soviet armor tactics. SOWW will have to address unit boundaries and brigade/division cohesion and I am sure they will.

Both games have strengths and weaknesses. But if you are looking for a worthy opponent for single player or co-op battles then there is only one choice, SOW. My recommendation is buy both.

[Saddletank]

A lot of these comparison discussions focus on how games look and less on how they play. This is unfortunate but stems from the PC format where graphics are now able to match the best animated 3D movies from 10-15 years ago. People like and want to see pretty graphics and the visual input to the human brain is by far the most important of our senses. To me, though, computer game developers have for too long invested too much effort in a game's appearance and not enough in gameplay.

A PC game is a package of finite dimensions, like a suitcase, you can only pack so much into it before going over your weight allowance and causing problems. At an airport check-in this means paying extra, in PC gaming terms it means crashes or users having to dial back on some features (usually graphics). What is the point in sacrificing gameplay for beautiful graphics if some of your customers with average PCs can't deliver those beautiful images to the customer?

Going back to the suitcase analogy, putting in graphics takes up so much space. Adding a poor/average/good/great AI engine takes up space. Adding in ballistics, damage modelling, morale systems, terrain cover and movement penalties, clever or not so clever maps, a campaign system... in other words adding in all extra elements takes up room in the suitcase.

NSD I understand is exploring multi-threading to use the power of multiple cores and so they are taking a bigger suitcase this trip. Good news.

The extreme example of a game that has way too much space in the case allocated to visuals is the Total War series. In the games since Empire I would say that around 90% of the space is used up in this way with the result that the games look stunning but all other aspects. Really. Are. Terrible... Dreadful. Shamefully bad. AI that is downright stupid and simply frustrating. Gameplay that is repetitively boring... etcetera.

NSD on the other hand made a decision early on to have excellent maps with terrain features the AI would be aware of and use, like roads, walls for cover and high ground for combat bonuses. It also decided to build what is probably the best RTS AI ever designed and MTG is right, it can beat a human player if the human plays with the same limitations the AI has - that is view the game from ground level.

HW I think has been designed to deliver a glorious movie-scape of a Napoleonic battle. It does this extremely well and looks very good. I like the flat open European landscapes and I like the huge distances between units - SOW's battlefields feel too crowded, probably because of the difference between the figure (sprite height) scale and the ground (horizontal distance) scale. However, like the TW series, HW has not invested enough work into the AI, though I understand its battlefields are extremely good.

SOW on the other hand delivers alongside amazing AI and so-so (in fact quite weak) graphics, several other strong features: Co-Op vs AI play, MP and SP modes all of which are robust and stable. Courier play with actual courier sprites who can be killed en-route to their destination and the dispatches they are carrying can be intercepted (though often not much useful can be gathered from them - this could use some improvement), and variable camera freedom modes from eye-in-the-sky drone-like omniscience for those who enjoy that style, down to a fixed location attached to the saddle of your officers horse, making it, AFAIK, the only "first person" battle RTS.

I dislike the current courier feature where a separate sprite is sent for each separate order, sometimes 4 to 6 riders go off to deliver one sentence each of what should be one multi-instuctional message. I would like a courier system that opens an order pad, lets you send a series of orders such as "go here, face this direction, assume this formation, take up this combat stance, place your right flank against division X's left, and use the roads to get there" and then close and send the order so only 1 courier sprite is sent.

To me there is little to compare HW with SOWG/W and SOWG/W is definitely the better design with the correct emphasis placed on allocating space in the suitcase to important stuff like socks, boxers, flip-flops and sunblock rather than a flashy tuxedo.

If I was allowed to make only one request to Norb and the boys for SOWW, it would be "don't pack a tuxedo".

[Destraex]

Are you saying that the separate graphics and game people for a game are in fact the same resource?
Most game designers tell you the graphics team is not the same one as the core game design team.
In sows case I believe that they ha e a specific person employed for sprites for instance.

I understand what you are saying or I would not own combat mission 2 games or take command among others. Sow certainly sounds like it is almost perfect. It has everything I want in a wargame.

But the suitcase can be filled with both as long as it does not sacrifice by gameplay elements.

The problem I guess most teams have is that people pine for graphics so much half or more of a game dev team becomes graphics.

But to say no improvement is warranted is a huge call.

[Saddletank]

I wasn't using the suitcase analogy regarding the teams resources. Of course graphic artists and 3D modellers for maps and buildings are different team members to the AI coders (for example). What I'm saying is that you cannot have superb 3D models like Total War uses *and* the excellent AI routines SOW uses *and* 5 mile maps *and* 50,000 sprite armies. There isn't a home PC that could run such a game. Ever wondered why Total War limits you to 20 unit armies and city-block sized battlefields? Now you know.

In effect the "suitcase" is the users PC capabilities. This container is what limits game designers. Add in super graphics and you must leave out something else. This is why SOW uses rather poor 2D sprites instead of sexy fully rendered little 3D men, each with his own combat and death animations. Honestly, who needs 1-on-1 swordfight animations when most of the time you're clickfesting from the radar map? Its a complete waste of effort.

Sadly gamers have grown up thinking good graphics = good game and screenshots pre-sell all games. Screenshots can only show graphics, nothing else, they can't show gameplay. I have come across comments about SOW on other forums along the lines of "it looks 10 years old with those 2D sprites" and the thought process is obviously that if it looks 10 years old then it plays 10 years old and will have weak clunky gameplay.

Its a really insidious vicious circle.

I just hope NSD can find a middle road to improve their sprites and battlefield graphics so that more people like the initial look of it and buy SOW:W and we get a bigger community, but at the same time they don't compromise on the AI and other good features the game has. The news of differently designed sprites is encouraging, but I hope it doesn't force any corners to be cut elsewhere.

[con20or]

but at the same time they don't compromise on the AI and other good features the game has. The news of differently designed sprites is encouraging, but I hope it doesn't force any corners to be cut elsewhere.

You don't have to worry about us compromising Ai or gameplay for eye-candy

[Destraex]

I always thought that the gpu was the limitation for graphics in a game and the CPU the limitation for the ai.
The graphical limits for the sprites being a function of how many men you want to draw at once and how much video memory you have.

You seem to think that both the ai and the graphics draw primarily off the CPU.
nobody is asking for a change from sprites to 3d models and a change to the CPU tracking them all.

What I should do is see how much video memory the game currently uses. If the 2d speites are not using my 3d video memory then yes its all on the CPU. I do assume though that my 2gb of video memory can handle the 3d map though.

But yes. If we use the kiss principle then we should remove the graphical element all together and leave you with your icon map to enjoy.

As for total war. They lost their way a long time ago to appeal to the masses. That though does not mean that good graphics equals a good game. There is room for both as histwar will maybe prove this time around.

Now just to be clear. I don't care either way. I was just observing.

[Squid_UK]

I have to echo really what already has been said. Please bear in mind its about a year since I last fired up Histwar. I know there is plenty coming in HW2, and Histwar 1 is a pretty good game. However it does have flaws, and I would say that SOW is by far a bigger favourite with me.

Things I like about Histwar is the Fog of war, you literally cannot tell what is happening. Further you really need to formulate a plan and hope it goes well. Trying to perform major repositions takes hours and by the time you've completed them its usually too late. That i think is realistic and it forces you to invent a original plan and commit to it.

I also like how you can alter units behaviours or doctrines. Also the reserve rules are pretty good.(I would like to be able to advise my commanders in SOW how many men to commit and how many to keep in reserve, obviously further affected by their personality)

Where it falls down is visually, and also there is a lack of feedback or transparency to the player. In SOW you can usually work out how a unit will do in combat. In histwar I have had some surprising results and been at a total loss to explain them. The AI is basic, but essentially its really you trying to guide your AI against the computer opponents AI anyway, so it gets away with it somewhat.

Histwar 2 does look interesting, but it really does need quite a lot more polish to be on par with SOW. To be honest they are totally different games. Histwar puts you in the shoes of the supreme army commander, whereas SOW you typically play a smaller but more involved roll.

I too would encourage those interested to pick up histwar, its worth supporting and I've had many hours of fun from it. But i have probably played SOW about ten times as much.

To be honest, there simply isn't a really great Napoleonics game out. I have Ageods Napoleons Campaigns (Good), Paradoxes March of the Eagles (Pretty Good) , Histwar (Interesting but Quirky) and of course the hugely disappointing Napoleon Total War (Shite). They all seem to miss the mark somewhat and thats why I am so excited about Norbsoft taking on board Waterloo. Its about time we had a stand out Nap title.

[nimitstexan]

From just the demo so far, learning to play Histwar seems about as intuitive as learning to ride a unicycle blindfolded. . . but I really wish SOW would switch to a graphics engine similar Histwar II's, even if it meant reducing the number of individual bodies on the field (personally, I find a 1/5 or even 1/10 ratio more than sufficient). It is not just the 3D soldiers (though that is part of it), but the terrain and environment in Histwar II seems much more realistic. Unfortunately, SOW graphics are starting to fall into the category of actually detracting from the gameplay experience.

[Calvin809]

I personally like the sprites the way they are now if it means better gameplay and a more historical feel with very large armies being shown on the field. I'm clueless about sprites but can they be enhanced by making them higher resolution or increase animation frames? What kind of enhancements are there in the works besides the larger number of uniforms?