From: Dave & Cathy Shaw Subject: Game Review Dave Shaw dshaw62197@home.com The American Civil War 1861-1865 Strategy & Tactics #93 The American Civil War simulates the entire War Between the States at a strategic level. A single map covers the southeastern United States, from southern Pennsylvania to northern Florida and the East Coast to east Texas. Units are given as strength points and notable generals of the war. Each turn represents a single season, broken into three months, or "campaigns." The driving force behind ACW is the Command Point, which allows players to build armies, activate generals, create forts and such. Both players select chits at random to see how many CPs they can use that turn. Combat is resolved on one of three tables, depending on the size of the attacking force involved. Victory points are collected from capturing cities and destroying armies. ACW suffers from two major handicaps. First, the rules are terribly disorganized and confusing. While some topics (such as combat) are explained fairly well, others are too lightly covered or missing entirely - for example, no where is there any mention of how specific terrain features affect movement. This isn't a complex game, but the rules don't make it seem that way. A few examples of play or outlines would have been nice. But even if you wade through the rules, the game itself just doesn't have much to offer that hasn't been done better elsewhere. ACW is a decent enough simulation of the Civil War, but it lacks any feeling of originality. The game plays well enough the first time through, but there's not a lot to bring players back. In all, ACW is a "woulda-coulda" game: with a better rules presentation and some more thought given to nuances, this game might have been above average. Unfortunately, this game just can't compare to others on the topic; VG's Civil War covers the war in a similar fashion as ACW, but with far superior rules organization and many more details that give players a true feeling of the era. As such, ACW is for Civil War game completists only - there are better simulations available out there.