This review first appeared in IPW, the newsletter for all discount games
club members. Contact colin@allusedgames.demon.co.uk for details.

MARKET GARDEN (Atomic)

WWII air assault Computer game

It was a long time in coming, but only recently I finally made the move
to computer wargames. The idea of having an opponent that is always on
hand is simply to good to resist. Add to this the fact that the computer
can also do all the calculations, tracing supply, plotting support and
any other tasks you don't enjoy, leaving you to concentrate on strategy.

But there's more.

You never have to set the games up and can store them for as long as it
takes to play to conclusion without disrupting family life by making the
dining room table out of bounds for weeks on end. Consider combat. With
the traditional game a unit is either full strength, half strength or
eliminated. Sure some games have used strength markers or duplicate
units representing a variety of different strengths, but they have never
been popular. A computer takes care of all this and could reduce an
entire army man by man if necessary. With all this in favour of modern
technology, must it now be time for me to finally fold up my maps and
never experience the joy of counting out hundreds of little cardboard
counters ever again? Read on.......

No prizes for guessing what a game entitled Market Garden is about. Yes
folks its Arnhem time again, the brilliant operation that failed by
trying to go a 'bridge too far'. Of course a contributing factor was the
fact that old Monty decided that any opposition encountered would be
second rate. Meanwhile Dutch resistance and aerial photo reconnaissance
suggested that, in fact, the 9th and 10th SS Panzer divisions were in
the Arnhem area. They were right, Monty was wrong, and the rest, as they
say, is history, in this case quite literally. Its a cracking topic for
a game which would go some way to explaining the multitude on the
subject.

When I saw the rules for Market Garden my first thought was, 'this looks
complex'. The game is one in once you have learned the rules for one
you're well on your way to knowing them all. However, as this was the
first I'd come across in the series I was counting on a steep learning
curve. My mistake was in looking at the game the way I would the
traditional board game. What I thought I'd do was read the rules and
make some brief notes as I went. Having seen a section titled
quickstart, though, I read through it and I was actually playing within
ten minutes.... no bull.

Having taken the advice of the rules author, I selected the smallest and
shortest scenario 'The first bridge' rather than jump into the full
blown Campaign as I would a boardgame. I decided to let the computer
play the Germans whilst my U.S. Paras had to secure a bridge and a
couple of towns. The screen itself shows a map comprising of hexes and
showing terrain in the same manner as hundreds of boardgames I've
played. Units were shown in exactly the same way as they would appear in
a traditional wargame right down to the NATO symbols. I felt at home
immediately. The only difference is that you cannot see the whole map at
one time but this was not the annoyance I thought it would be. All I
then had to do was click on a unit I wanted to move and, in doing so,
its attack, defence, armour and anti-tank strengths were displayed at
the bottom of the screen. In addition fatigue, morale and disruption
levels were also shown. Having decided on the information given, to
continue using the unit, I had then simply to hold the button down on
the mouse and drag the unit to the hex I wished to move it to. If moving
a whole stack, you only had to hold the shift key as well.

To have combat units have to start adjacent to the enemy and are dragged
into the adjacent occupied enemy hex denoting that they attack it.
Having done this (and for an experienced gamer such as myself with such
a small scenario it took no more than two minutes), all I had to do was
select execution from the menu and sit back. The units then proceeded to
dash about before my eyes or engage in combat. Questions of supply
allocation, Artillery and Air support I'd left to my staff (the
computer).

Within a short span of time I had won my very first, second, third and
fourth games, fought larger and more difficult scenarios, played both
German and Allied sides, winning every time. I began to wonder 'am I
another Napoleon?' I took a reality pill.

Something was mighty odd about the way the computer handled its units.
At times, whilst half the computers forces were being smashed to pieces
the other half would sit around doing nothing. At first I thought this
was all part of some grand masterplan conceived by some artificial
intelligence to demonstrate to poor humans like myself how very inferior
we are. Then I checked that it was not caused by lack of supplies or
other concerns I was unaware of I tried playing the game with the very
effective fog of war option. Still my victones continued. Soon, however,
the sad truth became clear. The computer was just not a very able
opponent. The outcome of these scenarios was becoming about as
predictable as an Iraqi election result. Only one scenario could be won
by the computer and that was when the human commands the British First
Airborne at the 'bridge too far' - a very uneven game to start with.
However, all was not lost.

I think the one scenario any owner of this game wants to play is the
Allied side in the full blown Campaign. All the excitement of defending
each of the three bridges whilst trying to break through with 30 corps
and dash across Holland. It is lucky then that this is the one scenario
that does provide a balanced, if some what long, game. Besides you can
always have the computer command your side too during night turns when
troops should be resting to reduce fatigue or just save the game till
you're in the mood. The length need not be a problem.

Sadly, the Campaign game does not play well the other way around, as my
Germans never fail to give the computer's Allies a thrashing. There's
obviously more to the game than I've discussed here. Also I may well
have delegated more to the computer than you would in my shoes, simply
through inexperience. However, I feel that this is really a good
campaign game with a bunch of substandard scenarios. As such my
traditional boardgames' future seems safe, at least till I get my next
computer game.

Alan Sharif