So don't be surprised when that rabble-rousing Vaclav Havel starts mouthing off and causing trouble for your Warsaw Pact. Era-specific events pop up during the campaigns as well that alter battle conditions and add flavor to the Cold War setting.
These play out like board games, in that you maneuver units on big turn-based tactical maps of Scandinavia before getting in close on detailed strategic battlefield maps when the guns start going off. There are four solo/multiplayer campaigns, each covering different theaters of World War III in Northern Europe circa 1985. The modes, at least, are straightforward enough. Gee, everything looks awfully calm from way up here. But even though this game is so daunting initially that you want to begin your time with the game by studying Clausewitz, the design is so slick and the combat so deviously challenging that you can't help being drawn into its what-if web pitting the Warsaw Pact against NATO. This supersize real-time strategizer set during a Cold War-era WWIII is one of those all-in games that practically punches you in the face with its complexity when you fire it up for the first time. Apologies to Keanu Reeves, but that's exactly the sort of stunned reaction provoked by Wargame: AirLand Battle.
