August 25th, 2009 -- Hearts of Iron III is quite possibly the deepest World War II-era strategy game ever made. And if aren't put off by its relatively steep learning curve, it's surprisingly addictive.
Let me be honest here: I'm not really the target demographic for Hearts of Iron III, which is clearly aimed at hard core strategy and simulation gamers. Although I enjoy strategy games to an extent, I rarely have the patience or time to dedicate to them -- which makes me sort of a 'strategy lite' gamer.
Hearts of Iron III is a deep, involving, complex strategy game -- a game largely played through menus, where you control diplomacy, politics, research, technology, and virtually every facet of your chosen country's infrastructure. The game's interface is pretty much a world map and a series of complex, number-ridden dialog boxes, slider controls, and charts. Success is achieved through successfully balancing the game's complex mechanics.
The game's tutorials don't help you get started much, as it requires a lot reading (in a Very Tiny Font, no less), and doesn't even bother to animate its arrows when it wants to show you something on screen. I highly recommend downloading the manual.
Your ultimate goal in this vast WWII-era sandbox is basically whatever you want it to be. You don't necessarily have to play the game to win World War II. You can actually decide upon whatever goals you want to achieve -- whether it's conquering the world, crushing the axis/allies, maintaining neutrality, or just doing something interesting to change or shape historical events -- like allying with Japan before Germany does.
Personally, I decided upon the following goals, which were, in no particular order:
- Be the first country to build nuclear weapons
- Nuke Germany
- Dominate the world through superior military technology
- Conquer all of North America and unite the continent into a country called CaMexica and standardize our language on Esperanto.
Granted, some of those goals may not be strictly achievable. I can't report on my success yet because Hearts of Iron III is an incredibly deep game, and pretty slowly paced. I'm not sure I'm even smart enough to achieve my goals, and may have to settle for just remaining neutral and researching the most powerful nuclear, aeriel, and naval weapons in the world.
Setting your own goal is a big part of what makes the game fun -- especially if you don't consider yourself a serious strategy gamer. Despite the vast array of dialog boxes, tabs, menus, sliders and numbers, it's fairly easy to set entire sections of the game to AI control, which lets you focus on the areas that interest you the most. For example, you can leave leave the diplomacy and politics to the AI while you work on building your military and directing scientific research.
What became readily apparent to me as I played Hearts of Iron III was that, despite its complexity, and my own general disinclination for such games -- it still succeeded in sucking me in and keeping me engrossed for hours. It's a lot like playing a grand chess game with the world as your board. Believe it or not, even watching those little research bars move across the screen as you inch towards the culmination of a vast, far-reaching plan (like nuclear bombs) is fun.
I don't think there is any better indicator of a successful and well-exectued game -- and its on that success alone that I wouldn't hesitate to recommend Hearts of Iron III to virtually anyone who likes strategy games at all -- even if their idea of strategy is a Zergling Rush. I still haven't achieved my dreams of a united CaMexica, but my nuclear ambitions are creeping ever closer. I just have to keep those damn Germans at bay long enough so I can rain Nuclear fire upon them and their allies. Viva La CaMexica!
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