One complaint about combat is that there is no feedback to the player on how results were achieved. So based on tactics and the units chosen, the player has only a vague idea of what his odds are. Even after many combats, players really have little understanding of what is working and why. You just press the button and hope for the best.

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While there are some issues with combat at the detailed level, WWI does a great job with the overall strategic feel of the war. In 1914, maneuver and breakthrough are the keys to gaining ground. But tactics quickly shift to trench warfare. By 1916, corps after corps dissolves when attacking enemy entrenchments. Just as in the historic battle of the Somme, where there were over a million casualties, such slaughter begins to sap national will. But by 1918, tanks and specialized assault troops give attackers a real chance of victory.

The AI player in WWI is better than your average AI but not brilliant. It has an uncanny ability to exploit the player’s mistakes. If the French human forgets to beef up a weakened army defending Soissons, the result will be German cavalry ordering schnitzel at some of the finer cafes along the Champs Elysees. The AI is capable of performing a dumb AI trick now and then, however. In Palestine, for example, the Turkish AI often leaves its flank open, ignoring Lawrence’s Arab cavalry.

For those players tired of the AI, WWI does allow for multi-player online play. While this aspect of the game was not reviewed, it is pretty clear that both you and your human opponent should really understand the game mechanics before you attempt this.

The game comes with a broad mix of scenarios. There are long campaign games like 1914, 1916 and 1918 that use the entire board and all nations available. One nice feature of the 1914 scenario is that the player can choose a strategy that will radically alter the initial starting positions. For example, the Hindenburg plan will shift armies to the East and concentrate on knocking Russia out early.

Then there are shorter scenarios like Tannenberg, Serbia, Coporetto, and Palestine. While the large campaigns take several sittings to complete, the shorter scenarios can be played within an hour. The Jutland scenario is just one turn, takes ten minutes to play, and really only amounts to a demo of the sea combat system.

WWI stands its ground well in the graphics and sound department. The map and menus are colorful, and sepia toned, giving a nice period feel. Like previous AGEOD titles, units have historic uniforms that change with the technology of the war. For example, German units start the war with the spiked pickelhaube, move to the distinctive M16 steel helm mid-war, and by late war Strosstruppen sport camouflaged M18s. Sound effects are mixed; ranging from the good (air-combat) to the not-so-good, like the wheezing "charge" that is played with each round of combat.

The game’s sound track stands out for special mention as being a real highlight of the game. There are an amazing 85 mp3 tracks of WWI–era songs; that’s four hours of music, for those who spend their day plugged into an iPod. Most songs are either contemporary recordings or played by military bands.

This review was completed on version 1.05f. This is one game where installing the latest patch is required for the players’ sanity. While AGEOD has aggressively exorcised the worst demons of the initial version, there is still some more work to do. Most frustrating will be one or two CTDs/freeze ups, per sitting. Frequent saves and restarts get you past this; curses and pounding on the desk will make you feel better.

The interface is in need of improvement as well. While much of the game is streamlined, there are functions that require far too much clicking. Reinforcements are a good example. The player has a display with new units coming in and a scroll-down list of armies to assign them to. But since the number of corps in an HQ varies by commander, the player does not know if the displayed HQs still have capacity. The result is a trial-and-error approach where the player picks up the new corps, drops it onto a HQ, is told there is no more room—and so tries again elsewhere. Furthermore, the player must develop a delicate and nuanced mouse technique to do basic things like attach and detach corps to armies. Get it wrong, and the game patiently waits for the player to keep trying until his technique is just right.

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