Computer Gaming

By Patrick S. Baker

X-COM: Terror from the Deep

With copies of the first X-COM game flying off the shelves, MicroProse, now merged with Spectrum Holobyte to form MicroProse, Inc., wanted a sequel to the game in just six months. The Gollop brothers hesitated at this proposal, declaring that all could be done in this timeframe was changing sprites and re-using the original code.

So, instead of developing the sequel the Gollops licensed the game code to MicroProse, that would produce the sequel, named X-COM: Terror from the Deep, in-house. Meanwhile, the Gollops went to work on what would become the third game in the series.

Terror was released on 1 June 1995 for DOS PCs and then ported to the PlayStation the next year. The game tells the story of the Second Alien War, some forty years after the First Alien War. Following the destruction of the Alien Brain on Mars, extraterrestrials under the Earth’s seas awaken after millions of years. These new aliens begin to terrorize ships and ports, and abducting humans. The X-COM organization is revived to fight this new alien menace from the deep.

I had a chance to chat with Barry Doyle the designer of Valor and Victory and Lance Craner of Yobo Wargames and we talk about the new digital version of Valor and Victory.

by David Garvin

Sometime back in the mid 1980s, I went to my friend Stephen’s house for the weekend. He was one of the first people who had a personal computer. On it he had a game called War in Russia. It covered the Eastern Front in its entirety, and between the two of us, we spent hours on it, using its now quite-dated graphics. We were not strangers to games on this level; however, the designer, Gary Grigsby, found a way to have the battles resolved down to the lowest levels.

By Mitch Reed

When I first heard about this game being ported to a digital format, I was excited and also worried on how some ports from board games turn out. After bugging Dave Thompson for a preview copy, I got the chance to check it out, and it is amazing and will make you salivate to play over and over again.

By Mitch Reed

I have long been a fan of John Tiller and the newest release from covers one of the forgotten campaigns of World War Two, the campaign to open the port of Antwerp that took place in October and November 1944. The took place right after the failure of Operation Market Garden and before the Battle of the Bulge, so it does not get the rightful attention it should. In their new title Scheldt 44, the designers change that with yet another great addition to the Panzer Campaigns Series.

It has been years since I consistently picked up a Real Time Strategy title but those days are definitely over. Combat Mission Shock Force 2 fills a perfect gaming niche for these pandemic days, with challenging scenarios and replayability. I was able to play through the tutorial and jump into battle feeling about as prepared as any fresh trainee does. There were some learning curves in the first battles outside training and overall I think those reflect more on my skills as a commander than the game. After a few battles, it was gratifying to see a well-orchestrated maneuver sweep an objective.

Like many of you I am under lockdown and I am itching for some gaming relief, well the good people at have finally released a PC port of their iconic board war game Lock and Load called . This project is one I was following for a while since it seems to been in development for a long time and now it is in early-release and has been giving me hours of fun while at home.

The Great War games keep rolling out and for junkies of the conflict are in gaming heaven. The next big release is coming to your PC and it is a remake of one of my favorite games; Strategic Command Great War. For those of you who have not played any games in the series (WW2 came out exactly a year ago) they cover conflicts at the strategic level, so you not only control vast armies but also control the means of production, diplomacy and technological improvements of the nation you play.

When PC gaming first became available, I like many of you, played the many games of the Close Combat series. is now releasing the seventeenth title in the series, Close Combat: The Bloody First which takes the classic series to a new level and uses a completely new game engine to make this new edition an instant classic.

By Bill White

Sometimes at NDNG we like to hear from our readers and today Bill White has provided us with his review of Armored Brigade, and new release by the folks at Slitherine/Matrix Games. Armored Brigade is a PC game that puts you in the role of a NATO or Warsaw Pact commander whose mission is to reach the Rhine in 7 days or blunt the WP forces from rolling over West Germany. The game has multiple nations in which you can play and even includes the forces of the non-aligned Finns. You can find the game and check out the special offer we have at the end of this article.