Hearts of Iron 2: Doomsday – an expansion of Hearts of Iron 2, but self-contained – is a grognard game.

I’m going to put it this way: you’re going to know easily if this is the kind of game for you by the end of this review. Look at the screenshots, and think about it.

Do you like:

Games that focus on all aspects of warfare, from diplomacy to research to the actual battles

World War 2

Semi-real time – the clock is ticking, and you’ll start fighting as soon as the scenario starts

Incredibly intricate, detailed, historical record

If so, just go out and get the game. You’re going to love it.

If you don’t know – well, I don’t know what to tell you. If you think you might like that kind of game, well, then, give it a shot. What can it hurt? You might learn a new love for a new type of game.

Now, let me be clear on one thing. This is an expansion. I haven’t played the original – just this version, which is complete in and of itself. The “Doomsday” part is an additional scenario/campaign waged starting in September 1945, with the Soviets making a first strike on the rest of Europe. The other addition in the expansion is the scenario editor.

I was a government major with a minor in history when in college at UVA, and still read a lot – and I mean a lot second only to science fiction – of history to this day, along with my brother, who was a history and English major. If you look over our shelves, it’s an eclectic selection of science fiction, history, and classics. And one of those history books is a book called We Now Know: Rethinking Cold War History by John Lewis Gladdis. If you haven’t read it, it’s a great book, and it’ll tell you why the Soviet Union didn’t attack back then, and in general, will teach you a lot about post World War 2 through Cuban Missile Crisis history.

Now, obviously, I review and read a lot of alternate history, sci fi, what have you, but I just wanted to point that out. In more than one of my other reviews I complain about “cartoonizing” or basically trying to attach realistic military concepts to a non-realistic game, but in this game, I really felt like it was a non-realistic scenario (though written out realistically, and yes, the Soviets were very upset about the idea of forward deployed nuclear weapons in Turkey at the time – think of it as a reverse Cuban Missile Crisis) but I just had a hard time resonating with the scenario compared to the incredible realism showed at all other levels.

Let’s put it this way – one thing grognards are also known for is their dislike of fantasy and non-realistic scenarios. This gets close enough – there’s not fantastic or unrealistic units, but rather a continuation of the war.

So what am I saying here? Well, basically, just that the scenario “Doomsday” doesn’t resonate with me. However, that’s only one small part of the game.

The rest of the game puts you into the thick of the action between 1936 (or so) and 1945. Don’t expect to get off easy; even on the easiest difficulty levels the enemies will pound you hard from the beginning.

Even the tutorial is hard. One of the sample scenarios you do in there is to defeat the Polish as the Germans – and I managed to lose it more than once because I left clicked instead of right clicked, and couldn’t find an “undo” button. Yes, the game is THAT fast paced, even on the default setting, and that ruthless. It’s somewhat turn based – day by day, basically – but it runs constantly unless you pause it. Therefore, you could play it like an RTS if you want, but you can continue to plan, plot, and strategize during the pauses. Believe me, you’ll want to do that.

In fact, it’s a bit overwhelming. Do not expect to just jump into it. If you do the tutorials, they’ll start off showing you just about everything. It’s more than overwhelming, it’s downright disenheartening. Make sure you read the manual thoroughly!

The graphics are adequate – as a game like it is, the most “realistic” graphics are historical photographs, and the graphic design does help with the overwhelming amount of information. The music is fairly standard, but forgettable.

Don’t expect to learn it all right away!

Just play through it, and keep playing. As you go on, you’ll start to enjoy the subtleties more and more.

If you read books like The Fall of Berlin 1945 by Antony Beever or Panzer Commander by Colonel Hans von Luck (formerly of the Wehrmact in World War II and an amazing story, plus a definite read for any devotee of armor tactics) then, as I’ve said before, go out and get this game. Even if you have to pause it every game-day (hint: turn the time lapse all the way down, and click on the date to pause it) to help cover your territories – because it IS a World War after all, and if you concentrate fully on your divisions in Europe you’ll find your navies in the Pacific dying – you’ll get a lot out of the game.