Special thanks to Fred for this review:

http://www.simhq.com/_naval/atlantic-fleet-review-interview.html

Interesting. How hard is it to play on the Iphone 6? I wouldn't mind getting it but a lot of these games are flat out tough on such a small screen, relatively small screen.

I actually prefer to play it on my phone which is a Galaxy S5 with 1920x1080 res because the smaller screen means resolution is higher. We tried to place the buttons where they are easy to tap and not accidentally hit the wrong one. The GUI itself was designed with the iphone4's 960x640 as the target resolution.

Well, I am all thumbs, and while I found the strategic map easy to navigate on iPhone, the tactical engagement was tougher as it was harder to adjust the sliders. I think this title is optimal for iPad. But then I do use glasses and couldn't play it on iPhone without them!

F by Heinkill, on Flickr

Would love to see a Windows Version of this, with a bit better GFX.

Yes the concept has great potential for a PC title. I'll let Nils (Evilflower) chip in here but I think they just develop for mobile. And knowing the PC sim space, I suspect they make more profit selling this game at 10USD on iOS/Android than they would selling a beefed up game at 100 USD on PC.

H

Thanks for the review and interview with Nils, HeinKill. Also about your grandfather story.

I can't speak about the future or the possibility of PC release, Nils will have to step in but yeah I'd love to play it on desktop too!

TFE (Przemek/Stary)

Great review, I'll be picking this up for my road trip next month.

BTW, the link at the bottom of the article is not working. Is this the link to the interview? I get the message:
We could not find that private message.

Sorry, not sure how that random link got in there. The interview resulted in the quotes from Nils used throughout the review, it isn't a separate article. I decided to integrate it. Cheers,

H

Gotchya. Can't wait to try it out.

We are actually planning a PC port of the title. It'd likely be the same game with some nicer shaders to take advantage of the PC hardware. We'll post more news about this later this fall.

It would be great just to be able to play this on a large monitor.

Would love to see this as a Real Time strategy game. Is this the project Heinkill mentioned, or will it be a different game entirely?

The moment you release this on the PC it's an instant buy for me.

Same here.

"And remember the good old days when a sim or strategy game came with a deeply researched dynamic single player campaign, challenging and intuitive AI, and a nice thick manual explaining all the detail about the conflict, and the game, for you to page through on your daily commute? Remember when the price for all of this seemed to match the value?"
Yes I do!

Perfect. There hasn't been a decent battleship type game on PC for ages... the gameplay sounds perfect, just a few more GFX details and that's good as gold.

I play it on a 7" Andriod tablet. It's fun, challenging, definately not one shot insta-kill. Best 10 bucks I've ever spent and I'm not even out of the destroyers, yet.

The more I have played it since the review, the more impressed I am with the tactical combat AI. I have yet to see it do anything dumb and have had numerous cases where it made really good choices or just plain outsmarted me. Here are just a few recent ones that stick in my mind (which is impressive in itself - not my mind, but that I remembered these engagements)

- Me with two British battlecruisers (BC) vs AI with 1 German battleship (BB) and two destroyers. The German BB angled away from the British BCs and concentrated its fire on the closest, trying to keep a good separation. The two German destroyers split up, one making smoke and moving upwind to a position where it could cover the BB if needed, the other charging straight at the British BCs to draw fire. The German BB took medium damage and then it and one destroyer retired under smoke cover. The third German destroyer was sunk but not before launching a torpedo salvo which scored medium damage on one of the British BCs.

- Me with 1 British BC (Repulse) and 2 destroyers vs 1 German BB (Scharnhorst). Scharnhorst scared the crap out of me by going to flank speed and steaming straight at my group. I sent my 2 destroyers toward it under smoke and tried to keep Repulse at max range to Scharnhorst. Scharnhorst was giving me very little to aim at head on with its low narrow profile and concentrated main forward guns on Repulse until the 2 destroyers were a threat, then switched to secondary guns and sunk one destroyer, before changing back to main guns and going for Repulse again. I was actually debating whether to quit and run despite Sharnhorst being outnumbered because Scharnhorst had scored a few hits and was closing, when I landed a salvo on Scharnhorst, knocked out one turret and started a fire. Scharnhorst turned broadside and let go with a salvo of torpedoes at Repulse, at max range, but forcing me to maneuver which ruined my aim and slowed me down. It then withdrew under smoke. I ended with one destroyer lost, one with light damage and medium damage to Repulse, while Scharnhorst received only light damage.

- My convoy of 3 freighters and 2 destroyers was set upon by a German wolf pack of 4 subs. The player has the unfair advantage of knowing there are four subs out there, but not where they are. The German sub which was closest opened fire with torpedoes targeting the nearest destroyer first, and scoring a hit which crippled its steering. Only 1 sub engaged, the other 3 still silent. I split the convoy in two, half turning toward the source of the attack, including my remaining destroyer, and the other half away (worried they were trying to herd me toward a trap - which they were). Another salvo of torpedos from the first sub sunk a freighter and the damaged destroyer. My cunning idea of splitting the convoy was a disaster, as the other three subs picked off my freighters as soon as they sailed into range. I managed to kill one sub with my remaining destroyer, with the loss of all merchant ships and one destroyer. The interesting thing about the AI in this engagement was that it did not cheat by just stationing the 4 subs equally around the convoy. It had 3 subs on one side and one on the other side of the convoy and opened fire with the one sub resulting in my turning half the convoy toward the other 3. There is no fixed 'pattern' in which subs engage a convoy, so chance and opportunity seem to play a large part.

- AI with Graf Spee vs me with two British BB (Warspite and Prince of Wales). As soon as we engaged, the Graf Spee made smoke and turned tail to run. Fair enough vs two British capital ships. Warspite slowly fell behind but Prince of Wales was able to match Graf Spee in speed and stayed within guns range, landing a couple of hits (Graf Spee unable to fire back while making smoke). I was starting to feel cocky, and swung Prince of Wales broadside on to give Graf Spee a full salvo, but missed, and lost ground. Graf Spee immediately stopped making smoke, turned and belted me with two full broadsides of its own, one short (I replied and only just tagged it), the other on target, knocking out my forward turrets and damaging my propulsion. It then made flank speed under smoke again and pulled away, to disengage. Result: Graf Spee with only light damage, me with a crippled Prince of Wales I had to send to port for repair, and badly bruised ego.

What I like about these examples is that the AI doesn't cheat, it just responds well to a situation and occasionally does something unexpected, but cool.

H

And sneaky!

Looks like a possible buy, but does it have an offline mode or do you need to be connected to the web to play?

I would only buy to play away from home but my pad does not have web access away from the home wifi. Also can you save ingame?

Since the playstore does not give the android version required I take it, it will work with all versions? My Galaxy pad is the original one, still works fine but does not update to the latest version, mine id v4.0.4

Cheers MarkL

Yes, Grandpa Jack had a long life, died at 93 and he summed it up like this when I spoke to him just before he died (his wife had just passed away):

"Since I was born I've seen houses go from oil lamps to electricity, transport from horses to cars, balloons to jets, I've fought in two world wars against Germans, Japanese and Italians, had two ships sunk under me, watched the fleets assemble for the signing of the peace treaty in Tokyo Bay, lived through the cold war, the bomb, seen man land on the moon, invent radio, colour movies, television and the computer, buried two wives, had eight children and about twenty grandchildren...I'm getting a bit tired."