Game of the Week, Sep 16 to 22

Hi everyone,

It’s time for Game of the Week!

This week’s Game of the Week is First World War Campaigns – East Prussia ‘14.

It is a little bittersweet putting this title up this week. We are on the cusp of releasing version 4.05, including new graphics from Jison, but we need some time after the release of Panzer Campaigns: Smolensk ’43 to make certain there are no unintended bugs introduced. You can expect a patch to be available in approximately a month's time.

The First World War started on July 28^th, 1914, 110 years ago. The assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand resulted in Austria-Hungary declaring war on Serbia, beginning World War I. Between August 2^nd to 7^th, 1914, Germany invades Luxembourg and Belgium. France invades Alsace, and British forces arrive in France. The Germans had hoped to knock the Western Allies out of the war quickly and then turn their attention to the East and the conflict with Russia. These latter events are covered by First World War Campaigns – East Prussia ‘14.

First World War Campaigns – East Prussia ‘14 is the current 4.04 version, released in June, and our product description encapsulates this campaign well:

In the middle of August 1914, the world's attention was focused directly on the Western Front where German armies were sweeping into Belgium and France. On the Eastern Front however, the Russians were on the offensive into East Prussia, an important agricultural region of the Prussian homeland, and the gateway to Berlin. The Russians planned a two-pronged invasion into East Prussia: one army approaching from the Niemen River to the east and one army approaching from the Narew River to the south, both aimed at outflanking German forces located therein, and the eventual capture of the strategic city of Königsberg. In their way stood a single German army, two resolute commanders, and a well-developed rail network. By the time the campaign was over both Russian armies would be almost completely destroyed and thrown out of East Prussia and the campaign itself would go on to become one of the most studied and celebrated victories in warfare.

There are 20 Scenarios, 4 Campaigns and 3 Grand Campaigns included. Below is a list of the major engagements included many with multiple scenarios:

• Stallupönen
• Gumbinnen
• Lahna-Orlau
• Bischofsburg
• Gross Gardienen
• Tannenberg
• Usdau
• Hohenstein
• Lyck
• 1st Masurian Lakes
• Wloclawek
• Chelmno-Dombie
• Kutno
• Lodz (breakout)
• Lodz (withdrawal)
• 2nd Masurian Lakes (1915)

Campaign scenarios consist of:

• The Russian invasion of East Prussia up to the end of the 1st Battle of the Masurian Lakes (206 turns)
• Two different hypothetical variants of the Russian invasion of East Prussia (206 turns each)
• The German invasion of Poland in their attempt to capture Lodz and thwart the Russian advance into Silesia (187 turns)
• A bonus small campaign/large battle scenario covering the German winter offensive of the 1915 2nd Battle of the Masurian Lakes, in which they intended to cut off and destroy the Russian 10th Army (118 turns)

Three Grand Campaign scenarios designed to be played with the other releases in the game series, which are intended to establish context and allow the player to influence the outcome of the war across many different scenarios (118 to 206 turns)

Multiple maps covering Lodz, the Masurian Lakes and all of East Prussia.

First World War Campaigns – East Prussia ‘14 includes the aforementioned playable scenarios, and campaigns, as well as a Getting Started scenario to introduce new players to the game system. The included scenarios are a good mix of small (division), medium (corps) and large (army) engagements.

Of the three included Order of Battles, the largest includes 2,800 units from the German, Russian, and Austro-Hungarian forces that participated in the campaign.

We included a lot of historical documentation and notes with this title, you can review each by clicking on the links below.

Getting Started Guide

Designer Notes

Order of Battle-East Prussia '14 (2nd Masurian Lakes)

Order of Battle-East Prussia '14 (East Prussia)

Order of Battle-East Prussia '14 (Lodz)

Planning Map -2nd Masurian Lakes

Planning Map - East-Prussia

Planning Map - Lodz

There has been a range of books covering the battles in East Prussia. Following are some representative books for anyone that would like some more background on the campaign. You can click on the book images below to be taken to the Publisher or Amazon, if applicable. A few of these books were mentioned in our Game of the Week – France ’14 post, but most are new additions.

Informational

Russian Campaign of 1914 the Beginning of the War and Operations in East Prussia. Written in 1933 by a former Russian general turned military historian Nicholas Golovine. This account reveals the challenges the Russians encountered as they attempted to invade Germany.

The Russian Army in the Great War: The Eastern Front, 1914-1917. Described as: A thorough, and thoroughly readable, history of the Russian front during the First World War, this book corrects widespread misperceptions of the Russian Army and the war in the east even as it deepens and extends our understanding of the broader conflict.

Tannenberg the First Thirty Days in East Prussia. The author of this history, Major-General Sir Edmund Ironside, later became Chief of the Imperial General Staff and commanded anti-Bolshevik forces in Russia after the war. He therefore knows the area he describes well, and his book provides a clear account of this famous German victory written with an expert military eye.

Collision of Empires: The War on the Eastern Front in 1914. A very good history of the first year of the war on the Eastern Front.

The Eastern Front 1914–1920: From Tannenberg to the Russo-Polish War. A very good book to understand both the history and why the Eastern Front was so different to the Western Front.

Catastrophe 1914: Europe Goes to War. Max Hastings needs no introduction on his history prose.

1914: The Year the World Ended. Another great general history to understand the genesis of the first world war.

If you have never listened to Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History, then you are in for a treat. Dan has a range of his podcasts up on Spotify, but the series that details World War I can be bought directly from his website here:

With over 24 hours across 6 episodes this is a thought provoking and unique presentation.

Now for video content:

Smart Wargames has reviewed East Prusia ’14, here.

TankofDoom also highlighted a play-through of an earlier version of the game.

Following are some in-game screen shots of what to expect. Each image can be clicked for a full-sized view.

So you know what is coming in version 4.05, here are a few screenshots of the new hi-resolution graphics. Jison has done some further updates since we initially shared them with you.

As mentioned, the build we are making available today is a the 4.04 version that was released in June. A range of new features were included, and you can read the Changelog here. All new purchases will be this latest version and upgradeable to version 4.05 when available.

If you already own First World War Campaigns – East Prussia ‘14, please note that you will have a new installer available in your store account. There will not be an update available for existing First World War Campaigns – France ‘14 installations.

Beginning with the recent Squad Battles updates, then Panzer Battles then Musket & Pike updates, Civil War Battles and now on to Panzer Campaigns - we have been requiring a complete clean install of your games to get the new version. There's a variety of reasons for this - core changes to file formats (moving to PNG files in some cases), new infrastructure for future A/I enhancements, Windows 11 compatibility changes and the enormous size many of the updates have grown to be. Regarding that last point, many of the updates were retaining backwards compatibility with ancient installers, in some cases back to the HPS days! This required inclusion of a huge number of files, and in some cases an additional Batch file to reorganize everything into the new file structures. It was getting problematic on several points, not the least of which was some security software packages were blocking the batch files from running.

So, these fresh installs will resolve all of those problems in one fell swoop. You uninstall your existing copy of the game using the built in Windows "App Management" feature in the Control Panel. You then do a clean install of the game, and everything is in its proper place. 

We will be doing this for every game series we publish, in time - if all goes well during the course of 2024. Once the new "base line" is established we will begin to offer incremental updates again on the site. These will only include files changed since that new baseline for that series. With that said, you can ALWAYS do a clean install at any time, and the installer linked in your Store Account is the most recent version.

So, again, how do you get these new versions? 

You must go and login to your Store Account to download new full installers. 

Notes regarding Store Accounts.

1. If you go to login using one of the above links and it tells you "no account found" - don't worry! - just send us an email at the Help Desk and we will locate your records. It's just a matter of completing the account setup process.
2. When you login you will see all your orders listed there. Under each order number is the word (Downloads). If you click that it will take you to a page where you can do a new download of the game and it will also display your serial number. Again, each of the installers is fully up-to date with the latest patches already included.

 

If you don’t already own this title, what are you waiting for? You can buy it directly from the dedicated product page.

We hope you enjoy this week’s, Game of the Week. We thought it was important to showcase this title on the 110^th anniversary of the start of the first truly world war.  Like all WDS titles, there is a lot of game play included at a very attractive price.