Klotzen Panzer Battles: World War 2 Strategy That re-writes The History Books

Independent developer Maxim Games today announced their debut title, Klotzen! Panzer Battles, a World War 2 turn based operational strategy game utilizing a hex based map system, is available now on PC via Steam with a 10% launch discount available until May 4th. 

Offering up countless outcomes to real life historical military campaigns through different scenarios, strategy game fans will have the opportunity to completely rewrite the history books. Players and budding strategists will be able to affect historical timelines and outcomes, from initiating the allied invasion of Normandy a year earlier in 1943, or even executing successful assaults on London or the USA. Klotzen! Panzer Battles offers up 26 historical, and close to 40 counterfactual scenarios, along with the random campaign-changing events. Players can also customize their own historical scenarios with the games built in editor.

Fans of games like Panzer Corps 2 or Hearts of Iron IV will be very at home with the offering here. Maxim Games has been working on Klotzen Panzer Battles for the last 4 years and has paid close attention to what is already offered by competitor WW2 strategy games.

Where Klotzen looks to shake things up is in three key areas

1. Improved AI, which makes the game more challenging/fun.
   
2. Improved air power set of mechanics/rules, that brings the whole gameplay a lot closer to reality, drastically increases importance of air power and gives the player numerous interesting strategies unique to Klotzen.
3. Branching campaign, with lots of what-if(alt-history) scenarios and events that increases replayability a lot.

With so much content and variation to how missions and campaigns can be played this should keep armchair generals pretty busy, the fact that this also contains counter-factual missions like invading the USA or bringing forward the Normandy invasion of France to 1943 are fun 'what if' scenarios to play out.

The game features some nicely detailed units too which presents the game with a decently presented look and feel. With air, land and sea power available for players to diversify their tactics, and more than enough campaigns and resources to utilize, this looks like it could be a very viable alternative to other WW2 hex based strategy games that have launched in recent years including the likes of Unity of Command.

Klotzen Panzer Battles is currently available on Steam for PC (no linux version to speak of and not current Steam Deck tested) but you can find out more about the game here.

The Ultimate WW2 Strategy Game for 2018

Armchair Generals of the world rejoice, there's a new WW2 hex based strategy game on the horizon which is looking to take the Panzer General crown, Klotzen! Panzer Battles was recently announced as a new addition to the popular hex based strategy gaming genre for PC and arrives during the summer of 2018.

Klotzen! Panzer Battles will offer a challenging turn based combat experience with a built in adaptive AI system that will look to capitalize on ways to attack the player when they least expect it. The game looks to provide a wide variety of historic engagements from WW2, all of which are based on historic engagements. Impressively Klotzen! Panzer Battles aims to provide players over 550+ unit types in the game  which are divided into 22 unit classes including infantry, Battleships, armored tanks, bombers, submarines, and fighter planes. Klotzens other unique approach to strategic combat will allow players to re-write military history by conducting historic military campaigns to play out a range of entirely new and unique outcomes such as the invasion of Normandy a whole year earlier in 1943 instead of in June 1944 or successfully invading England to take London or on the Eastern front to successfully steamroll the Russians in order to take Moscow.

Combat in the game takes into consideration things like supply lines which are crucial to moving units as well as being able to recycle knocked out units. Add to this the ability to coordinate multi task force initiatives with attacks from the air and sea by utilizing naval power parked off the coast. Attacking towns and supply lines from the air provide a tactical edge not seen before in other hex based games. The various Campaigns offered in the game can be fought over a variety of terrain options such as the brutal harsh realities of Winter combat on the snow covered Eastern front and at the other end of the scale, the unforgiving cooking pot of North Africa.

Map sizes in Klotzen! Panzer Battles look pretty substantial and vary from 200km to over 1000km in scale, (each hex represents 10km).

By far one of the biggest draws of the game is the way that developer Maxim Games has managed to visualize the game, typically most of the WW2 hex based games on the market cater for a 2D perspective, to do this Maxim Games have pre-renderded 60 images of each unit, by comparison Panzer Corps managed only 2, right side, left side. The 3D effect adds a nice bit of finesse to the game looking to make its mark in today's crowded strategy market.

Another nice aspect of Klotzen Panzer Battles is the fact that the outcomes of campaigns is different each time, there are two or three different outcomes to each map which increases the replayability aspect of the game. The role of Generals and Commanders all with various traits also shakes up the outcomes and ongoing tactical operations of the game which I think offers a nice spin.

From the looks of it Klotzen Panzer Battles has looked closely at what both Panzer General and Panzer Corps have already offered up to WW2 strategy gamers and decided to bring the WW2 hex based genre up to date with a really thought out strategy offering of its own. For any game looking to introduce something fresh into a heavily populated genre developers need to look at areas where rival games have made their mark and then improve upon that offering with their own unique ideas. The use of aircraft as an attacking asset on supply and towns is an interesting one, the visuals are fresh and really nicely detailed and the sheer number of units and proposed scenarios (60 scenarios at launch) make this a title to keep a close eye on for sure.

Panzer General has ruled the roost for many years and Panzer Corps DLC offerings have kept the lights on for a good while but this looks like it could really shake up the genre nicely.

Be sure to check out the Steam page for Klotzen Panzer Battles here