After playing through non-steam versions of Theatre of War 2 (Africa, Kursk, Battle for Caen) and Theatre of War 3: Korea I purchased the steam versions as well (during sale).
IMHO, this is not just another WW2 tactical game, it is the MOST REALISTIC simulator of company-level battles of 1943-1951 warfare!
Not easy to master for everyone who is used to "select'em all -> send'em all!" tactics! Every shell and armor interaction follows real physics laws, every unit moves are done in the real scale (time and distances), all battles are very intense and make you feel that this is how it was for real!
Every wargamer eager for WW2 realism must try at least!

Overall, ToW games shine in armor combat. Each crew member is individually modeled and they depend on each other. Each projectile is calculated individually, including it's path after penetrating the armor. Secondary fragmentation, shell stability, interior equipment damage, this kind of things (and in Kursk and later games you can turn on hit vectors display mode that visually shows you detailed info - hit angles, caliber, penetrations...).

Moreover, starting from Africa ALL vehicles have historically correct view ports, so if a MG gunner is killed noone will be using his view slits and tank will become blind from the right side. This is not all. A crew member can use only one view point at a time, so if a commander is busy assigning targets appearing from the front to a gunner, he may not notice targets from behind (and noone else in the tank can watch behind).

Well, you get the idea:)

This is a game for a niche audience, I find it understandable that many players don't like it, but if you like "realistic" RTS, spam saving, and micromanaging the smallest details, then this might be the game for you.

Similar to Sudden Strike or Blitzkrieg series, you don't have any base building nor recruit units, you play a mission with a set amount of troops and reinforcements. You can upgrade your units across missions and the infantry can capture weapons or vehicles.

The good

• Realistic units, nice, detailed models, a ton of them.
  
• Interesting missions, all based on history.
  
• Different shells and calibers, shell penetration, line of sight, ballistics, it's a detailed and complex simulation.
  
• "Morale" system, soldiers will panic and refuse to follow orders, both your troops and the enemy.
  
• Soldiers will take a few moments to follow orders, which adds to the realism of the delay in giving/receiving orders.
  
• Micro/macro strategy, you can micromanage a single soldier picking up a machine gun or manning a canon, or macro manage a bunch of tanks and infantry squads.
  
• Uncanny level of detail.
  
• Good sound FX.

And the bad

• Dated graphics.
  
• Some bugs (I experimented some crashes, nothing big)
  
• "Dumb AI", you have to micromanage everything to make it work (actually, some bad pathfinding...)
  
• Slower paced than other RTS.
  
• Controls can be a little awkward.
  
• Non impressive UI, voice acting and intermissions.
  
• 1C is known for providing subprime support to their older titles.
  
• No skirmish, limited multiplayer options.

One of the main complains in the reviews is that the game pauses every time a unit dies. This can be unchecked in the options menu, but I find it very immersive: every time a soldier dies I stand up in my chair, cry their name out loud and say "no, not Vladimir... not Vladimir, noooo" while I imagine a montage scene of boot camp and the aforementioned soldier bonding with the rest of the troops.

This game runs Ok in Linux via Proton.

Disclaimer: This is the same review I have for ToW 2 Africa (since it's basically the same game) and I played a lot more hours back in the day before I got it on Steam.

Great game!....Released in 2010 and still better than most CM today. A must to experience for people loving than genre!....It is realistic and historically accurate, what is there to dislike?....

A good game with really good and clear effort and love behind it, BUT there is one glaring, game breaking problem, and that is the extreme frame rate drop nearly half way through any mission. At times it can drop to about 5 frames a second. It has nothing to do with machine as I run far more demanding games, but rather the poor coding.

Sadly, I cannot recommend this game, but if the concept interests you try out Graviteam Tactics Operation Star. With the uniform mod, that game is not only gorgeous and historically accurate to the T graphics wise, but also the best strategy game on the market.

This series has attracted my attention for years and today I give Kursk 1943 a try. The outcome is very disappointing. Cumbersome control (esp. mouse rotation) + confused minimap movement + can't see either don't know who shoots you or you shoot who + bad AI (I ordered 3 Soviet soldiers to approach a German infantry then attack him, it turned out the 3 arrives at the German soldier's side and just stands there, the German doens't repond to the 3 either). Designing a RTS game in 3D is a disaster. The only pro is the beautiful landscape, the blue sky and delicate tanks and soldiers models, which give you a fresh vision of what the battlefield of 1943 looks like (our memory were mostly black and white). I will not buy any more games or DLC of this series. What a pity.

Theatre of War 2: Kursk 1943 is the eastern front exclusive, more refined, "other half" of Theatre of War 2 set during the fighting on the Kursk salient shortly after Stalingrad; Players take on the role of either a Red Army commander wishing to thwart Operation Citadel and push towards Berlin or a loyal Wehrmact Panzer Ace hoping to see victory for Germany in light of the loss at Stalingrad and Baku. Compared to Africa, Kursk's two campaigns are longer than any campaign in A:1943 (at 10 missions each) and more fleshed out from simply attacking, holding, or defending objectives with the use of event triggers to signal retreats, purposeful use of ambushing, the addition of crew morale/cohesion, and tank defenses becoming imperative to survival. Kursk clarifies the foundation put down by A:1943 and improves upon it creating an addictive wargame simulation.

Kursk cuts the experimentation of Africa and places it in a more concise package: combat is still asymmetrical to an end, the Wehrmact and Red Army have many tanks that can go toe to toe with each other making tank battles(honestly a series highlight) even more fluid, unpredictable and interesting to watch compared to the deserts of Tunisia, the use of combat support is more even handed here between both sides and a timer is introduced meaning players can simply have a cooldown for getting more airstrikes, mortars, howitzer strikes, or reinforcements rather than a limited cap defined from the beginning of a mission.

The game does away with the "tactical pause" mechanic unless player desired, features blood and gorey elements, and ups the immersion, this game really sounds like a battlefield on the Eastern Front, any silence is deafening and I still remember the Red army Missions to this day.

The Red Army and Wehrmacht feature huge arsenals with some returning vehicles from ToW2(M3 Stuarts, Shermans, and Grants in Soviet flavor) and new ones (including a new roster of USSR vehicles like the T-34/72 and infantry like the NKVD, and late war Werhmacht tanks like the Panther and Jagdtiger). With the addition of units which can effect morale on a sector wide scale unlike anything seen before in the franchise, landmines, flamethrowers and and barbed wire for area control; Kursk still pushes the envelope while acknowledging what Africa got right and wrong.


Battle for Caen seems to largely acknowledge this as well by taking another crack at the Western Allies with a fresh prospective: set during the Normandy Landings of 1944, BfC focuses on British vs Waffen-SS forces around Operation Epsom, the UK no longer relies on American tanks, equipment, or Artillery and have a matured arsenal (featuring the M10 Wolverine, Achilles, Churchill/AA, 17-pdr, and many more, over 40 additional units for both sides), that create a pronounced difference in tactics without sacrificing the playability or viability of either faction and missions are presented in a cut and dry fashion with clearly defined objectives. Eight maps set in and around Normandy, France are available in multiplayer with this DLC and they are some that I have great memories with.


Players are given more flexibility when building their divisions and reinforcements where they have full freedom to decide what is given at the cost of the RPG-lite level mechanics from Africa (for infantry and crews) being curbed. This creates less situations of tankers firing over and over at a target with unbreakable morale and more realistic scenarios of tankers leaving a tank under sufficient bombardment and immobile. Combat in this game is more fluid than it's been previously in the series and it really shines in this game, carefully plan your attacks and watch as your units execute the enemy with extreme prejudice for the motherland or fatherland. This game is faster than predecessors but still slow, yet with the focus of this game compared to the somewhat lack of focus seen in Africa makes it a pleasure to play; I largely played this game when it wasn't on steam and therefore my time with it compared to other ToW will seem less so but that's anything but the case.

游戏更多的的细节模拟还原，较少的娱乐性。模型，贴图，损毁效果非常棒，比钢铁之师2的模型细节高不少。不愧我童年1c大哥。小众但不乏我们的热爱。玩法拿苏军第二关举例，德军南面装甲进攻，苏军守着三个阵地，道路前沿，后方村庄，东边山头。主力集中山头，德军有豹豹和IV猛攻，德军两种选择，沿着道路进攻或者向山谷冲锋直到拿下山头阵地。苏军37mm炮布置在前沿，第三道防线有zis3支援，你甚至还有全套的美系英式装备（斯图亚特，m3李，以后玛蒂尔达瓦伦丁丘吉尔比你t34多了去）。如果德军冲破防线，苏军将侧面暴露。开始时候苏军工事已经布置好了，掩体和战壕都是准备好的，不需要变动。开始后就旁边欣赏战斗过程就行了，这也是游戏玩法之一。德军坦克虽然强大，但履带断了，基本就失去进攻能力了。游戏到后期，关卡设计德军会从侧面包抄，增加了游戏趣味性。游戏的真实在于步兵和载具的反应能力，并不像正常rts点哪里就到哪里，有一段延迟，而且模型损毁，火炮散布，炮击音效非常真实。游戏中喀秋莎散布就相对有更好体验。游戏中还提供战术数据，士兵装备信息等参数。但参考意义较多，给玩家初步判断。但玩法还是战场布置好了，之后只要欣赏就行了。有坦克增援就稍微手操一下，火炮支援点一下，剩余步兵和炮兵基本不用动了。鼠标移动，欣赏整个战场就行了。总体游戏画质不错，记得关闭hdr，修改下分辨率和相机视角就行了，别的基本，猴子都会操作。

Theatre of War 2 is not for everyone. You either like it or you don't, as the game is more focused for young adults and above. It is one of those games that you have to read the manual before you play, but it is very rewarding once you understand the mechanics as it has a moral system as well as realistic line of sight and armor penetration.

It is an excellent game, but only for those who are looking for this particular type of RTS. The only annoying aspect is the pausing when a unit dies, but that can be remedied by going to the steam configuration option of the game before you start, as the option is not available in the main menu of the game to disable it.

Pros:

>Realistic gameplay in terms of map size, unit damage, unit movement, etc.
>All units are very detailed & indepth in terms of weapons,
selecting ammunition type, unit size ratio, etc.

Cons:

>Unfriendly user interface.
>Game can suffer from some technical problems; random crashing.
>Sometimes non responsive user input; giving units orders, actions, etc.
>Combat can be long & drawn out.
>Missions objectives can be buggy at times.
>Lacking in the sound aspect, particularly music as the game lacks sound tracks of its own.

Not totally a bad game however from being released in 2010 it seem to be very behind for its time.
As many of the cons are normally associated to games of the past.
I cannot recommend this game.

Overall I give it a 4.5/10