So I finally Finished return to Palmyra

[Warnoise]

Well I finally played and finished this game on Realistic mode. Here are my thoughts about the game.

As a person who finished and enjoyed a lot the first Syrian Warfare I didn't have the same feeling after finishing this game. Maybe the hype was the cause of this. I was so excited when i read about the new stuff in the devs interviews. Some of them are not present in the game (which is a fatal mistake because that will decrease player's trust for the dev) and some of them are completely different from how they were announced.

Here are the things that disappointed me the most in this DLC:

-Allies: The devs said in the interview that we will play a support role helping the main SAA throughout almost the whole game. And that the allies will not be useless. Unfortunately that is totally different in the game. Ally presence is barely felt throughout the whole game. They are either useless, or practically non present (or maybe a bunch of little squads stationed here and there)

-Missions: Other than missions 1 and 2 (those are excellent missions) , the 3 remaining missions are not well designed and are pretty repetitive (mission 3 and 5 are almost the same). Mission 4 is too easy and so monotonous that I was just watch the screen waiting for it to finish. Mission 5 is a mess. Mission 5 is basically everything criticized in the first Syrian Warfare condensed in 1 mission. Annoying infinite enemy spawn right next to your positions, "protection" missions not giving you the time to set up your defenses, and the huge wave of enemies that just amass huge numbers of the same units to overwhelm you with sheer numbers (273 vehicles killed in the last mission). Mind you i don't mind the numbers, just make more diversified other than the same vehicles infinitely respawning in the same place. I am glad to hear the devs are reworking it because it is a boring mess that doesn't feel like a final mission at all.

-Contents: Well in here I am just slightly disappointed because the devs have promised something that is'nt present in the game: Drones. The devs clearly talked about it, but they didn't include for god knows why. I understand there are circumstances that prevented them for doing so, but they must let us know. This can be called false advertisement and that can literally destroy any dev team no matter how good the game they release. Please devs, don't make it harder for yourselves any further.

I think the devs should listen closer to players feedback because that is the best way to correctly improve the game imo.

Other than that, i think the DLC is not bad overall, the AI is a lo more interesting sometimes pulling off some great moves, the new vehicles and units are great and offer some much needed variety in the game, the first 2 missions are very fun and challenging and the English voice acting is absolutely superb (arabic is not bad too (T-90 is amazing) but infantry voices in general need more realism/more "drama" in it because they talk like a bunch of drugged up hippies)

I personally would give it a 6/10

[rgreat]

Mostly agree.

Missions 1 and 2 are very good. Mission 3 is a bit plain, but still ok.

But 4 and 5 are not so good. Like there was lack of time or effort in developing them.

[Benzo-Kazooie]

Agree on the last 2 missions being very repative, especially mission 5. Felt like they got rushed or bored and decided to just make it a simple "search and destroy" mission

[Zryachiy]

Grats, mate!
I agree with you on the last 2 missions. The last mission was supposed to be the turning point and it lacks the atmosphere of motivation....no instrumental version of "Shut up your mouth!" when having the final push.

Mission 3 was somehow buggy too.

[Warnoise]

Originally posted by Raiden Raiden 0 (雷電雷電):

Grats, mate!
I agree with you on the last 2 missions. The last mission was supposed to be the turning point and it lacks the atmosphere of motivation....no instrumental version of "Shut up your mouth!" when having the final push.

Mission 3 was somehow buggy too.

In the last mission 5 unfortunately there is nothing to push. Adding "Shut up your mouth" might have made the mission more exciting, but 90% of the mission is basically sitting watching the enemy throw billions of tanks and praying the god a stray rocket won't hit your Supply truck (happened to me in mission 5). "the final" push is basically killing a bunch of weak infantry gathered together in the middle of houses (1 grad salvo killed half of them) so it was meh.

Historically, SAA was supposed to retake the city and Tigers are only the vanguard who pierce through enemy defences, the last push should be you (Tigers) and your allies (SAA) pushing together towards a heavily defended city. Not Tigers only doing all the job pushing against a bunch mindless jihadi standing there waiting to be slaughtered.

I was supposed to get a helicopter in mission 5 but i didn't get one, I am sure the Gazelle was alive when i finished the mission 4 (i lost only 2 soldiers and 1 vehicle in that mission) so i don't know why I didn't receive.

PS: The voice acting of the Jihadi commander is AMAZING! The voice acting is the biggest highlight of the DLC imo.

[Zryachiy]

Originally posted by Warnoise:

In the last mission 5 unfortunately there is nothing to push. Adding "Shut up your mouth" might have made the mission more exciting, but 90% of the mission is basically sitting watching the enemy throw billions of tanks and praying the god a stray rocket won't hit your Supply truck (happened to me in mission 5). "the final" push is basically killing a bunch of weak infantry gathered together in the middle of houses (1 grad salvo killed half of them) so it was meh.

Historically, SAA was supposed to retake the city and Tigers are only the vanguard who pierce through enemy defences, the last push should be you (Tigers) and your allies (SAA) pushing together towards a heavily defended city. Not Tigers only doing all the job pushing against a bunch mindless jihadi standing there waiting to be slaughtered.

I was supposed to get a helicopter in mission 5 but i didn't get one, I am sure the Gazelle was alive when i finished the mission 4 (i lost only 2 soldiers and 1 vehicle in that mission) so i don't know why I didn't receive.

PS: The voice acting of the Jihadi commander is AMAZING! The voice acting is the biggest highlight of the DLC imo.

It's indeed quite redundant. I just stationed my ATGM squads, Tigers and two T90s at the defense perimeter since the whole enemy division consists of weak tanks and technicals that can't even penetrate a T-90, and did some micromanagement with ATGMs (I disable the rest to use ATGMs and let only one squad use it to conserve ammo...or I just disabled the whole ATGM and let my two T90s hit the spotlight of killing vehicles like a hot knife through butter)
while I send two assault squads, one Tiger squad, a T-72AV and one Shilka (which I got from Mission 2) to take the two points in the city, since they are excellent in storming buildings and there will be hundreds of infantry holed up which my Shilka cleaned 90% of the area...and there are also like 3-6 tanks which a T-72AV has no problem dealing with these, since majority of the tanks are T-55s and T-62Ms both reinforced and not. So far, I encountered just one enemy ATGM squad holed up in the northwestern point which I picked off with an RSO air controller's anti-building bomb strike, so I don't have to worry about any of my vehicles getting suddenly blown up by a hidden ATGM from beyond-visual range.
I also had my raiding party of Technicals (RCLRs, ATGMs), BTRs, Tigrs, and Humvees to pick off any small groups coming from the southern parts of the airport which will try to attack our rear and retake the points they've lost. I wouldn't even have to worry about tanks either since turrets are too slow to move and even a paper-armored Hilux with RCLR can outrun it....and also quickly pick off 2 enemy MLRS technicals from the north early in the game. By any chance, I managed to pick off both the driver and the crew without setting it on fire and had a quick grab of it....a slight help against enemy infantry.

I just used the Grad in bombarding targets at the city to soften the area a bit before I send my small CQB specialists, a T-72AV and a Shilka, and Gvozdikas bombarding the northern point.
I didn't even got the Gazelle either...most likely everyone's problem too.

I was expecting for a Mi-24 or a Mi-28 since I missed those good beasts, and since the mission is heavily based on vehicles, so they come quite in handy. Also, we didn't had the chance to use Ka-52 Alligators to control....only just allies to control it and give fixed support. But if we had full control on these helicopters, we have limitless ways of devising effective strategies.

They also didn't add any snackbar trucks or snackbar tanks in the mission, since irl, they had heavy use of suicide bombers. Snackbar tanks are a great addition to the game, but in my disappointment, I didn't find even one in the last mission which adds up to the challenge.

[Warnoise]

Originally posted by Raiden Raiden 0 (雷電雷電):

Originally posted by Warnoise:

In the last mission 5 unfortunately there is nothing to push. Adding "Shut up your mouth" might have made the mission more exciting, but 90% of the mission is basically sitting watching the enemy throw billions of tanks and praying the god a stray rocket won't hit your Supply truck (happened to me in mission 5). "the final" push is basically killing a bunch of weak infantry gathered together in the middle of houses (1 grad salvo killed half of them) so it was meh.

Historically, SAA was supposed to retake the city and Tigers are only the vanguard who pierce through enemy defences, the last push should be you (Tigers) and your allies (SAA) pushing together towards a heavily defended city. Not Tigers only doing all the job pushing against a bunch mindless jihadi standing there waiting to be slaughtered.

I was supposed to get a helicopter in mission 5 but i didn't get one, I am sure the Gazelle was alive when i finished the mission 4 (i lost only 2 soldiers and 1 vehicle in that mission) so i don't know why I didn't receive.

PS: The voice acting of the Jihadi commander is AMAZING! The voice acting is the biggest highlight of the DLC imo.

It's indeed quite redundant. I just stationed my ATGM squads, Tigers and two T90s at the defense perimeter since the whole enemy division consists of weak tanks and technicals that can't even penetrate a T-90, and did some micromanagement with ATGMs (I disable the rest to use ATGMs and let only one squad use it to conserve ammo...or I just disabled the whole ATGM and let my two T90s hit the spotlight of killing vehicles like a hot knife through butter)
while I send two assault squads, one Tiger squad, a T-72AV and one Shilka (which I got from Mission 2) to take the two points in the city, since they are excellent in storming buildings and there will be hundreds of infantry holed up which my Shilka cleaned 90% of the area...and there are also like 3-6 tanks which a T-72AV has no problem dealing with these, since majority of the tanks are T-55s and T-62Ms both reinforced and not. So far, I encountered just one enemy ATGM squad holed up in the northwestern point which I picked off with an RSO air controller's anti-building bomb strike, so I don't have to worry about any of my vehicles getting suddenly blown up by a hidden ATGM from beyond-visual range.
I also had my raiding party of Technicals (RCLRs, ATGMs), BTRs, Tigrs, and Humvees to pick off any small groups coming from the southern parts of the airport which will try to attack our rear and retake the points they've lost. I wouldn't even have to worry about tanks either since turrets are too slow to move and even a paper-armored Hilux with RCLR can outrun it....and also quickly pick off 2 enemy MLRS technicals from the north early in the game. By any chance, I managed to pick off both the driver and the crew without setting it on fire and had a quick grab of it....a slight help against enemy infantry.

I just used the Grad in bombarding targets at the city to soften the area a bit before I send my small CQB specialists, a T-72AV and a Shilka, and Gvozdikas bombarding the northern point.
I didn't even got the Gazelle either...most likely everyone's problem too.

I was expecting for a Mi-24 or a Mi-28 since I missed those good beasts, and since the mission is heavily based on vehicles, so they come quite in handy. Also, we didn't had the chance to use Ka-52 Alligators to control....only just allies to control it and give fixed support. But if we had full control on these helicopters, we have limitless ways of devising effective strategies.

They also didn't add any snackbar trucks or snackbar tanks in the mission, since irl, they had heavy use of suicide bombers. Snackbar tanks are a great addition to the game, but in my disappointment, I didn't find even one in the last mission which adds up to the challenge.

Ididn't bother with the MLRS because they eat a lot of ammo. I however had about 10-12 tanks that i captured from the enemies. So i just steamrolled everything with the tanks.

Yeah i am also disappointed we didn't get to control the alligator. Yeah there is a huge lack of VBIED. Considering Vbieds are ISIS speciality, they should at fast civilian cars as VBIED too imo since they are very quick and hard to hit with heavy weapons. Also add more ATGM infantry for the enemy because now once you managed to amass vehicles you practically won.

Add more ATGM infantry, ATGM technicals, more RCLR technicals and SPG infantry to punish vehicles and make having infantry more important. Mission 1 was the best because the enemy had so many types of infantry it was amazing, vehicles couldn't survive a second without proper infantry support.

I miss the thrill ihad in mission 1 and 2(and 4 which is the best mission in the whole series) in the first game when i felt the pressure of a VBIED slipping through buildings to reach my garrisoned infantry while they were busy fighting other enemies.

I wonder are they going to rework the missions.

[Murikov]

I absolutely agree with your thoughts, missions 4 and 5 felt quite bland in hindsight. It's a shame about the missing drones too. They would be super practical, even if it only was a small reconaissance quadcopter with limited use.

By the way, mission 4 reminded me very much of C&C General's 3rd mission of the US campaign:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdbKYwhZwKs
Kinda similar map design and mission objective.

[Benzo-Kazooie]

Originally posted by Murikov:

I absolutely agree with your thoughts, missions 4 and 5 felt quite bland in hindsight. It's a shame about the missing drones too. They would be super practical, even if it only was a small reconaissance quadcopter with limited use.

By the way, mission 4 reminded me very much of C&C General's 3rd mission of the US campaign:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdbKYwhZwKs
Kinda similar map design and mission objective.

Man that game was amazing! Still holds up today, especially with Zero Hour DLC. All three sides had great music

[Zryachiy]

Originally posted by Murikov:

I absolutely agree with your thoughts, missions 4 and 5 felt quite bland in hindsight. It's a shame about the missing drones too. They would be super practical, even if it only was a small reconaissance quadcopter with limited use.

By the way, mission 4 reminded me very much of C&C General's 3rd mission of the US campaign:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdbKYwhZwKs
Kinda similar map design and mission objective.

Also reminds me of China's Mission 4 in Generals vanilla too.

I remembered mishearing a GLA Terrorist's quote when selected:
"I WILL DIE FOR OUR CLOTHES!"

[HarryB^]

How about the skirmish? Did you like the skirmish?

[Benzo-Kazooie]

Originally posted by HarryB^:

How about the skirmish? Did you like the skirmish?

no skirmish yet

[Warnoise]

Originally posted by Swiggity Swooty:

Originally posted by HarryB^:

How about the skirmish? Did you like the skirmish?

no skirmish yet

If the devs want to take it to the next level, they absolutely need to add skirmish/mod support. That is the only solution for sales boost. Something is telling me they might add that with the Aleppo DLC though

[HarryB^]

Would love to have 246 men storm a town or village in skirmish.

[Benzo-Kazooie]

Originally posted by Warnoise:

Originally posted by Swiggity Swooty:

no skirmish yet

If the devs want to take it to the next level, they absolutely need to add skirmish/mod support. That is the only solution for sales boost. Something is telling me they might add that with the Aleppo DLC though

they would have to since although i enjoyed this DLC, i don't want to pay another $16 for 5 missions when i could buy another game for that price....

[ColonelForbin]

I agree with everything you said, especially considering there was a few delays in the release...
A big point of this game is needing sales to continue building on it with expansions, after such a strong performance with the base game, this expansion is not gonna cut it if they are looking to expand it even more...
there is a countless number of small companies out there trying to make it on the steam marketplace, they have to make a good product or this game will be dead in the water, its that simple, if they make a good product people will buy it.