Classified France ’44 World War II can be considered as the largest war in human history to this day, with many forms of war from total war, proxy warfare, guerrilla warfare, to special forces sabotaging enemy rearguards… are all great materials for game makers so far.

During this war, one of the turning points in the western battlefield was the unprecedented landing on the Normandy coast in 1944, but in order to achieve that landing, numerous counterintelligence tactics with espionage forces and sabotage were conducted to distract and ‘clear’ the war Landing was a nice success.

Classified France ’44 is a turn-based group strategy game set in the battle behind such enemies, has just been released on the market, and is also the debut work of Studio Absolutely Games, a game studio oriented to develop games of this genre.

So is this debut game a successful debut for a ‘rookie’ like Absolutely Games?

Let’MarkGame find out through the following review, guys!

YOU’LL LOVE

Thoughtfulness in every way!

Although the current time is no longer the golden age of the strategy game genre, whether real-time strategy or turn-based, but Classified France ’44 It can still be considered a good example that a game studio can take care of its products with seriousness and care, to bring thoughtfulness in almost all aspects of the game.

Set in the Second World War, but this game reminds players of another ‘blockbuster’ with science fiction colors XCOM 2 in many ways.

The first impression of the writer for this game is the extremely smooth combination of popular turn-based strategy gameplay (such as King Arthur: Knight’s Tale) and added the stealth characteristic of real-time strategy games Shadows Tactics or Desperados, which few other turn-based strategy games can do.

You can crept closer to the target when undetected, hide behind obstacles or groves and finish off your opponent. Even if you are skillful enough, you can complete a large part of the levels using just this stealthy mode of action.

Of course, if compared closely to famous real-time stealth strategy games (like the line Commandos or Men of War) then Classified France ’44 Still proving somewhat lacking, but to be able to integrate both different gameplay styles together, it can be seen that the ‘quantification’ of values on each character is done extremely meticulously, with much more parameters than conventional turn-based strategy games, help characters get more flexible animation and A.I (artificial intelligence), and also create certain challenges for the game screen.

This also indirectly solves another problem of mere group strategy titles such as King Arthur: Knight’s Tale or Redemption Reapers Launched in the past few years: The boredom in the gameplay with too few different tactical solutions allows players to choose with each level.

Therefore, the replay value of the game becomes much higher, even for the writer himself, there is always a question floating in his mind after each level, which is ‘Can I do better?’

Going deeper into details, the gameplay of the game is not based on a simple sequential turn-based combat method according to classic moves – actions like Tactics Ogre: Reborn and some other turn-based strategy games, but relies mainly on the amount of action points (AP – Action Points) for character actions.

How to play this on Classified France ’44 Not new, but extremely suitable for small-sized levels like in the game. It forces players to ‘measure the jar of fish sauce and count the onion’ in each move to achieve the desired effect, especially for those who want to experience the game in a way … as stealthily as possible.

How to play this on Classified France ’44 Not new, but extremely suitable for small-sized levels like in the game

In addition, all kinds of weapons and actions with different AP point consumption and damage levels force players to have a very careful calculation, to be able to confront many different types of opponents in the context of strong enemies – we do not follow the plot of the game.

The characters are oriented to develop with different stats, skills and equipment after each battle to be able to have stronger fighting power, meeting more fierce battles in the later stages.

From there, your characters tend to ‘role-play’ more and surely you will regret, even reload the game screen, if you accidentally lose a certain ‘fighting’ character.

To add some excitement to the battle, the game team at Absolutely Games has also added a few cutscenes to ‘characterize’ the action in the style of the game Fire Emblem Fame brings excitement to players.

In terms of plot, although built somewhat not too ‘monumental’ like many other Normandy-themed games, it is this plot that creates a reasonable lead, connecting the levels together, as well as unlocking extremely perfect side levels.

You will feel an extremely harmonious combination of gameplay and storyline, thereby providing a smooth gameplay experience from the beginning to the end of the game, without ‘elephant’s tail and mouse’s head’ like some other turn-based strategy games whose plot is only ‘coloring’.

Graphics and sounds of Classified France ’44 It is somewhat impossible to keep up with modern ‘blockbuster’ games, but that does not mean that they do not perform their role well.

In fact, the graphics platform of the game is quite rough with models with low polygons and only average shadow and explosion effects, but that is why this game is quite light, working on even old PCs. With a game that focuses a lot on gameplay, what the graphics quality of the game shows is extremely good.

You will feel that the levels are designed with very specific aesthetic elements with a very characteristic atmosphere, bringing complete emotions to the game screen from the French countryside to the heavily equipped military bases of Nazi Germany…

The sound of the game is also well dubbed with a quality soundtrack composed by Ian Livingstone and performed by the Sofia Session Orchestra.

Ian Livingstone is one of the monuments of the British ‘game music’ scene, associated with countless big names in the game industry such as games Total War: Rome II, Total War: Warhammer III or The Quarry and also a guarantee of the quality of background music for many top games today.

Overall, with what has been shown, Classified France ’44 Bringing you an extremely well-groomed, attractive game, attracting players completely from beginning to end, especially for fans of the turn-based group strategy game genre.

YOU’LL HATE

A few small grains of grit!

It is a pretty perfect game, but Classified France ’44 It is also inevitable that some small ‘grains’ make players feel a little overwhelmed when playing.

For example, the cutscene action mechanism brings excitement to players, but in most tight areas, you will see nothing but … wall when the characters fight each other.

Besides, the way of ‘spawn’ (place) troops on the map is also easy to lead to other bad and funny scenes. As the player once encountered a case of being surrounded and shot down by the enemy who just appeared and shot down in ‘one note’ when he missed letting his character come quite close to the border of the game screen.

Not to mention that the user interface (UI) design is also a bit difficult to see in conditions of many objects, putting players using the mouse at risk of clicking in the wrong position.

Of course these issues are quite minor, without too much impact on your experience with Classified France ’44.

The way ‘spawn’ (placed) troops on the map is also easy to lead to other bad jokes