An oddly stupid game – Pike and Shot Review

It is puzzling why a company would program such great historical detail in a game and then ignore all those same rules when you play. Cannons miss stationary Tercios 60% of the time (you will get tired of shooting only to see zeros while computer artillery hits your cavalry as they gallop), charging Tercios can get disrupted by cavalry (dealing with cavalry was one of the reasons they were created and were the charging unit after all), and melee battle results are little better than a coin toss. I deleted the game when 200 detached musketeers charged and disrupted my experienced 2000 strong Tercio. The battle results in this game are so ridiculous and childlike it isn't even possible to get frustrated. It's just stupid really. Update. I downloaded the game a second time just to see if I had been missing something. The mechanics seem to favor the computer (why can't I shoot a Tercio from behind while it's engaged in melee?) but the scenario designers themselves are the biggest problem. You are outnumbered in almost every battle, often with inferior quality troops, and most combat resolves into "AI unit does 30 damage , your unit does 22". There is the game in a nutshell; you are outnumbered by many thousands (even playing a quick skirmish) and your troops will often just exchange 30 people for 22 (that is pretty demoralizing math). It is so odd for a company to create such a one sided game (why make people play on the losing side of historical battles so often?) but I guess that is what enables it to burn so many hours of a person's time. I want to like the game as a fan of military history, and that period of time, but can not understand why the battles were setup/chosen the way they were (an attempt to make them maddeningly difficult/addictive?). The battle setups and selections turn what could have been a promising game into a string of depressing engagements (that you will often fight outnumbered and with poorly trained troops).
Review by Oldgamer38 on Pike and Shot.