Is Order of Battle: WW II Insanely Hard, Glitched, Buggy, or All Three?

[poetic_justice_]

Typically I enjoy RTS games, which appear to be the forte of Slitherine Ltd. Currently OOB: WWII is on sale for $10 US on PSN. Incidentally, while the base game is free for PC gamers, console players must purchase the base game in order to play. There is very little information for the base game in console form even on the publisher's website. Consequently, given how rare certain trophies, is this due to game mechanics or is something bugged or glitched in the game code itself?

 

https://www.slitherine.com/game/order-of-battle-world-war-ii

 

Fortunately, there are no DLC-related trophies. However, I wondered if any DLC units/maps/campaigns made the trophies more manageable, specifically the ultra-rare submarine trophy. Does anyone know?

 

This is what little I could find online for the console release, both Xbox and PS4. 

 

https://www.metacritic.com/game/playstation-4/order-of-battle-world-war-ii/critic-reviews There are no metacritic reviews.

 

 

This was the best YouTube review of the console version I could find, but it does not address trophy issues. The reviewer gives it a 7/10 overall but notes it is a niche game specifically for players who like turn-based strategy and World War II. The base game is in-depth and takes many hours to complete. It is historically accurate following major battles of WWII, utilizing 1,400 different unit types from the various nations fighting during World War II. He notes that battles can be lost if a player takes too long to complete a map, so farming damage/heals for trophies is of limited effectiveness. The graphics look dated since it was released on PC seven years ago. However OOB: WWII is well supported by its developer, The Aristocrats. While there is a learning curve, the reviewer states the tutorial campaign is well done and introduces new players to key mechanics. However, reading other authors' posts, certain mechanics are not addressed in the tutorial, and so I am including another mechanic video below.

 

 

This gamer offers a Supply and Efficiency guide:

 

https://www.thexboxhub.com/order-of-battle-world-war-ii-review/ The Xbox reviewer of this article thinks the console controls are clunky compared to PC. Realistically, it is quite difficult to port a mouse-and-keyboard set up to a controller, so this is not surprising. 

 

If anyone who has played the game can clarify whether trophies are rare due to difficulty, bugs, or glitches, that would be appreciated. Thank you.
 

Edited February 8, 2023 by poetic_justice_

[Piw3001]

No, the game itself isn't hard at all. Especially not, if your familiar with those kind of games. I've played the Panzer General series for ages back in the 90s, so I would rate OOB campaigns on medium difficulty 3/10. And actually you don't need to finish the campaigns to acquire platinum. Except "summa cum laude", where you have to finish the short tutorial campaign on medium difficulty without using a single unit, there are no trophies for succesfully completing the game. Basically for the plat you just need to level each available unit class to five stars, and this is where the grind begins. Five stars equal 10,000 XP. Usually you get about 50-200 XP per Battle, so your unit has to fight between 100-200 battles. They can fight once per Turn and a turn takes 10-15 minute on average. So doing the math, it will take you 20-30 hrs of gaming to level a unit to five stars. But this is actually only the truth for tanks and infantery units. For example anti-air and anti-tank units fight only occasionally (as there are simply almost no enemy tanks and aircrafts) in the first scenarios of the German "Blitzkrieg" campaign, which is besides the tutorial campaign the only one included in the base game. So despite finishing this campaign succesfully, which took me more than 50hrs, I was still missing most of the trophies. So I had to buy the next DLC "Panzerkrieg" to level up the other unit classes. Good thing: Some campaigns are connected, so you can take over your core units, they will loose 50% of XP, but that's still better than starting from the scratch again. I'm now after 150 hrs of gameplay at the end of the third German campaign, at least I have all land unit related trophies, but I'm still missing all for the maritime units, as there is no seafighting in the German campaigns. So I have to get another DLC. "Pacific" is recommended for the ship trophies.

 

So to sum up, why the Platinum is so rare:

 

1) It's absolutely impossible to get Platinum without buying at least 2-3 DLCs. I would recommend to get the two German DLCs "Panzerkrieg" & "Endsieg" and the US one "Pacific" which continues the tutorial campaign. But this is without a sale 3 x 15 Euros/Dollars/Pounds additionally. Personally I think, even the full price is justified (I bought them 50% off). The campaigns are fun, well designed, varied and huge. You can spend easily 50 hours and more on a single campaign. But most players are not willing to spend more on DLCs than the base game or don't buy DLCs at all. 

2) Strategy games always have low rarities, no matter if they are hard or not. Console gamers are simply no avid strategy gamers, who will put hundred of hours into an unknown platinum.

3) Even if you don't play the game the intended way and only go for the trophies, platinum will take at least 50 hrs and will be very tedious.

4) I would give the game itself 10/10, it's a great reboot of the Panzer General series, but the console port is 7/10 at most. Though it's a PS4 release it's unplayable on it. You definitely need a PS5 and even there AI turns often take 5-10 minutes on the larger scenarios. You'll gaze for minutes on the tv without anything happening. And you'll ask yourself, is the AI still thinking or did the game crashed again? And it crashes at least once per hour, though that's not so bad, as it usually does after autosave and on AI turns. The controls are okay, but some features of the PC version are missing. For example there's no tactical map, though it could be easily implemented via the touchpad as almost every PS4/5 game does, and the XP isn't displayed too. Had to figure out how it's calculated by playing it via Steam. And apparently the devs doesn't seem to care much about the console releases.

 

I will definitely keep playing it after Platinum (which I rarely do), but I'll do it on Steam. It's a great game, but if you don't care much about trophies and just want to enjoy a good game, do yourself a favor and play it on PC. 

[poetic_justice_]

On 2/11/2023 at 5:20 AM, Piw3001 said:

1) It's absolutely impossible to get Platinum without buying at least 2-3 DLCs. Personally I think, even the full price is justified (I bought them 50% off).

 

2) It's a great game, but do yourself a favor and play it on PC. 

 

Thank you for that answer. It explained a lot. This is a strange situation, where players have to purchase DLC to fully level troops from the base game. The crashing issues concern me, so I don't think I'll be getting this on PlayStation. Thank you for your help.