After many false starts over the years, I’ve (Dave Mackey) managed to release Civil War Strategy 2.0. I already see a few minor items I need to correct – but nothing that inhibits gameplay, in fact I’ve played several games with my wife without issue!
The new version’s greatest improvement is that it now runs on Windows natively – there is no need to run it via a DOS emulator like DOSBox as has been necessary up until this time. There have been a number of other small changes but nothing too exciting. The goal for 2.0 was simply to get the game up and running on Windows. The source code has had numerous lines changed in the process to make it compatible with a Windows compiler (QB64).
If you find any bugs, please let me know. A helpful README.txt file is included with the game, please take a minute to read it over. It includes information on the third party libraries that were utilized in the creation of the game as well as a more detailed note on the changes between versions.
I wanted to get this game out as soon as possible because it has brought me so much enjoyment over many years and I know that it has done similarly for others. I wanted to see it experienced by new generations and moving it to Windows is a first step.
In the future I have a number of enhancements in mind, but I intend to keep the game quite true to Hutsell’s vision. Enhancements currently under consideration include:
- Fixing a few areas that have been broken since the old versions from what Mr. Hutsell’s intent as indicated in the game manual was.
- Making it so that armies that cannot be drilled do not appear in the list of armies to drill.
- Fixing the random events so that they display again.
- Improving the display for modern monitors.
It is my humble opinion that this game is still extremely playable after so many years…I hope that it will perhaps attract those who have enjoyed pixel based games in more recent years, as well as the immensely popular Minecraft.