I remember when I was younger, my family loved to play board games (to be honest, we still do).  Monopoly, Scrabble, Chinese Checkers, it didn’t matter.  We loved them all.  The favorite, however, hidden on the top shelf of the closet, was Stratego.  We were always told that we were too young to play, so it became a special treat when an adult would pull it out down from the shelf and play with us.  In a nutshell, it is the board game version of Capture the Flag.  Although there must be dozens of electronic versions of Stratego available, I have never enjoyed playing any of them.  None of them could compare to my memories of that torn cardboard box, with masking tape covering the letters, so it looked like the game was called "ATEGO".  So, it was with a little trepidation that I installed Inscenic’s Napoleonix, a Stratego-based wargame. 

Installation and Registration:  Download the program, and install it via ActiveSync.  Inscenic does a nice job with the trial version, giving you full access to easy mode.  In the trial version, however, you cannot access the more difficult modes of play.  Additionally, the computer will always start from the same opening position, and you cannot save your game.  This is more than enough, however, to give the game a thorough evaluation.  Register the game to unlock all of these advanced features.

The Story: The game is set in 19th century France, which is led by Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte striving toward political and economic domination of all of Europe.  Between 1799 and 1815, France waged war with Great Britain, Austria, Russia, and many other European and West Asian countries. 

You can play as Napoleon and lead the French armies to victory; or as Mikhail Kutuzov, and lead the Russian Army to defeat the French and change the tide of history. 

Gameplay and Rules: This is a turn based strategy game.  At the beginning of the game, you are presented with the all of the pieces necessary to populate your army (depending upon the map you select, you will be afforded different pieces.)

You must arrange your pieces on your side of the board in a strategic  manner in order to ensure that you can offensively attack your opponent while defensively protecting your territory and flag.  Each piece is worth a value from 1-9.  A general is worth (1) while a scout is worth (9).  When two pieces battle, the more powerful piece (the one with the lowest number) will win the square and kill the opponent’s piece. 

There are, however, several special pieces, which have no values and defy the rules of the conventional battle: Spy, Braves, and Mines.  Spies can defeat generals and marshals, but are otherwise very weak.  A brave can defeat any other piece in a single act of courage, but only if they attack first.  Either way, they will also be killed in the process.  Mines will explode anytime they contact another piece, with the exception of miners who can disable them.

The game proceeds with each player taking turns moving a single piece one square in any direction (the exception to this are scouts which can be set to move multiple squares in a single turn).  You will notice that while you can see the arrangement of your entire army, the layout of your opponent’s army remains hidden.  You can see where his pieces are located, but not each piece’s value.  Anytime you do battle with one of your opponent’s pieces, you will learn the identity of that piece (a battle occurs when two opposing pieces land on the same square at the same time.)

This is where the strategy comes into play.  Is it better to arrange your army with the lower numbered pieces forward so that they can move into enemy territory and, like pawns in a chess game, get obliterated while revealing your enemy’s position?  Or is the better strategy to put your higher ranking pieces forward and wipe out as much of your opponent’s army as you can?  Whichever strategy you choose, remember your opponent will also be devising a strategy of his own and is dedicated to wiping your army off of the map.

One problem I had is that there is no way of marking which of your pieces’ identities your opponent has learned.  At times during the battle, I found that it would have been helpful to know whether my opponent knew the piece chasing his Colonel was only a Lieutenant, and there should be an icon or marker allowing you to keep track of this simple fact. 

Winning The Game: There are several ways to win the battle and end the game.  The most common is to capture your opponent’s flag by landing on it (in some modes, you may also be required to carry it back beyond your farthest line at the edge of the game board).  Remember, however, each side has a real flag and a fake flag.  If you capture the fake flag then you will not win the game.

Additionally, the game will end if one army is completely obliterated.  This can occur by defeating all of that army’s troops, or by selecting the surrender option.  Finally, if, after a predetermined number of rounds, no battles have occurred, the game will end and points will be tallied based upon the remaining pieces on the board.

Modes: You can play against the computer opponent, which is my favorite way to play.  You can also play against a live opponent either with hotseat mode (two players on the same device) or over a network or Internet connection.  I found that this was not an ideal game for hotseat mode.  The whole premise is based upon your position remaining unknown to your opponent.  Hotseat mode makes it too easy to cheat (even accidentally) by sneaking a peak at the layout of your opponent’s army. 

Graphics: Your armies are beautifully drawn with three dimensional graphics.  One thing that really impressed me was that the two armies look different, not just different colors, so a corporal for the Russians, for example, and a corporal for the French are completely different pieces.

The board itself consists of two types of squares: field squares, onto which any piece may be moved; and lake squares which are completely impassable.

The board, which is displayed diagonally across the screen, does not fit on a single screen.  Instead, it constantly scrolls to center on the piece which is being moved.  I found this constant scrolling to be disconcerting, and wish the board could be resized to fit on a single screen.

Version 1.1, which was released in the middle of writing this review, also added a second map (Waterloo) which is based on the classic rules of Stratego.  I love the option of playing on more than one map layout, and hope Inscenic would provide additional maps or expansion packs which could be downloaded and added to the game. 

Views: The standard view displays the armies in high resolution VGA graphics (or QVGA depending upon your device).  While this is stunning to look at, it can be confusing until you learn the values of each piece.  For this reason, Inscenic has provided a map mode.  Just select the checkerboard option and your view of the screen will be replaced with a two dimensional map of the board, showing the layout of each piece by value.  You can continue to play in this map mode as long as you like.

My preference, however, was to continue playing in the three-dimensional view, but turn on a smaller version of the map mode, which displays in the upper corner of the screen.  By doing this, I can continue enjoying the exceptionally drawn graphics, while also being sure I am moving the correct piece.

Customization: Many of the features of this game are fully customizable.  First, you can determine whether you want to play as the French or Russians.  Nonetheless, I hope that future versions will add additional armies, in order to broaden the scope of this game.  Likewise, you can also select which map to use (each of the two maps have slightly different rules). 

Additionally, from the main screen, you can select three options to customize the rules.   If "Bring Flag" is selected, then you must capture the flag and bring it back beyond your lines, as described above.  Uncheck this box, however, and simply finding the flag will automatically end the game.  You can also determine the strength of your spies and scouts.  Unchecking slow scouts allows them to move multiple squares in a single move.

Saving: I frequently mention that the ability to save a game is a must for any game I play.  I typically enjoy Pocket PC games while riding the train, which means I must stop playing, regardless of my position in the game.  If I cannot save the game, and have to start from the beginning every time, then I will not last very long with the game.

Inscenic did not add an option to save the multiple games, which would have been nice.  It does, however, automatically save your game upon exit.  Simply tap "continue" to pick up right where you left off.  I appreciated this option as I never would have had the time to complete a single game without it.

Conclusion: I have not played a lot of Stratego-based games on my Pocket PC, mainly because I could never find one I liked.  That has now changed.  With its rich and stunning graphics, and exciting gameplay, I have thoroughly enjoyed leading the Russian army in battle after battle against Napoleon and his French battalions.  Sometimes, I even win a game.  This is the best Stratego-based game (or if you lived in a house like mine growing up, ATEGO-based game) I have ever played, and I am looking forward to additional updates from Inscenic which will hopefully include a growing library of maps and armies for a more global assault.

Vital Statistics:

Name: Napoleonix

Version: 1.1

Platform: WM 2003 SE

Also Available: WM5, Palm, Symbian, Windows

Developer: Inscenic

Available From:  Inscenic          

Price:  $9.95

Technorati Tags: Napoleonix – Inscenic – Stratego – Just Another Mobile Monday

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