Comments on: In Praise Of: Covert Action.

By: Hentzau

Hentzau — Sat, 26 Jan 2013 11:02:41 +0000

You could definitely improve on it with modern technology, but Firaxis ain’t ever going to go back to Covert Action (Sid Meier in particular views it as something of a mistake) so it’s probably never going to happen. Even if they did we’d probably end up getting another Railroads.

(I tell you what, though, Covert Action suddenly strikes me as being almost ideal for a mobile/tablet game. All you need to do is shorten the minigames, make them actually good and add in a log that reminds you of where exactly the plot has gotten to so you can play it in 5-10 minute chunks.)

By: Hentzau

Hentzau — Sat, 26 Jan 2013 10:55:49 +0000

The details (like locations) are random but I’m fairly sure the people and plots are pre-set. However, I never saw a repeat despite playing 15-20 cases, and even if you know how the plot works it doesn’t help all that much because you can’t see what is going on *now*. There’s just enough obfuscation to prevent prior experience with the game being an advantage. For example, you might know that one guy is the safe cracker and that he’s going to be receiving the safe cracker kit, but you don’t know who he is, where he is, or where the kit is right now, and the only way to find those things out is by chasing down leads just as you would if you didn’t know.

By: Darren

Darren — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 21:44:10 +0000

Fascinating. It sounds like it’s ripe for a redo (a la Pirates!), though I can’t imagine the metagame being half as good in a modern iteration.

By: Josh

Josh — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 20:50:29 +0000

Sounds fascinating. How random was the generation of the background plots? If you played the game 100 times, to what extent would you have knowledge that could act as a spoiler, rather than simply having experience that would help in a general sense?