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| Fully Refitted Salvo! 1.5 Sets Sails Chart a course for high seas mayhem with Salvo! 1.5, the refitted and upgunned version of last year's Salvo!, the fighting sail game for both Windows and Mac. The 1.5 Upgrade was originally released as a patch, allowing owners of the original Salvo! to add a treasure chest's worth of enhancements and features to the game. This is a new printing of Salvo!, incorporating the 1.5 Upgrade, so that the latest players will not have to download the patch. If you already own Salvo! and have applied the 1.5 Upgrade, there is no need for this version. This is NOT a new version, Gold version, et cetera. So, if you already play the Salvo! 1.5 version read no further. For those of you who are new though, continue onwards. What is Salvo! 1.5? It's the closest one can get to Horatio Hornblower's world without experiencing press gangs, or rum, sodomy, and the lash. Well, we suppose you could add rum to the experience if you wished, but unless you run some weird fetish website where people pay to watch gamers play games and get whipped with a cat o' nine tails, the rest is probably best left to the annals of the Royal Navy. Salvo! 1.5 is a strategy title for both Windows and Macs (with the ability to share files between both systems) that transports players to the age of fighting sail between the 17th and 19th centuries. Fight under the banners of England, the Netherlands, France, Spain, and the newly born United States, or raise the black flag of anarchy as a Barbary or Caribbean pirate. All the major vessels of the era are included, with ships ranging from bombards to ships of the line. Players can command in battle single ships up to armadas, and thanks to the Salvo! 1.5's highly intuitive control scheme, whole groups of ships are as easy to navigate as individual vessels thanks to Salvo! 1.5's squadron controls. An "Action Marker" system controls individual ships, but regardless of how many ships you're running it's easy to move, grapple, volley, board, and more with just a handful of mouse clicks (or use of the extensive hot key list). Salvo! 1.5 features a broad selection of branching campaigns, along with the ability to create your own battles using the Battle Generator. The Battle Generator allows the virtual admiral quite a bit of latitude in designing a scenario, from automatically creating a battle with a few clicks, to allowing precise control over practically every aspect of a scenario. So whether you just want to see how well a couple of British and French frigates would fare against each other, or you want to handcraft the battle of Cape Vincent, your options are only limited to your ambitions. Salvo! 1.5 also allows full editing of the ship database. This customization allows both the modification of existing ships that come with the game to the inclusion of brand new vessels. Each vessel is made up of a ship name, appearance, rigging details, Captain, country, handling, quality, morale, size, number of guns, number of crew, and number of marines, giving gamers a wide variety of editing options. From laying down fantasy ships that never saw the light of day, to rearming your favorite historical vessel, almost anything is possible. What's a wargame without chrome? A wargame from the sixties usually. Salvo! 1.5 shines with a nice assortment of Age of Sail wargamey goodness, like fire ships, shore batteries, boarding actions, and more. Land and shallow water play a role in Salvo! 1.5, and players can refit and upgrade ships between campaign scenarios. Originally designed as a single-player game, the 1.5 Upgrade has added a full multiplayer component to the game, allowing sessions to be played either through hotseat play or play-by-email (PBEM). PBEM games are not system dependent, meaning that a PC player can play against a Mac player, the same as if they were both on PCs. PBEM in Salvo! is easy, with turns saved after completion, making it a no muss, no fuss affair that anyone can easily get into. write your comments about the article :: © 2006 Game News :: home page |