Fire-Brigade: The Battle for Kiev 1943

Game Meta:

Release Year:

1988

Genre:

Strategy

Format:

Diskette

Creator:

Dave O’Conner (Design, Programming), Tony Oliver (Design, Programming), Ben Freasier (Design, Programming), Hugh Fisher (Design, Programming), Steve Adam (Design, Programming)

Company:

Panther Games (Developer, Publisher)

Platform:

Macintosh

Conversions:

Amiga, DOS

“Fire-Brigade: The Battle for Kiev 1943” is a strategy/historical battle, turn-based, tactical game. It is set in the 1943 conflict between the Soviet tank division and German elite Panzer Korps known as the ‘Fire Brigade’. You can play as the Soviets or as the Germans, and you can play against the AI or against another player over the network. The option to play over a network made the game innovative for its time.

“Fire-Brigade” won the Charles S. Roberts award for Best 20th Century Computer Game, in 1988. According to Panther Games, ‘Fire-Brigade” was a step-up from existing war games, being one of the first to take full advantage of the new graphical mouse-driven interfaces that 16 bit computers were making available’.

“Computer Gaming World” celebrated the game for its graphics, but nominated the real achievement of the game as being the “integration of the elements of combat and the function of the change of the chain of command” (Computer Gaming World, 1988 Issue 49, p.40)

References: Panthergames.com; http://museumvictoria.com.au/: Computer Gaming World, 1988 Issue 49.

Version information:

“Fire-Brigade” was published by Mindscape in the USA and by Panther Games in the rest of the world.

A version of the game was made for the Apple IIGS, but was scrapped due to ‘hardware limitations’.

“Fire-Brigade: The Battle for Kiev 1943” is part of the Apple Collection held at Museum Victoria.

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Box Art:

Media Coverage:

Additional Game Releases