Feels just like playing the board game but without some of the minor housekeeping actions (moving trackers, removing cards, etc).

Its a very good port from the table top game. Didn't have any bugs now. I played about 10 Games.
If you have the table top version already you're quick to adopt and you might discover that you played some cards wrong on the board. Also you don't forget to move any markers because the system does it for you. You get an possible outcome overview of your coups and realignment attempts. So this version takes a lot of headspace away and enables you to to develop your tactics.

In my opinion its a very good game and a very good port to the PC. Thumbs up and thanks to the devs. Good job on this one. :)

A fantastic strategy game and intriguing historical simulation. A chess-like duel between two players, which has enough variance to make each game interesting and unique. This is a game in which you are tasked repeatedly with making the best of a bad situation.

If you enjoy history, strategy board games, or plain 1v1 battles of wits, you will love Twilight Struggle.

This is a review of Twilight Struggle the game. It applies to the board game behind the computer game. The computer game is a faithful and very well done translation from the board game. If you like the board game, the pc version will be for you.

Full disclosure: I am really bad at Twilight Struggle. And I hate it. Emotionally, I loathe this game. I loathe it in the way I loathe really physically attractive people who are ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥s. I mean, there's an atavistic part of me that's attracted even as my personhood is offended. I really love the core mechanics to this game, but I hate playing it. I hate spending time with it. I mean, I go out with it hoping I'll get lucky, but then I don't and I question why I put myself through all this torture.

And so in the end, like the attractive girl (or guy) who demeans you, I have to eventually own up to the fact that I really just hate this game despite how fun it can be when it's in a good mood. But too often it's not in a good mood.

I hate this game because of the luck. Yes, good players will win more than bad. I'm bad. Yes, ok. Happy? I'm ugly and I'll never be attractive enough for the attractive girl/guy. It doesn't change the character flaws I see in this game, though. The game is sadist. I'm not a masochist. I don't enjoy being dealt a crap hand, pounded by the AI (yes, I can't even defeat the *%@#& AI), and then expected to cling for dear life for 3 hours just in case lady luck decides to take a crap on the other fella.

I don't enjoy this type of play progression. I feel I'm being arbitrarily punished. And even if the idea is later the worm will turn, I don't really enjoy waiting on luck. I don't like feeling as though I'm losing because of bad luck, and I don't like feeling (later) that I'm starting to win because of my opponent's bad luck. But that's what this game essentially is. Full-on crisis management. That's not for me. I want to win or lose on merits and mistakes. Even the best players can still lose against me because of luck. I know because that's how I've beaten them. It was 4 hours of them waiting for a card that should have come, but didn't. That's not fun for anyone.

The core mechanics are so much fun, but this game just suffers from far too many "Haha! Screw you!" cards that can end up turning into "Haha! Screw your whole 6-round turn!" hands. It's way too swingy for my tastes. Add to this the 1d6 dice rolls for bonus RNG. Now for a board game, this is an understandable limitation. But for me, a 1-in-6 chance of AWESOME vs. FAIL is also unenjoyable. It's exhilerating when you coup/flip a country from -2 to +4 influence because you rolled a 6. It's less so when you spent a whole action round just to roll a die and see literally nothing happen. On the other side, it's VERY frustrating when your opponent makes a Hail Mary coup roll and woops! now you've lost 4+ action rounds of work you put into securing Asia. These events just suck. They're not fun. They make me angry. More than any game, this game makes me angry and frustrated. Why do I bother playing it? Again, it's because the mechanics are sound and it's basically a fun game. It's a fun game, though, that all too often treats you like crap. If you're a masochist, you'll be fine. But if, like me, you don't enjoy being punished arbitrarily for simply making the right decisions, then this game is going to result in broken monitors.

Maybe if you spend hours and hours memorizing all the cards in the deck, then predictability will set in and you'll also enjoy the game. I feel that most people who are good at the game, that's how they get good. They learn to "count cards". But for me, I just can't put up with it. Gawd, I just hate this game.

Last but not least, this is a zero-sum game. It's totally appropriate to the war theme. But I know for a fact that I don't like zero-sum games very much. I like competitive games with a score. So even if you lose, you can still see how your score was relative to earlier games. But TS is not that. You lose. They win. It's just another thing where my personality doesn't fit the game.

Looking at how this game makes me feel emotionally and compare that to how I see people respond when they play a game like Overwatch and I get it why Overwatch is such an ingeniously designed game. It's because it's not just about being a good game, it's about being a good game experience. TS is for me an unpleasent game experience, even though the game itself is ingenious. I can't get past the unpleasent experiences I have at my current skill level to want to learn how to get good. You know how games have a learning curve? This one has a punishment curve. And I've got other stuff to do with my time. I don't need the stress.

Just to be clear: I can handle bad luck and set-backs. I play Darkest Dungeon. I play plenty of rogue-likes. But arbitrary randomness is just not my thing. Lulz punishment is not my thing. "Haha! I tricked you into committing nuclear armagedon because you played a card that let me randomly draw a card from your hand which happened to let ME stage a coup, but since it's your turn it counts as you lowering DEFCON which means YOU LOSE!" (This is seriously a game mechanic. It's not one you'll intuit until after it happens.) That type of esoteric edge-case meta-game isn't my thing.

tl;dr

TS is not my thing.

Twilight Struggle is widely considered to be one of the best boardgames of the last decade (it’s ranked #2 on the Board Game Geek website) and this software version absolutely does it justice. Follow the tutorial, then play a game or two and you'll find the interface to be very intuitive, allowing you to easily examine your cards, test each play option, and execute your decision quickly. Watch the video above to get a good feeling for how things work.

Multiplayer is asynchronous, allowing you to create games with various chess clock time limits from 30 minutes all the way up to 45 days, for those who want to play just one move per day. There’s a chat function in both the multiplayer lobby and each game. The friends list is not connected to Steam, but specific to your Playdek account, which is required for multiplayer and shared amongst all their games. If you’ve ever played Ascension, Agricola, or any of the other Playdek iOS games you can use the same account. Rankings use the standard ELO system.

Singleplayer is still a work in progress in the initial release: it's a challenge for less-experienced players, but not Twilight Struggle veterans. Also, expect to wait 10-20 seconds for the A.I. to take each turn. Playdek says the single player A.I. is learning from every game played, so it should get better as time goes on. Right now it's a great way to learn some strategies to improve your multiplayer play.

The game is cross-platform Mac/PC, and it'll also be cross-platform with the upcoming iOS and Android releases, so you'll be able to play other folks no matter their choice of gaming device.

Playdek has added some nice touches like audio clips of cold war era leaders and other period-appropriate sounds that help set the mood. Sound effects are easily turned off if you don't like them. You can also increase the interface speed once you know what's going on and don't need time to read the cards as they’re played.

The game interface scales well. I’ve played in on an 11” MacBook Air up to a 40” UHD desktop display and everything’s looked good.

I highly recommend Twilight Struggle for both the veteran tabletop player who’s looking for more opportunities to play, and for the newbie who wants to check out one of the best boardgames there is. I’d never played Twilight Struggle before this and now I can’t stop.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5. 5 stars as soon as the A.I. is better and faster.

Twilight Struggle like Poker: few minutes to learn, a lifetime to master.

TO NEWBIES / PPLS THAT NEVER PLAYED THE GAME:

Twilight Struggle is not the easiest game to catch and play, you won't enjoy it until you've an idea of what you'are doing considering the main strategy course.
My suggestion are:
* Play vs IA a lot, and ignore the result of the game.
* Read documentation and strategy on Internet.
* Prefer USSR in your first games, and give NO additional influence to US (+1 US is the actual standard indeed).

During the match:
* Play for the points - Always think which area will be scored. If Europe scoring is gone, don't overfocus yourself on Europe. If you have a scoring card of a region where you are weak and you reasonably think your oppo can overwhelm you there, headline it for limiting his score.
* Do your best for using your event cards as Operation instead of events - They'll be back in reshuffle hopefully flooding opponent hand.
* Consider when play an oppo event - You'll have to do it, just decide when is the best moment for eliminate from the game that card minimizing the effects.
* Consider space race an emergency option - you will not place influence but neither activate the oppo event, but it will be back sooner or later.

Time after time you'll understand that there are some etabilished standards:
* Luck and Unluck with dices and draws are almost ininfluent - you must plan a strategy simulating you'll fail premium rolls, and then enjoy every improvement. Do something "desperate" only if you have no other options. And if you have no other options, you've probably had some misplay before.
* USSR will be aggressive and advantaged in Early War, US will be very strong in Late.
* USSR will try to end game at +20 pts in Mid War, US will close the game in Late War or Turn 10 end scoring.
* USSR Turn1, ActionRound 1 will be on 90% of times: Coup Iran , with a 3 or 4 op card. Generically USSR appreciate Coup every turn as 1st action to degrade and keep Defcon 2 for prohibiting USA Coups in Battlegrounds: logically USSR will avoid to have Non-Battleground cheap countries, so USA will be pressed by Lack of Military OPS.
* You'll play for points but also a step forward - you'll spend some, if able, for take advantage for later scoring, and for later event (i.e.: USSR will "Always" be interested in Middle East due to OPEC Card effect) having a better vision of the game.
* You'll thing about creative tactics like Coup Italy instead of Iran, if you have proper cards to Red-Color Europe; you'll understood that Thailand will be an hot place, that having Pakistan and India in the same time without having their war card in hand can be a problem, and many many many other considerations.
* In the meanwhile have some games playing US, to see the other side of the game and have a deep, complete view of the game, and unlocking it's way to play with clear ideas.

If you are a gamer that stay on-pause thinking about what to do, Twilight Struggle will be like sitting in front of a fire tasting a good Armagnac. And you'll never have a game like the previous one.

Ah, don't forget to play versus human opponents during your learning curve - IA will NEVER be smart, insidious and challenging as another TS player.

If you'll be enough patient and appassionate to appreciate the game, your €/£/$ will be very well repaid.

I kinda wish the computer was more deliberate in its choices - like I wish the game would pause at every single choice. "I play this card for the OPs points, and now I play these points in these countries, etc." It takes me a minute to understand what exactly the computer has done. When I play with friends, we all talk about what we're doing, and we all make sure we're all on the same page before moving to the next step in the turn.

Other than that - faithful interpretation of the board game. I am so happy to be able to play this on PC.

I really like this game as a board game, but as a video game, it removes all the fiddly and remembers the few rules I get wrong in the physical version. This game is intense. AS the USSR, you need to pummel the US into submission within the first few turns before the USA gets their legs. USA has to do damage control before the USSR wrecks them and then turn the tide when they get the right moment. This game will make you cry and feel like the whole world is crashing down around you as make good hard heartwrenching decisions that hopefully keeps you alive to fight another round.

This is the Cold War in a box. I cannot wait to play more of it.

Have you played the board game? If yes, then you will love this version.
Have you ever wanted to play the board game? Buy the board game.

The strength of this version is the speed. No setup time, no dealing and reshuffling cards, no bickering over dice results, no placing tiles. This is AWESOME for experienced players. However... doing all those little things TEACHES you the game. For example, reshuffles are a critical element of the game and actually doing it with your own two hands shows you why. A milisecond of image on a screen doesn't have the same effect.

Aside from this, there are some graphical changes that could clear things up, but it's a fantastic game nonetheless.

9/10 for Veterans.
7/10 for Newbies.

With over 20k ratings on BoardGameGeek, Twilight Struggle is considered the best boardgame of all time.

And Playdek did an amazing job bringing it to PC/Mac.

The only negative right now is that on launch, the single-player AI is a work in progress. However, Playdek plans to collect data from games to "teach" the AI. Once that happens, this game will be a 10 out of 10.