Red Storm: The Air War Over Central Germany, 1987 ★★★★★

"Red Storm" is the second sequel to the Charles S. Roberts Award-winning game Downtown. Red Storm is a standalone game that utilizes the Downtown game system to depict a hypothetical air war in May/June 1987 over the central portion of the NATO/Warsaw Pact front in central Germany. Like Downtown and Elusive Victory before it, Red Storm is an “operational” level air warfare game where players manage large strike packages and numerous combat air patrols in an effort to strike enemy targets, protect their own ground troops, and secure control of the air over the land battle raging below. Both sides have highly advanced all-weather aircraft, long-range missiles, precision bombs, sophisticated electronic warfare assets, and dense air defense networks of surface-to-air missiles and radar-guided AAA. The game features aircraft from the United States, United Kingdom, West Germany, Canada, Belgium, the Netherlands, Soviet Union, and East Germany.

As the NATO player, you fight outnumbered in the air, but with a qualitative edge in technology and better-trained pilots. NATO faces the daunting task of contesting the air in the face of the initial onslaught from the WP air forces while also getting bombs onto targets on the ground both on the frontline and rear echelon forces of the Soviet and East German armies. As the Warsaw Pact player, you must push your numerous but less flexible forces to the absolute limit in an effort to overwhelm NATO forces in the air and destroy them on the ground, all while supporting advancing ground forces. Both players also have to manage their air defense networks consisting of overlapping layers of SAM and AAA.