Dai Senryaku Exceed 7: Modern Military Tactics

Whoa. Talk about a game that's more than the sum of its parts. While the simplified graphical appearance and sometimes repetitive music may initially be a turn-off for some, give this one a chance in multiplayer and you WILL become hooked for a LONG time.I have three gaming friends who come over to my place to hang out every other weekend or so. We'd played a ton of different multiplayer games across several genres, from Halo to Mario Kart to Worms. Then one afternoon I introduced them to an old favorite of mine that I'd never played in multiplayer, a little under-the-radar strategy title called Dai Senryaku VII: Modern Military Tactics Exceed for the PlayStation 2. We ended up playing over ten solid hours that evening and never came close to finishing our match; since then we haven't played anything else, and I'm talking since October 2009, folks (It's now early February 2010). This while all the big names released last fall and winter sit by untouched from the current-gen consoles; that should tell you this baby has serious staying power. All three of my friends have since saught out and bought their own copies of the game. We've made and played on new maps, unlocked all of the 400-plus units, and basically have had some of the most fun I've ever had from any game of any genre. If you think the trash-talking and intensity gets high playing a five-minute match of Halo (I'm talking civil, profanity-free dialogue between you and some buddies, not what you all too often experience online with strangers), you've not come close to what happens when you've played twenty or more hours into a match (you can save your progress and come back later) of Dai Senryaku and someone's on the verge of being eliminated. It is NOT EASY to win this game; it takes true strategy and a careful balancing of your unit types to succeed, and human opponents will adapt every time to what's going on.The sheer depth and fun of this game defies the current notion the western market has that turn-based games are dated or obsolete. Players will quickly develop favorite units (I play as the United States and can tell you that my friend Mike, who plays as Russia, absolutely DESPISES my Ticonderoga-class ships with their Aegis interception systems, my FB-22 fighter-bomber, which can strike ground targets with cruise missiles from 18 hexes away, , my A-10 Thunderbolts (Warthogs), which are basically flying tanks that can both take and dish out a ton of damage, and my Patriot missile systems, which share the Ticonderoga's lethal intercept abilities against aircraft. Watching his reactions in particular is fun, whether he's grinding his teeth at my attacks or exuberantly celebrating sinking one of my hated Ticonderogas. My friends and I have all had those moments where the range of emotion demonstrates that Dai Senryaku is a much, much better party game than would commonly be thought possible from this genre.I would like to take this opportunity to ask SystemSoft Alpha (the game's Japanese developer) to please bring a current-gen version of Dai Senryaku over to the States for the PS3, X-Box 360, and the Wii. Online would be a huge evolution for the series, as would more nations and unit types (Daisenryaku 3.0 Perfect on Japanese Windows has 48 nations and over 1,400 unit types!), the continued ability to make and fully customize your own maps and games (the PC version I mentioned can support up to 8 players), downloadable content such as World War II campaigns, nations, and unit types (as was done when Working Designs ported over Iron Storm for the Sega Saturn), and a beefed-up graphical presentation. I really , really hope that somebody out there with some pull will make this happen; this series deserves some serious limelight and recognition, and if such a game is made it will be a Day One purchase for me and my friends.

Dai Senryaku 7 was an entertaining game, but not without it's flaws. On the plus side, the computer AI was pretty good and made you work for your victories. Leveling up units was good and made sense as new crews become veterans. Some levels were hard, but not impossibly so. I enjoyed the campaigns and got a few good weeks out of it.There were some technical problems with the gameplay. Aircraft burned a lot of gas on the move and had to head back often for refueling, but if they stayed in a hex for the entire turn without moving they used up very little fuel. Jets can't do this at all, and helicopters can only do it by expending just as much fuel as if they were flying fast. Squads could replace lost units at cities and bases, which makes sense only to a point. A destroyed tank can often be repairs and returned to battle. A jet or helicopter that goes down is in pieces and can't be repaired at all. Lastly, a few units seems stronger than they should be. US tanks rated lower than the top line Russian and European tanks, but in real battles US tanks have done extremely well against their Russian counterparts. Conversely, the US stealth bomber could drop a ridiculous number of bombs before running out of ammo.Overall I'm still pleased. It is an older game, so I don't expect perfection, but I feel I got good value for what I spent.

I originally picked up this game when I was far younger from a game stop and loved it. It had a huge impact on my love of strategy games overall. Bought it again because I have lost my original copy and I was even able to enjoy my saved game that had unlocked all sorts of extra units. Comparing this game to the newest version available on Steam and this one kind of wins out. It has far less units than the PC version but the animations are overall better and so are the sprites. This game has given me hours of fun and I'd recommend it for anyone who doesn't mind spending hours on a single game. The logistics system forces you to plan out campaigns and while the AI can be bad its also capable enough to put up a decent fight.

There are not many strategy games on the PS2 but this is one of them. I had always been a fan of strategy games and never really even looked for strategy games on the PS2, just didn't think there were any. When I came across this 5 years ago I was surprised. The graphics are not very good even for the PS2 but the great gameplay makes up for the bad graphics and before long the graphics become a non issue. Have discovered a few other strategy games for the PS2 subsequently, one I recommend is the Army Men RTS. Dai Senryaku is highly recommended.

bought the wrong version, couldn't return

Was excited to buy this game, the cover looked cool, thought it was going to be a lot of tank warfare. Turns out the cover is misleading, and this is more a strategy game with graphics that leave much to be desired. Didn't play it more than 15 minutes.

Pretty great, but I have experienced some trouble moving there and landing there.

Very difficult to get the hang of the strategy, but once you do it is addicting. There are so many missions and maps to play, every mission you beat you unlock a unit. Some nights I play with my son for hours since I'm hooked. You continually try different strategies to beat the computer players or your friends/family. Occasionally the game will freeze in the middle of a match and there is no way to unfreeze it even if you have been saving it all along. This is very annoying, but doesn't happen to often.

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