Updated: March 6, 2024
Any gaming title that has not one but two bombastic adjectives in its name can either be ultra cool and amazing, or totally pointless. There's no middle ground. It sure does attract attention, though, and during one of Steam's mega discount sales, I got it. Right away, I realized the game had failed an objective. By calling itself Ultimate, it should really be one single installment. And yet, there it was, the sequel.
What I got and tried is this second version of the game. Same same but improved. The game simulates battles, just like before, only does it more ultimatively and epic-like than before. Today, I will tell you how my first two or three hours of playing went. Also, I tried it in Linux, exclusively. This is technically a Windows title, but with Steam Proton being awesome, I decided to try my luck that way. Let us.
The idea ...
Very simple. UEBS 2 lets you create - simulate - battles. You build two or more armies, choose their "type", place them on a map, and then watch chaos unfold. There's a range of Unit Categories and Unit Selections you can try. For example, you can pit WW2 Sherman tanks against a horde of ostriches. Or you can send Spartans to defeat Roman legionnaires, or perhaps fight Evil Gingers (yup, a real game unit) with Chuck Norris (yup, a real game unit). Norris or Norrises, plural. Aha.
You can also choose the unit quantity, battle formation and spacing, and then select one of the dozen available maps. To see what gives, I tried the basic 1-vs-1 scenarios, but you're not limited by that choice at all. You can have multiple armies fighting, and if you set your heart and mind and CPU power to it, try to recreate some of the big historical battles. And some ... not so historical battles.
The execution
And that's it. Enter the map, enjoy the carnage. The one annoying aspect of the game is that it's hard to pan and orbit the battlefield, even with the highest scroll setting. The cinematic (and flying cinematic) views are a little better, but you still sometimes need to slow down the battle speed to position the camera correctly and not miss the fighting.
The music and sound effects are repetitive. The visuals are ok, but there are a lot of glitches, like upturned turrets or sideways turrets on Sherman tanks, legless animals and similar. But if you look beyond the technical details, you end up with wacky simulations. Say, as I gently hinted before, what happens if you send 100,000 ostriches against a well-staggered formation of tanks? The armor wins, cool. But what about the same amount of aggressive birds against a handful of modern soldiers?
The only way the birds can win this is if they poo the tank to death, and the crew inside suffocates.
I have to admit, the sight and sound of 100,000 ostriches fearlessly marching and clucking is a bit daunting.
The results of different battles were different than what I expected. I never thought ostriches could defeat a battalion of modern troops, but there you have it. Likewise, the Spartans seemed to destroy the Romans with effortless brutality. Chuck Norris is one super weird unit, though.
I created a scenario where 2,000 Chucks fought against a myriad gun-toting soldiers. Turns out, Chucks be invincible. The bullets bounce back. Even the nukes can't harm Chuck. So this was a rather underwhelming simulation.
How many Chucks could UEBS2 chuck if UEBS2 could chuck Chucks? Nope, don't look like him, at all.
An almost solid wall of bullets coming at Chucks ... and ricocheting.
Divine powers
While your armies are brawling, you can interfere, of course. You have a handful of God-like powers, including flood, tsunami, tornado, nuke, and black hole (which vacuums up units in a rather comic fashion). Essentially, you can fire them at the troops from an "invisible" gun, roughly centered where your camera is pointing.
This makes for some super-ridiculous scenario action, including incinerated pieces of your armies flying everywhere, massive explosions, and other completely pointless yet utterly satisfying effects.
Black hole effect fo' shizzle.
Napoleon-era soldiers stand no chance against thermonuclear weapons.
Custom units, mods
If you find the available repertoire of gingers, zombies, and real-life soldiers boring, you can always create some of your own. Then, you can also try different mods - units created by the community, like say the AT-AT robot from Star Wars (the one where Captain Jean-Luc Picard leads Voyager through the Stargate).
Gameplay
By and large, UEBS 2 is about fun not historical accuracy. There's an RTS mode, but it's still a far cry from a real battle simulator. The ranged units fire or more less at the same time, which doesn't make sense when you're fifth or seventh in a column. There's no panic, no fatigue, no ammo depletion. In this regard, I found the battle simulation in something like Total War: Medieval II way better. Grittier, less predictable. The graphics could also be better, but for me, this is not that important really.
One needs to remember - it's about having fun! It makes no sense that a formation of 2,000 WW2 soldiers would only kill 6,700 ostriches in a head-on battle, with the humans defending. I mean, seriously. Yes, the birds are scary but they're still oversized omlette machines. So yes, fun fun fun.
Gameplay in Linux
All right, but there were some glitches. Trying to load the City of Troy map resulted, every single time, in a sluggish play. Instead of loading almost instantly, the map would take a good 2-3 minutes to load, and then, the whole thing would run at maybe 1 FPS. No such problem with any of the other maps. I found myself killing and restarting the game until I figured the culprit.
UEBS 2 also would crash on screenshot, but this goes away if you disable the screenshot sound in Steam. By and large, for a Windows title, the game ran pretty well. I think it has more graphics glitches and internal bugs on its own than any Linux-specific issues.
Conclusion
Ultimate Epic Battle Simulator 2 is epic. Ultimate? No. It needs work. Better graphics, better sound, more realistic and chaotic combat, better camera management. There are also some bugs, and all in all, it feels somewhat rudimentary. That said, it's a super-fun and slightly addictive game. If you like mathematics, you like chaos theory, and you like history, UEBS 2 lets you simulate all sorts of interesting scenarios that you won't be able to encounter or recreate in other games. It's a visual computation engine, but it does not compromise on the fun factor. Far from it.
At the end of the day, how much fun you have also depends on your determination and patience. You can mash up some really clever scenarios with UEBS 2, and it has the power to make it happen. But you do need to spend time preparing the battle setups, otherwise the action will be quick, ruthless and boring. All in all, this is a unique title. And insane. Good insane. It's obvious the game does not take itself seriously when you have Chuck Norris and Nikola Tesla as your combat units. But that's good. The lighthearted approach is what makes UEBS fun and endearing and helps you forgive all the raw and unpolished edges in the game. All in all, recommended, especially if you're a numbers nerd. Le fin.
Cheers.