Toward the end of 1942, the German High Command saw that the tide on the
East Front had reached its peak. After the setback in front of Moscow in
1941, the mighty German Army surged forward again in the summer of ’42.
After defeating an ill-fated Soviet summer offensive at Kharkov in May,
they drove onward to the outskirts of Stalingrad by the late summer of
that year. This is where the Stalingrad '42 game picks up the fight,
including a number of scenarios covering the drive to the Volga.
After several months of bloody house to house fighting in the fall, the
Soviet positions were reduced to pockets of rubble, barely 300 meters from
the Volga. As the season turned to winter, Hitler remained fixated on
taking the city, ultimately leading to disaster for his troops. He had
badly underestimated the Soviet army’s ability to mount an offensive on
his flanks.
The Russians cut through weak, poorly equipped, Rumanian troops and
encircled the entire Sixth Army. In Stalingrad '42 you can re-fight this
titanic struggle, exploring both the historical situation in addition to a
number of plausible "What If" situations; a German retreat, a corseted
flank defense, or a powerful panzer rescue force made available had Rommel
been successful at el Alamein.
