American Civil War -- Take Command: Second Manassas (PC Games, 2006)

This game is the best civil war game I have tried. You can take command of a brigade or a whole army. The scenery is detailed with authentic landscape; hills, forest, buildings, crops, just as they were during the battle as well as weather conditions. You can travel anywhere on the battle field, which covers several miles. The sounds are realistic, when off at a distance you can here birds and grass hoppers and a muffled artillery unit thunder away. When riding next to your troops you here the boots marching, hooves clomping, and other minute details. When near a battle in progress listen to the muskets popping and men hollering. Command a charge and watch your troops run in with bayonettes or clubbing with rifle butts. If you have a cavalry unit under your command, you can use them to steal enemy supply wagons, charge and take enemy artillery,(be careful!) or charge a weakened infantry unit. You can leave units under your subordinant officers to do other things so you don't have to worry about baby sitting them while your gone. You can position artillery units anywhere you like, or leave them to be placed by thier officers. Things can get confusing, you can get lost in the large woods and have to check over the map to get your bearings. I believe this was how it really was. Your troops will tire and have to rest if pushed to hard. You have to command your troops wisely; if you send them across an open field after an enemy artillery battery, the results will be devastating and whats left of your men will come running back for cover. You actually have to scout around and lead a unit a few miles out and around to get in good position to take the enemy artillery. But a long trip can be foiled by a hidden enemy brigade. You have to really watch for week spots in your enemy to pull off a daring raid and take captured cannon back to your lines. Superior generals may give you orders to hold a position or take an area or just give a plea for help in a battle line, you can obey orders or do things your own way. The units are very detailed, find one from your own state! Each unit is given historically accurate traits. I was happy to engage a Wisconsin unit (my state) while playing as Stonewall Jackson. When Jackson trapped this unit in the real battle, they held him off untill nightfall and slipped away. When Jackson told one of the prisoners that he had never seen Yankees fight like that, the young man replied, "We aint Yankees sir, we are farm boys from Wisconsin and Iowa." Things I like most are the freedom to travel anywhere, no spots are off limits, and the beautiful scenery. The dead lay where they fall but not too terribly gory. I'm still learning the details, commanding a brigade successfully is not at all easy and I have an even greater respect for the officers and soldiers of the time. Any one who speaks poorly of any Civil War leader would be humbled if they had to do what they did. Sorry if I'm getting lengthy, but I only covered the basics here. I would think most people would really enjoy this game! P.S. It works on my Vista computer, set at Windows xp.

Having played several other Civil War games, in my oppinion this is the best one out there. The graphics are excellent, very detailed. The troop number scale is about 1 to 8. Thats 1 soldier for every 8 actual soldiers. When you have 60,000 troops involved in the fight, you have an awesome battle scene. After a major clash, there are thousands of bodies on the battlefield.
You can choose to command a brigade, division, corp, or the whole army. I usually command a corp, that's 6,000 to 14,000 men.
There are 3 modes of play. Historical, open play, or custom. I prefer open play, because you can play it in about 6 different scenarios such as defending a position, attacking an enemy position, or just go searching for the enemy who could be anywhere on the map.
I have over 300 hours of playing time on this game and have never been bored with it. It's very strategic and different every time you play.

This should not be a game at all. It does give the ways the troops fought at the beginning of the Civil war but as far as excitement it was so boring waiting for the battles to finish i went and played checkers instead. More exciting.
Don't waste your time with this one unless you are a CW student.

The graphics are pretty nice, and the detail of the orders of battle are amazing. Its so detailed, you can actually see Gen. Jackson sucking on a lemon and holding up his finger as he always did due to his eccentricities. Its a kinda complicated game though, howvever through a lot of practice, its no problem.