Tinian: SEIZING THE RUNWAYS 1944 by Joni Nuutinen
LINKS:
⊕ Play Store
⊕ Amazon
⊕ free
⊕ local apk
WWII Marine force is tasked with carrying out an amphibious assault on the island of Tinian in order to turn it into one of the biggest airbases in the world. To surprise the Japanese defenders, the American commanders decided, after some loud arguments, to roll the dice and land on the ridiculously narrow northern beach. It's width was only a fraction of what WWII-era amphibious military doctrine considered wise. And while this surprise move guaranteed an easier first day, the narrow beach also limited the speed of the reinforcements and made the logistics vulnerable.
⊕ Taking place from: 1944-07
⊕ Map size: 1200 = 30 x 40
⊕ US Marines are tasked with carrying out an amphibious assault on the island of Tinian in order to turn it into one of the biggest airbases in the world. Pacific
⊕ Released: 2023-11
WELCOME:
Tinian: Seizing the Runways 1944 by Joni Nuutinen is a turn based strategy game set on the WWII Pacific theater.
You are in command of the American WWII Marine forces tasked with carrying out an amphibious assault on the island of Tinian in order to turn it into one of the biggest airbases in the world. To surprise the Japanese defenders, the American commanders decided, after some lively arguments, to roll the dice and land on the ridiculously narrow northern beach. It was much narrower than what any WWII-era amphibious military doctrine considered sensible. And while the surprise guaranteed an easier first day for the American troops, the narrow beach also severely limited the speed of the future reinforcements and made the supply logistics vulnerable to any storms or other disruptions. Commanders on both sides waited to see if the US Marines could block the inevitable Japanese counter-attack during the first night, to keep the landing beaches open to allow successful continuation of the attack.
VICTORY CONDITIONS:
The object of the game is to control all the 100 Victory Points as quickly as possible.
QUICK TIPS: Settings: You can change hexagon size, city icons, unit icons, and many other aspects from settings, or via the four round buttons in the upper-left corner of the gaming view. Unit markings: Lower left corner shows HPs (Hit Points), upper left corner shows the number of MPs (move points), right side has several type of markings: warnings on red, attached resources on white, ground information (what's under unit icon) is marked on green. Zooms buttons (Z) are located on upper-left corner. Combat core concepts: adjacent units critically support each other in battle: encircling is often more efficient than using brute-force direct attacks. TMP-system: By controlling Key Tactical Locations (green diamonds) you will gain TMPs (Tactical Move Points), which can be used to move between two hexagons sharing Tactical Route (yellow-green arrow between the hexagons) without losing regular MPs..
CAMPAIGN NOTES:
Victory Conditions: Control all 100 Victory Points (VPs), which are gained from the cities.
Tip: Due to the fact that American forces surprised Japanese defenders by landing Northside of the island, the player can advance fast and spread out way too much early on. And when the inevitable Japanese counter-attack comes, the thinned-out US front line might lead only one or two units facing the attack and getting swamped and surrounded by the counter-attack. This then dictates the flow of the reinforcements and movement of the nearby Marines for the many turns to come, as the player goes from controlling the campaign to mostly reacting to the rapidly changing situation.
Air force units weren't added as rewards due to the map's small scale (20 hexes wide), the brief timescale of a few days, and the limited number of Japanese units, which already allowed some players to finish quickly. With artillery and naval bombardments occasionally running out of targets, adding air units seemed unnecessary.
Landing Ramp: When a landing ramp unit moves from water to land hexagon, it will transform a few hexagons into the SOUTHWARD direction of the landing spot into a road. The landing hexagon cannot be enemy controlled, city, or already has a road or a railway network on it.
About map: The so-called cities represent various exact locations or in some cases the name of the overall area. The road network represents both the road and the local railway network, which crossed over each other on several points, so compromises had to be made.
147th Infantry Regiment will arrive as late reinforcements, although in real life, it was a reserve that was not committed into the battle.
During the night hours, units from both sides might lose 1 move point. During the midday hours, Japanese units will have slightly less MPs due to the American air superiority.
American Commanders are regimental leaders.
The generic airfields of the underlying game-engine are not really suitable on this particular physical scale, but since they are such a popular game mechanics, they are included to allow airlifting zero or one HP units to safety and enable gnerals hopping from airfield to airfield.
Due to already small number of units in play, the Less Units feature has been completely disabled for this particular game.
The funny thing is, before doing the research for this project, I was, for some strange reason, under the impression that the alternative US landing option that was considered, was to land right next to the main city of Tinian. Maybe the feint operation the US Marines carried out affected me too.
Scenario Specific documentation that includes links to more generic documentation on how the game series and the underlying game engine works.
To get a feel play the free turn-limited demo version (sideload or Amazon App Store), while screenshots are available on the app stores.
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-- Developer Log: tidbits about military history and scenario updates
-- Sortable Table of all campaigns