The first strategy game I seriously played and loved was Dune II: Battle for Arrakis. Before that, I was absolutely not interested in this genre. I never found it particularly exciting to virtually push some combat units around on a map. But Dune 2 nevertheless cast its spell on me and has not let go of many of us to this day. A whole bunch of successors poured over the audience in the years that followed. However, these clones soon lost the appeal of the new. Perhaps I would have found these fresh ideas in other – less well-known – representatives of the genre back then. In search of such pearls, I enter the famous hexa fields of The Perfect General II.
A murder mystery works very well in confined space, because it tickles the audience in a very special way – it appears 'solvable' as all the information seems to be at hand. Agatha Christie knew it when she wrote the quintessential Murder on the Orient Express and similar setups have appeared many times in the genre since then. One issue with the classic train setup is the 'confined space' aspect: A train can usually stop at any time, at the next station or outsiders can enter it. That is why Orient Express has it stuck in a snow storm in the middle of nowhere. No special events are necessary for aircrafts flying over one of the oceans in order for them to be inaccessible, making them probably even better suited for this setup. The Zinderneuf is a Zeppelin – extremely convenient due to its long travel time over the Atlantic! The airship is almost halfway on the way from London to New York when a murder occurs. The player, a detective, has got 15 suspects and 12 hours remaining until arrival.