"Iwo Jima is in American hands. Japanese airspace is now dominated by endless American bomber runs. Nevertheless, an amphibious invasion will be necessary to ensure final victory. Every island closer to Japan has proven harder to take, with fiercer resistance and more brutal fighting. Now, the invasion of the Home Islands must begin, with an assault on Okinawa. The battle is guaranteed to be the most difficult yet."
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Primary Objectives
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- Capture and hold Shuri
- Capture and hold Hagushi
- Capture and hold Taira
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Secondary Objectives
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Special Operations
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USA - Buckner's Forces
- Atomic Bomb
- Economic Aid
- Assembly Line
- Corps Reorganization
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Walkthrough
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And to think, this game was supposed to be praised for its historical accuracy. I'd like to see the fine folks at Atari explain why there're FOUR Yamato class battleships around the island, considering only two of them were ever in active service during the war, and one of those two was destroyed months before the landing at Okinawa. Not to mention the ridiculous amount of air power they gave the Japanese... but anyway, accurate or not, you're going to have to fight all of it if you want to complete the campaign.
Start off by using your battleships and carriers to blast the two battleships to your left. You should note that aircraft carriers can send two bombing attacks at the same time when they're fully charged; that'll be very useful later when you're destroying enemy bases with them. Similarly, it'll help you take care of these battleships a lot faster.
Once they're dealt with, send everything east to the northern part of the island. Have one of your battleships land a Corps HQ on the northern-most part of the shore, and have the other two (along with your carriers) blast the third battleship near the island. You need to start doing two things immediately after that.
- Build your base, build it compact, and build it FAST. You'll have maybe three minutes before the first attack, and that's if you've already been moving fast. Get a couple ammo/oil depots, then an Infantry HQ and an Engineer Brigade. Get five units of Engineers, then start cranking out artillery bunkers along the south-eastern edge of your tiny base area. Be very careful not to move too far to the east or too far to the north, or you'll spark the first attack even earlier.
- Use one of your carriers to scout the water on the other side of the island. There's a Japanese carrier over there, and it will absolutely destroy you if you don't take care of it fast. Once you have it in your sites, send all four of your bombing waves over there, and if it survives, keep sending more.
By now you've probably got five or more tank divisions attacking your base. Hopefully, your artillery bunkers will hold up, especially if you've got your Engineers fixing them the entire time. You should make each of your battleship units into a team. That makes it very easy to select each one and use them to blast units on the shore, which will be very important to your survival for the first part of the mission.
Once you've got your defensive line held up solidly and the enemy carrier is destroyed, you need to shift your attention to destroying the closest enemy base, which is just on the other side of the mountains near you. The best way to do this is with your carriers, but it's going to be expensive and time consuming. Make sure you keep your defensive guns repaired the entire time, and if any units charge your base, have your fingers on the hotkeys to send battleship shells down on them.
Target the enemy's Armor HQs first, then go for the Corps HQ. When things start to thin out a little, you should start to build up your base a little more. Get your mechanized building, your artillery building, your motor pool, more depots, and so forth, building them all to the north, not to the south or east. Once you've got three units of Artillery Tanks (and their upgrades), you can start using them to help finish the base on the other side of the mountain.
The Japanese will not like this, so be prepared to deal with absolutely ridiculous amounts of units. Use everything you can to deal with them, including the battleships, the carriers, the artillery tanks, and even the engineers if necessary. If you stop this rush, you'll be in good shape. Start building even more stuff on the north side of the mountain, and eventually stretch your supply line all the way around the top of the mountains to meet the front of your base, where the defensive guns are sitting.
Once you've gotten yourself in this possition, it's just a matter of using the classic hit and run tactics to destroy the enemy bit by bit. Don't EVER get too confident in your forces though, even if you manage to build nine units of artillery tanks. Every single part of the island will be crowded with insane hoards of units that will easily destroy you if you attack too fast or in the wrong spot.
Work your way down the island, taking the far eastern city first. Stretch your supply line westward, using a second Corps HQ from your battleships if you have to. Don't take your eyes off of anything you think you've secured throughout the battle; the enemy can use paratroops, and they will quite easily take your cities back and destroy undefended buildings if they get the chance.
The rest of the mission is basically just a matter of how well you can handle your forces. I'll just give you a few pointers to remember, and you should be able to dominate the island eventually (even if it takes you five hours, like it did my first time...).
- Don't forget about your carriers. They can cause severe amounts of damage, so always make sure you have them striking a target of some form or another.
- Definitely don't forget to use your Atomic Bomb special operation. It can destroy huge amounts of forces, and it'll weaken buildings by a significant amount. When possible, follow up an atomic bomb with all of your bomber strikes to eliminate as many structures as possible.
- Watch out for enemy planes. Even after you destroy the carrier, the enemy will build airfields to cause problems. Don't fall asleep on the job and let your base get leveled.
- Don't get over confident. Even when you think you're doing great and nothing can stop you, don't be surprised to run into twenty armored units every now and then. Never attack outside of your supply zones, and if you lose any units of your tanks, replace them as fast as possible.
- Even though you don't need to destroy the far southern base to win the mission, it's almost a necessity to prevent overwhelming hoards from blocking the last target city. Just don't forget about your atomic bombs and carriers; those two weapons alone can pretty much level that base.
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