Broken Lines

Broken Lines is a 2020 tactical role-playing game from the Danish studio PortaPlay. In an alternate Second World War, a plane carrying eight soldiers crashes behind enemy lines, in a place where a strange gas and a strange enemy have changed the war. The game follows the survivors as they try to get out.

Battles are planned and then play out: you give orders to the squad, then let a few seconds of real time run, and the game pauses itself when something new happens, such as an enemy appearing. Between battles the soldiers argue, make decisions and suffer from stress.

Its squad is its heart: eight soldiers with personalities who quarrel about what to do, in a war that does not make sense to them. Its planning system is a good middle road between turns and real time.

It is short and its battles are not very varied.

Broken Lines shares Commandos' situation, a small team deep behind enemy lines, and adds pauses and a squad who talk. It is one of the few recent games built on real time with automatic pauses for a squad.