I'd love a
First Indochina War setting.
I've been reading a lot about this conflict and the more I do, the more I also think it would be perfect for Red Orchestra style gameplay. Now of course, from a marketing perspective the First Indochina War is a harder sell than WW2. But if Tripwire would actually do any form of marketing, even a setting like the one I'm suggesting would sell more copies than RO2:HOS.
Anyway, about what I'm suggesting...
The First Indochina War would be interesting because, mainly it's never been done. It would be considerably different from Rising Storm, both the weaponry used and the location, i.e. maps would look totally different. There is a wide range of different interesting uniforms and equipment loadouts for both the French colonial forces as well as for the vietminh. The weapons used is an interesting mix of old World War 2, combined with modern semi-automatic rifles. As a compliment to their own weapons the French used a lot of American weapons and equipment but also British (like the
Sten gun and Lee-Enfield No. 4 Mk I). The Viet Minh on the other hand used a mix of French, Chinese, Soviet, Japanese and British weapons.
A short list of
Weapons:
French
- MAS-36 (French made bolt action rifle, early years)
- MAS-49 (French Semi-automatic rifle, it was the main rifle of the French after 1951)
- FM 24/29 (standard light-machine gun, slowly faced out after 1952, however not completely)
- AA-52 machine gun (late war machine gun)
- MAT-49 (Submachine gun, main automatic weapon)
- Lee-Enfield No. 4 Mk I (used by the French Foreign Legion)
- M1919 Browning machine gun (Foreign Legion and French colonial)
- M1 carbine (French and Foreign Legion)
- Browning Automatic Rifle (French and Foreign Legion)
- Thompson M1928 (French and Foreign Legion)
- Sten Gun (Used by French special forces, often with silencers)
Viet Minh
- Mauser C96 (Chinese version of the K98, almost the main rifle early war)
- MAS-36 (Caputred from overrun forts and garrisons)
- Mosin-Nagant
- SVT-40
- Ariasak (very limited, captured from surrendered Japanese)
- SKS
- PPSh-41
- PPS
- Degtyaryov machine gun
- Ariasak (captured from the Japanese)
- Thompson (limited, supplied by the British and Americans during WW2)
- Sten gun (limited,supplied by the British)
- RPG-2 (first full scale use of Rocket Propelled Grenades against armor)
As well as a variety of other medium and heavy machine guns from from both China and Soviet.
Maps
Aside from pure djungle maps, hamlets and rice paddy fields many of the battles would be Viet Minh surrounding and attacking forts made of concrete. However, a fort map would not just be a fort in the middle with jungle around. I'm imagining maps with three levels. First the Viet Minh have to capture the forward scouting positions and bunkers in the surrounding terrain. The second level is the trench line, with barbwire, dugouts and sandbag bunkers, that's surrounding the main fort. Last and final level would be the concrete fort.
French soldiers
although there is a lot of great battles that have never been done in a fps before that would be great. So much untapped potential :/
