There are also tons of regions and almost as many cities demanding attention. Since the map does not help track what's happening, the only way to sift through this information overload is by using management panels that condense the country to a sortable spreadsheet. Less than halfway through a German campaign, in 1937, the German regional panel contained 43 entries, while the city panel contained 31. Each turn involved sorting and re-sorting the columns by various categories to find areas for exploitation. It's a bit like assembling a jigsaw portrait of the country with every turn.

Most of this is busywork. For instance, a region might have ten slots for farms, three of which are filled. Therefore, to actually use the available resources, the player must visit this region at least seven more times to order up more farms. The region probably also has metals or coal that are available for mining, which might add another half-dozen slots. Now multiply all those empty slots by the number of regions under control. Making full use of national resources therefore requires hundreds upon hundreds of repeated orders.

Speaking of repetition, the plethora of diplomatic options available are more trouble than they are worth. Even one of the simplest interactions, making a trade deal, leads to one fruitless offer after another. Locating the magic number at which the AI will take a deal is nothing but maddening trial-and-error. Likewise, trying to gain an alliance is difficult and largely pointless. It is less annoying to go it alone.

Things do not improve once war breaks out, which necessitates more plunges into spreadsheets and tabbed menus, along with some scavenger hunts around the poorly-marked map. Although a lot of different units are available for production, the exact composition of a force seems irrelevant. Wadding up a bunch of tanks and infantry and chucking them at other countries seemed to work pretty well. Then there are odd quirks like the long pauses between turns. After hitting the "next turn" button, the game usually freezes for several seconds before the next turn loads. This leads to a bunch of skipped turns, with important status reports and diplomatic offers disappearing in the switch.

The pained reluctance with which it advances turns is likely to be shared by anyone playing it. While the underlying game might be straightforward, nothing about it is simple, because the interface always wants more sacrifices. When fighting a war on two fronts, with scores of regions, cities, and armies trapped under layers of menus and spreadsheets, it finally becomes clear: Making History II isn't about being Churchill, Stalin, or Hitler. It's about being their secretary.

Rob Zacny is a regular contributor to GameShark . He also contributes at Gamers With Jobs and is a panelist on the Three Moves Ahead strategy gaming podcast.