NATO Commander

The scenario involves a Cold War Soviet invasion of West Germany. The player is given operational control of NATO land armies, while the computer controls the Soviets, and must repel the invasion by deploying his forces geographically and choosing their offensive or defensive roles. As the battle progresses, both operational and political factors influence the outcome. NATO may lose or win back cities and territory; according to the scenario chosen the player had the option to decide to stave off the Warsaw Pact onslaught by countercharging head-on, buying time for space awaiting a diplomatic solution, or mounting a counteroffensive.

The game's interface has strong similarities to the seminal Eastern Front in the way the map is displayed and various orders are given to the units, but NATO Commander takes place in real-time, with one second of time representing 5 minutes passing in the game. It also has various unit types including armor, infantry, armored infantry (mostly for reconnaissance), airborne troops, air force and helicopters. The latter are useful for attacking Soviet units that are isolated or surrounded, which protects them from surface-to-air missiles from the Soviet side of the map. Another major change is the hidden movement system, which only displays Soviet units that are visible to the allied units. Air forces can be used for air superiority, ground attack or as a reconnaissance force to help reveal the hidden Soviet forces.

Computer Gaming World in 1984 criticized NATO Commander for being imbalanced in favor of the Warsaw Pact, but concluded that the game was one of the first combat games to take advantage of computer power, resulting in a "superb strategic simulation". A 1992 survey in the magazine of wargames with modern settings gave the game three stars out of five, and a 1994 survey gave it two-plus stars.