On June 22, 1941, before dawn, German tanks and guns began firing across the Russian border. It was the beginning of Hitler's Operation Barbarossa, one of the most brutal campaigns in the history of warfare. Four years later, the victorious Red Army has suffered a loss of seven million lives.
The Barbarossa campaign included some of the greatest episodes in military history: the futile attack on Moscow in the winter of 1941-42, the siege of Stalingrad, the great Russian offensive beginning in 1944 that would lead the Red Army to the historic meeting with the Americans at the Elbe and on to victory in Berlin.

Barbarossa is not simply one game but it is composed of three different types of games.
1) The Standard Games: There are four of these games. They depict specific situations of crucial parts of the war
2)The Campaign Game: It combines the four afforementioned games and fill in the gaps so that the campaign can be played out in sequence
3)The Variable situations: Several "what if" historical effects are examined when added to the above games.

The Game includes a 23" by 29" map sheet that portrays the area os the Soviet Union in which the operations took place.
A hexagonal grid is superimposed upon the map to regularize the movement and the position of the playing pieces.
The combat map is all inclusive with a Terrain Effects Chart (TEC) and Combat Results Table(CRT)
There are two types of units each repressenting one of the opposing armies.Each piece is distinguished by type strenght nationality and mobolity.