If you are playing the Americans and a key bridge is blown up, you will never make it to Arnhem. You can win anyway, because victory conditions are based on a comparison with the historical case. With some minor qualifications, it is safe to say that the weapons and soldiers behave in a very realistic manner. Soldiers are affected by casualties, suppression and all the other usual factors, and behave pretty much as you would expect soldiers to behave. As in real warfare, there are heroes and cowards, and you will feel like calling out the firing squad when in a critical moment, the leader of an important squad panics and hightails it for cover.
Tanks sometimes behave in an unrealistic manner.
New weapons including flamethrowers are introduced, which adds still more value to this excellent game. You can also roll your own and set up battles. Summing up Close Combat 2 is a definite candidate for wargame of the year. It is more interesting than its predecessor because it has more variety, and the the AI and the graphics are much improved. Most scenarios still consist of either taking territory away from the enemy or of preventing the from doing it to you, so the battles tend to be slugfests.