CM Operation Flashpoint 3 announced | "Oops, they're doing it again..."

[nodunit 397]

What I want to know is what kind of world do they live in where they think the sun is super nova. Or for that matter in many games with the clean clarity, the 'cgi effect' and or coffee grain effect.. top winner for that though would be apache air assault comming to xbox.

Edited November 19, 2010 by NodUnit

[ben_s 11]

http://www.youtube.com/user/flashpointredriver

lol

[Zipper5 74]

I would totally associate that channel background with Operation Flashpoint.

[instagoat 133]

Apparently these guys from the trailer (at least it seems that way, also from the released sketches) are the characters you play as during the campaign, so they´re at least getting that part right.

I think I´ll keep an eye on this game just for the sake of its single player. I hope PMC will finally deliver a gold SP campaign worthy of the true successor to OFP:CWC, because Arma 1, Harvest Red and Arrowhead fell way short of that high water mark.

There´s been a mention by some mod on the RR forums that they´re trying to stick with the example set by CWC, using cutscenes and pre-mission build ups. I´m wondering how that´ll turn out in the end...

[nodunit 397]

What made CWC and Resistance such great campaigns..oh dear..so many things really, there is no 1 thing.. (Warning, loooong post)

1. There was no such thing as "always winning", even when you won sometimes something would happen that would shift the tide. And even when a mission was failed, the war would still go on. (for some).

2. Multiple vehicles and command.. CWC had a perfect buildup for this, OA tried to tackle it but it is just far too frantic and quick paced.. with OFP you went grunt-to light command, jeeps, lesser armor, lesser armor simple command, greater armor, greater armor commend, squad, platoon.

Several missions of the same vehicle helped you attune to what you were using as opposed to "Hey I'm a tank..and now I'm in a helicopter".

3. Relateable characters. This is IMO one of the best points of CWC, everyone was human, Armstrong, James, Blake, Victor, just to name a few..we saw a great spectrum of human emotion and action. Joy, play, joking around, sadness, anger, fear, disgust and so on. But with all that eventually it set in..We do what we do because we must, not because we want to."

4. Mission variation, stealth, direct attack, optional, downtime, table turn. Each mission adds something even if you aren't doing anything. The time spent driving around and at the base talking or walking around, gives you an appreciation and helps to focus your nerves and mind, a sigh of relief, something to help ease and calm the nerves.

Iirc after the evacuation from Nogova you wind up on Malden, it is night and you have been tasked to patrol the base. Everything is fine, you're nice and relaxed..then you hear that they are detecting movement..suddenly you go into alert, perhaps even nervous..

You experience unexpected turns, early on you and a relatively large force even with armor support, take a town. You successfully do so but have taken heavy casaulties..but you got it..or did you? Suddenly the operator sounds panicked and you hear why, hearing the news of an armored division comming to take it back you panic and flee into the woods.

However if there is one mission to describe stealth, fear, panic and nerve it would be After Montignac, alone by yourself..in a soviet occupied region..a hind patrols the skies, infantry patrol the land and armor watches over, it leaves you feeling helpless and powerless which really, is what players need to experience more often rather than the gun ho.

5. Anti war. This was a strange feature in OFP, strange in that how true it is..in so many games you see war as a promoted thing, as it is desired but in OFP people actually wanted to avoid it. The Nogova president urged his people to not fight against the soviets, Victor did not want to fight and truthfully neither did Armstrong at first, aside from the invasion, not many of the citizens even wanted to fight from the start..the only reason they fought was because they had nothing else to live for, their lives were taken, their families, they had nothing to lose.

To go with this, sometimes the loss of squad mates meant losing people in the next mission which further the experience, helping or devestating..but to me, the most powerful message was without a word spoken..the cutscene unfolding of the church with a graveyard, body bags and makeshift graves with wooden crosses, helmets and dog tags played. Not a word is spoken but a chilling and somewhat saddening organ song plays, this message conveys the tragedy of war at its finest.

tl;dr The two campaigns were so great because of so many things, each complimenting the other to drive a great but supposedly simple story, enriched by the characters and events, you can't leave one thing element and hope for it to be as good.

Edited November 19, 2010 by NodUnit

[Tonci87 163]

Absolutelly agree on this. Every Single Point is true

[paragraphic l 2]

How hard would it be to recreate that Teaser in ArmA II? With or without the post-processing. But offcourse with the additional units you'd expect to see with such an insertion in a hostile invironment.

Totally agree with what made those campaigns great btw.

[instagoat 133]

How hard would it be to recreate that Teaser in ArmA II? With or without the post-processing. But offcourse with the additional units you'd expect to see with such an insertion in a hostile invironment.

Totally agree with what made those campaigns great btw.

I wondered the same. You´d need some air-cam addon to make it work properly, and you don´t have any cool on-board action animations you could use. Still, I think this could be done much more dramatically in Arma 2... also, is it just me, or does it strike you as weird that they have Marines doing an airborne assault in a country that´s not located anywhere near the sea?

Maybe they overlooked that there is somesuch thing as Airborne Infantry? Then again one of their cast is wearing an US Army shirt with the velcro shoulder pockets, so maybe they´re a special Marines-Special Farces-Airborne-SEAL-Delta Force-Tier One-ubercommando-TeamAmerica strike force from outer space??

[ben_s 11]

I wondered the same. You´d need some air-cam addon to make it work properly, and you don´t have any cool on-board action animations you could use. Still, I think this could be done much more dramatically in Arma 2... also, is it just me, or does it strike you as weird that they have Marines doing an airborne assault in a country that´s not located anywhere near the sea?

Maybe they overlooked that there is somesuch thing as Airborne Infantry? Then again one of their cast is wearing an US Army shirt with the velcro shoulder pockets, so maybe they´re a special Marines-Special Farces-Airborne-SEAL-Delta Force-Tier One-ubercommando-TeamAmerica strike force from outer space??

Knowing CM, that is most likley. :icon_rolleyes:

[johncage 30]

just saw the screenshots:

http://worthplaying.com/article/2010/11/19/news/78346/

at least the character models and textures aren't bland and blurry like the first.

[max power 21]

How hard would it be to recreate that Teaser in ArmA II? With or without the post-processing. But offcourse with the additional units you'd expect to see with such an insertion in a hostile invironment.

Totally agree with what made those campaigns great btw.

The difficult thing would be animating it and getting the characters to look so different.

[Colossus 2]

Two first INGAME (yes, Tim Browne confirmed this) screens...

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/hs471.ash2/74435_177006605648555_147516158597600_692098_4624509_n.jpg

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/hs574.ash2/149616_177006662315216_147516158597600_692099_2940022_n.jpg

That's as in-game as Ian Malcolm's CGI pic with OFP: Resistance units in 3d Max, or as he said it "[Resistance buildings, some unreleased units]" [1], back in 2005. :D

Funny I remembered that. Shame I can't find that picture. :(

Edited November 20, 2010 by colossus

[4 IN 1 0]

so maybe they´re a special Marines-Special Farces-Airborne-SEAL-Delta Force-Tier One-ubercommando-TeamAmerica strike force from outer space??

By that do you mean, Starship troopers?:D

[Perforator 10]

is it just me, or does it strike you as weird that they have Marines doing an airborne assault in a country that´s not located anywhere near the sea?

Marines often conduct air assault operations in southern Afghanistan.

[ben_s 11]

You cannot even call in those A-10's they've been showing off about in all the mag reports..... They're cinematics only. I'm starting to wonder what they DID spend their money on getting into the game....

I' really do give up with CM, They'll have to do something magical to fix this. I mean, They even took the post processing system from DiRT, so they didn't work for that... What have they been doing?

[instagoat 133]

You cannot even call in those A-10's they've been showing off about in all the mag reports..... They're cinematics only. I'm starting to wonder what they DID spend their money on getting into the game....

I' really do give up with CM, They'll have to do something magical to fix this. I mean, They even took the post processing system from DiRT, so they didn't work for that... What have they been doing?

It looks like they´re trying to tell a proper story with their campaign. They already said that they´re trying to go with a documentary style, so they´re probably taking a lot of inspiration from Generation Kill, and youtube videos from the battlegrounds in A-Stan and Iraq, for example. I don´t mind that, what made OFP so great was that it had proper characters you could follow. A good story doesn´t need fancy features.

Less is more.

However, I´m a bit sceptical about their abillity to pull this off well. If DR is anything to go by, RR will be nothing more than slightly better mediocricy.

[Tonci87 163]

I can only say that the fact tha Black has left the project (A Genius of a game developer, his shooter "Black" [only for consoles :( ] was a really really brilliant game) means that this isn´t going to be good. Thats at least what I think. When they said that Black will be the creative Director for RR i thought, "well this might become good" but now? No way!

[ben_s 11]

I can only say that the fact tha Black has left the project (A Genius of a game developer, his shooter "Black" [only for consoles :( ] was a really really brilliant game) means that this isn´t going to be good. Thats at least what I think. When they said that Black will be the creative Director for RR i thought, "well this might become good" but now? No way!

Huh? Black was the director for CM's game "bodycount" not RR. RR is still Sion and Tim and James.... etc

I think you've got muddled up.

[ProfTournesol 956]

God, this trailer is simply

[ben_s 11]

Well, I hear a gameplay trailer is on the way soon. Why can't they just do a trailer like the old CWC one? That was great... Even the newer ArmA II ones arn't as good as the older CWC ones. :(

[andersson 285]

Why are you still comparing OFP:DR&RR with CWC? Different games, different companies. Let CM do their own thing, you cannot compare or hope that they will be the same.

[Zipper5 74]

They share the same name therefore it is logical for them to be compared. As CM are very well aware, no such comparisons would be drawn if they dropped the name. They chose to keep it.

[ben_s 11]

They share the same name therefore it is logical for them to be compared. As CM are very well aware, no such comparisons would be drawn if they dropped the name. They chose to keep it.

Correct...

Heres some "extra" info some guy has been posting because he has reportedly seen gameplay

The video quality is great but you can't always hear the game sounds properly because the Gamefocus guys and a couple of guys from Codemasters are doing a lot of talking and laughing, especially when one of the guys that is playing gets obliterated by his own breaching charge.

(http://community.codemasters.com/forum/general-discussion-1335/446556-gamefocus-red-river-gameplay-footage.html)

One of the guys from Codemasters also demonstrated a way of blasting holes through walls and buldings with a big bazooka type weapon that first shoots red bullets for targeting exactly where he wanted the bazooka bomb to hit. He said it was a good way to get into places when you run out of breaching charges.

One of the Gamefocus guys shoots the bazooka at some enemies that are shooting at him from behind rocks on a mountain and they shoot a rocket bomb back at him and it makes a massive explosion and the entire screen is covered with swirling dust and chunks of debris, it looks really cool.

(http://community.codemasters.com/forum/general-discussion-1335/446556-gamefocus-red-river-gameplay-footage.html#post6761585)

In the gameplay footage that I seen one of the Codemasters guys plays the same mission 3 different times but each time he chooses a different place to land the helecopter and the mission plays out differently. The first time he tried to land he selected a spot near a large village but as soon as the helicopter touched the ground the helicopter and all the marines on board were shot to peices by enemies hiding in the village.

The second time he told the helicopter to land in a different place but when it flew over a high ridge big enemy bullets coming from somewhere on the ground started to blow hole in the walls of the helicopter and then it started to spin and it crashed.

The third time he landed near a really rocky area near a steep mountain side and all the soldiers ran out safely and hid in the rocks.

(http://community.codemasters.com/forum/general-discussion-1335/446223-replayability.html#post6762590)

Yes you can tell the pilot where to land but you have to be careful because it is difficult to spot where the enemy can be hiding in ambush. When the guy from Codemasters told the pilot to land near the village he couldn't see the enemy from up above but they were hiding inside the houses and started shooting from the windows when the chopper touched the ground. It was almost like that scene in Saving Private Ryan when the soldiers land on the beach and don't even make it out of the boat.

It looks very good graphics-wise but maybe a bit to realistic for some, sort of like watching a real life documentary with lots of killing and maiming and screaming. Red River sure won't be for the squeamish.

(http://community.codemasters.com/forum/general-discussion-1335/446223-replayability.html#post6762616)

Were there vehicle entry and exit animations included?

The guys playing didnt get into any vehicles but there were some AI marines that opened up a jeep door and stepped inside if that is what you mean.

At one point a marine opened up a jeep door to climb out when the jeep was hit by a rocket bomb but before he could step out the door was blown off by another rocket bomb and the marine fell on the ground in a mangled mess. It looked very convincing but was way to gory in my opinion.

did you run out of the helicopter or did you just appear out of it.

The guys playing didnt get into any vehicles but there were some AI marines that opened up a jeep door and stepped inside if that is what you mean.

At one point a marine opened up a jeep door to climb out when the jeep was hit by a rocket bomb but before he could step out the door was blown off by another rocket bomb and the marine fell on the ground in a mangled mess. It looked very convincing but was way to gory in my opinion.

(http://community.codemasters.com/forum/general-discussion-1335/446223-replayability.html#post6762765)

What type of evidence did you see in the footage that showed off the new and enhanced AI ?

I havent played Dragon Rising yet so I can't compare the AI but I seen some Dragon Rising gameplay footage on Youtube and can say for sure that Red River's graphics are a billion times better.

How did they behave in combat- using cover, weapons accuracy, realistic movement etc...?

The players were choosing different ways for the marines to enter into houses and clear the rooms and that was probably the part that impressed me the most because it looked so real, it was hectic.

Most of the time it was hard to see the enemies because they kept popping up from windows and from behind rocks and trees, there are rocks everywhere and it was hard to see where they were shooting from because they were shooting from all sides.

(http://community.codemasters.com/forum/general-discussion-1335/446223-replayability.html#post6762778)

What was the AI weapons accuracy like- both friend and foe?

Both the friendly AI and the enemy AI kept hiding behinds rocks and mud walls and inside houses and stuff when they were shooting at each other so it is hard to say how accurate they were because they didn't stay out of cover for long when firing because there were bullets and rockets flying everywhere.

Was it dangerous to exposed for too long?

One of the Gamefocus guys ordered a jeep to move up a narrow track that had no cover between it and a nearby village and it was hit by 2 rocket bombs almost immediately

Did you see evidence of the usefulness of suppressive fire?

One of the Codemasters guys fired a huge machine gun at some houses on a hillside that the enemies were firing from and they didn't shoot out the windows anymore. The bullets were blowing the crap out of the houses so I guess the enemies were laying low.

(http://community.codemasters.com/forum/general-discussion-1335/446223-replayability.html#post6762833)

What kind of weapons and equipment did the soldiers use? Like shotguns, assault rifles, grenade launchers, smoke grenades etc?

I don't know much about weapons to be honest but I do know for certain that one of the marines was using a shotgun inside some houses and it was literally blowing the enemies apart. There was a special type of machine gun mounted on a jeep that shot grenade bombs all over the mountain side and there was a huge machine gun that the marines assembled inside a doorway that punched holes clean through house walls and vaporised a enemy soldier that was running across a rooftop.

The enemy rocket bombs were everywhere and the marines had a bazooka gun that shot red bullets before it fired the bazooka bomb.

(http://community.codemasters.com/forum/general-discussion-1335/446223-replayability.html#post6762864)

Not sure if he's telling the truth or not. Its just basicly the only *good* info there is on Red River. Some things look nice, Choosing location to land insert helo, tracer rounds for SMAW's, entry/exit anims for vehicles? The things we asked for back in the old DR request threads... Perhaps they DID listen to us? (well, on some parts at least)

[Zipper5 74]

Well, to quote that age old saying - pics or it didn't happen. For now, I call viral marketing scheme on this one.

[ben_s 11]

Well, to quote that age old saying - pics or it didn't happen. For now, I call viral marketing scheme on this one.

lol, He said he has a video, But we all told him not to upload it. Pretty much a catch 22. If he's telling the truth he must upload the video, but if he uploads the video he will get banned and it will immedietly be removed and his brother/friend would get court issues from breaking NDA... And if he doesn't, all the info is worthless.