What do you think off the "future" setting

[Magog 10]

Arma 3 will be more factual than fictional (according to the slider concept).

Considering its still a game and not a training simulator found in a real army facility, it has to make some concessions in regards to absolute realism since it has to cover a large scope of simulation.

Its not "one-vehicle study simulator" where you can devote all your resources in making sure all the switches are in the right place and all your buttons function as it should.

There is another company that does that.

Arma is a war game, a battleground simulator, an action/strategy game in the first perspective with a focus on combined warfare and a slight leaning towards the infantry side.

You know that, we all know that.

Vehicles are just models, hollow software representations that apart from appearance cannot function realistically 100% in this game.

So, even if the Apache looks 100% from the outside, its function will be much more limited than it would be in a study simulator.

In the end, then, its just the appearance that makes it "realistic" or not.

If you took the Apache model and added a second rotor or removed one cockpit but retained the functionality as in shooting cannons, missiles and turning as expected, they only thing that would make it "unrealistic" would be its outer appearance.

And IMHO, that's a pretty shallow point of view.

Argue with DCS over the fidelity of their simulator, but in Arma you are only arguing over the visual appearance of a model.

If the Comanche doesn't do it for you, download a community Apache and make a mission out of that, simple.

I want to see the Comanche. I want to drive something new, something fresh. And in my mind it will be as realistic as the Arma (not another game) experience can give you.

Hell, maybe in the future, BI could be able to have different games communicating with another (as DCS claims it will), so Take On Helicopters, or Tanks, or whatever, could merge with Arma. One game to provide the vehicle simulation fidelity, another the operational environment.

After all, they have demonstrated that technology between them is shared and that TKOH can read Arma maps.

You contradicted everything you said above in the paragraph highlighted red.

[Murklor 10]

Battlemechs are useless on the battlefield, and for that reason will never be fielded, ever. They´re large targets, they´re cumbersome and slow, they´re complicated to operate and maintain, and pretty much their only advantage is the coolness factor.

You seem to have alot of real life experience with battlemechs? You know they are large, you know they're cumbersome, you know they are slow and hell, you even got the specs for their operation and maintenance!

Otherwise, I dont really see your point. We dont have a powerplant capable of supporting anything near a battlemech yet. When we do they wont be usuless. There are distinct advantages of a bipedal or quadraped design both in terrain and urban warfare. A battlemech would easily be able to go where a tank can never go and imagine a mech leaning around a building. With advanced robotics, a quadraped mech would probably be the most agile and fastest thing on the battlefield - imagine a huge metal cheetah being able to navigate almost any obstacle and change running direction in the blink of an eye.

Either way, Arma III will be modern combat, so it wont have mechs. Remote operated drones would be neat though :p

[Flogger23m 2]

Don't like it. Make a proper M4, AK-74 ect. first then we can move onto the rare weapons.

Fix what you have. Quality over quantity any day. A properly done M4 would be much more interesting and fun to use than a bunch of guns that all behave the same (as in ArmA 1/2). Until I get an M4 with proper animations, sounds, no clipping into the sights/stock when moving, proper weapon collision for it ect. then move onto the FN 2000.

Edited June 19, 2011 by Flogger23m

[arigram 0]

You contradicted everything you said above in the paragraph highlighted red.

How so?

My point was that a model doesn't have that much influence in the realism of the gameplay and that I like the slight freedom of creativity that was given to BI artists.

[NeMeSiS 11]

You seem to have alot of real life experience with battlemechs? You know they are large, you know they're cumbersome, you know they are slow and hell, you even got the specs for their operation and maintenance!

Otherwise, I dont really see your point. We dont have a powerplant capable of supporting anything near a battlemech yet. When we do they wont be usuless. There are distinct advantages of a bipedal or quadraped design both in terrain and urban warfare. A battlemech would easily be able to go where a tank can never go and imagine a mech leaning around a building. With advanced robotics, a quadraped mech would probably be the most agile and fastest thing on the battlefield - imagine a huge metal cheetah being able to navigate almost any obstacle and change running direction in the blink of an eye.

Either way, Arma III will be modern combat, so it wont have mechs. Remote operated drones would be neat though :p

With current technology we cannot make a mech that is of any use on a real battlefield. and without current plans for anything in that direction, its highly unlikely we will have them within 20 years. With current technology we can make a Mi-48, and it seems that choppers will still be useful the next 20 years, so a new type of chopper like the Mi-48 is feasable. I dont see why you are trying to not understand us.

Fictional vehicles does not equal fictional gameplay.

Fiction is not the same as science fiction.

Edited June 19, 2011 by NeMeSiS

[BobcatBob 10]

Although I kind of like the "new" weapons like the Tavor, Comanche, and such(regardless of how likely they are to be adopted by NATO) the thing i really don't like is the purley "fictional" designs/hybrids. Don't get me wrong, this will in NO WAY stop me from buying and enjoying the game (that will up to my PC:p) but considering the campaign (which looks like it will be really worth playing this time around) will most likely utilize most if not ALL of these fictional assets I am a bit irked to be honest, so I would PERFER if in the future BI would stick a lot more to the real-world gear and leave the mashups to the mod community.

[Innomadic 10]

OMG OMG LIEK ARMZA 2 I REWINNED FOREVAAAARRR!!!

You seem to have alot of real life experience with battlemechs? You know they are large, you know they're cumbersome, you know they are slow and hell, you even got the specs for their operation and maintenance!

Its been done, and from that we know they're useless. Until they become something like Metal Gear, we will never see them in Arma.

edit: That being said...

...i was kinda freaked out by that.

Don't like it. Make a proper M4, AK-74 ect. first then we can move onto the rare weapons.

Downloaded ACE recently?

Edited June 19, 2011 by Innomadic

[Murklor 10]

Its been done, and from that we know they're useless. Until they become something like Metal Gear, we will never see them in Arma.

Lol that's not even a mech. Its just some plastic crap with wheels under its sliding "feet". That's like calling the local garbage truck a mech because it has an arm to pick up cans.

As I said, until we have a powerplant capable of supporting them, it aint going to happen. In 20 years? Not a chance, especially with this ongoing campaign of "clean" energy that's ineffiecent and costly rather than going advanced fission/fusion power. 60+ years is more like it, if the hippies goes away.

So maybe Battlemechs for... uh... ARMA LXXXIV ?

[Caselius 94]

I am quite glad i wont constantly have to look at M4 and AK74 variants anymore.

Variety is fun.

I agree. No more those boring Abrams,T-55,T-72 and BRDM-2. Its better to have new content then just have the same vehicles and guns from Operation Flashpoint ages

[Innomadic 10]

Lol that's not even a mech. Its just some plastic crap with wheels under its sliding "feet". That's like calling the local garbage truck a mech because it has an arm to pick up cans.

As I said, until we have a powerplant capable of supporting them, it aint going to happen. In 20 years? Not a chance, especially with this ongoing campaign of "clean" energy that's ineffiecent and costly rather than going advanced fission/fusion power. 60+ years is more like it, if the hippies goes away.

So maybe Battlemechs for... uh... ARMA LXXXIV ?

That was my point. Battlemechs in the next 20 years will be nigh upon impossible due to the fact we can hardly make a working one now.

[Steakslim 1]

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/06/power-down-senate-zaps-navys-superlaser-railgun

Well shit.....

[LJF 0]

Why on earth would anyone even bother to try and make a mech? What's the point? There are no benefits of the design at all, everything they could do can be done already and much much better by other technology.

A mech is basically a tank that is worse in every single way. And no we haven't built one so we don't know, but we haven't built tanks in the shape of unicorns either so they could work also? The design itself is inefficient and fundamentally flawed. And humans aren't an example of the design working, we evolved to fulfill many more tasks than to kill stuff and secure ground.

Even if you could produce something like the Iron Man suit that same technology could be applied to a tank and or plane that would still be far better (it would be more stable, a smaller target, probably faster, able to carry more and better weapons, be less visible on radar etc etc etc). Mechs will never happen except for B-grade sci-fi movies and anime, and we all know how accurate those two are ;)

[Innomadic 10]

Why on earth would anyone even bother to try and make a mech? What's the point? There are no benefits of the design at all, everything they could do can be done already and much much better by other technology.

A mech is basically a tank that is worse in every single way. And no we haven't built one so we don't know, but we haven't built tanks in the shape of unicorns either so they could work also? The design itself is inefficient and fundamentally flawed. And humans aren't an example of the design working, we evolved to fulfill many more tasks than to kill stuff and secure ground.

Well if we delve into wishful thinking and the world of hypothetical, i think Kojima got it right with the concept of Metal Gear, epecially when we consider the uncanny valley in robots, and that these things are not absolutely ridiculous like Armoured Core or Gundam styles. They have weaknesses and they can't fly.

Mechs like those have a fear aspect, instilling terror in its enemies with its animalistic sounds and almost human movement. The appearance of a REX would have a greater effect than a simple tank, and we already know what that feels like when you hear it behind a wall or approaching from the other side of a hill. Thats the other advantage, being able to reach over and around obstacles that no ordinary tank could, and cross terrain that tanks simply couldn't pass.

That is assuming you find a power source capable of powering such a machine, and is assuming one has the ability to create it, and assuming alot of feasible technical assumptions themselves. However if you could make such a machine...

230 kb image removed

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3061/2789151808_3775289559.jpg

...that thing would be a terrifying weapon.

REMINDER: This is ALL hypothetical.

edit: Yep, my bad, i'll just link it instead

Edited June 19, 2011 by Innomadic

[AstroMan 10]

I agree on the Fear factor

But once you know how to take it down its just another pile of metal.

joints would be a very easy target.

[Innomadic 10]

I agree on the Fear factor

But once you know how to take it down its just another pile of metal.

joints would be a very easy target.

Yes, but how many soldiers are Solid Snake equivalents...besides, you'd be sending them in numbers. Its hard enough to kill one Metal Gear, let alone 3 at a time.

[instagoat 133]

Yes, but how many soldiers are Solid Snake equivalents...besides, you'd be sending them in numbers. Its hard enough to kill one Metal Gear, let alone 3 at a time.

Metal gear, like any other mech, cheats to become the threat it is. In the end of MGS 4, Rex is bombarded by Ray, and the other way round... so either the weapons these machines use are tremendously weak, or they are tremendously tough. Unrealistically so...

Any realistic mech, using real world armour values and weaponery, is nothing but a large, lumbering target. You can´t hide it very well, it´s comparatively slow and cumbersome, it will use a lot of fuel unless driven by nuclear power, and will probably be mechanically very complex and thus a maintainance nightmare. You can´t armour it very heavily, otherwise you need to employ -massive- articulation mechanisms (which need to move quickly enough to rebalance the machine if it trips/tips, which is difficult if each leg is lugging around several dozen tons of composite armour all around.)

So, Mechs only work, I believe, when they cheat: magic shields, handwavium armour or super-weak weapons.

[paragraphic l 2]

I'm very happy we are getting something that the community isn't working on. Most of the addons we see being made are improved versions of what we got with ArmAII and additions to current gear.

There is 1 or 2 mods that focus on far future, maybe 2 or 3 that depict past battles. But most is being made for current settings.

It's great to see some stuff from BI that isn't anything the community is interested in making themselves. I really hope they've done some research into all sorts of technology advancements.

Something like monitors will most likely be redundant in 20 years and we'd get something like tactile holograms. I for one would love seeing some creative concepts being made in a 'realistic' fashion to fit the ArmAverse.

[paecmaker 23]

Metal gear, like any other mech, cheats to become the threat it is. In the end of MGS 4, Rex is bombarded by Ray, and the other way round... so either the weapons these machines use are tremendously weak, or they are tremendously tough. Unrealistically so...

Any realistic mech, using real world armour values and weaponery, is nothing but a large, lumbering target. You can´t hide it very well, it´s comparatively slow and cumbersome, it will use a lot of fuel unless driven by nuclear power, and will probably be mechanically very complex and thus a maintainance nightmare. You can´t armour it very heavily, otherwise you need to employ -massive- articulation mechanisms (which need to move quickly enough to rebalance the machine if it trips/tips, which is difficult if each leg is lugging around several dozen tons of composite armour all around.)

So, Mechs only work, I believe, when they cheat: magic shields, handwavium armour or super-weak weapons.

dont forget the balance, even a hit that doesnt destroy the walker would probably knock it over and make it a sitting duck.

[Innomadic 10]

Metal gear, like any other mech, cheats to become the threat it is. In the end of MGS 4, Rex is bombarded by Ray, and the other way round... so either the weapons these machines use are tremendously weak, or they are tremendously tough. Unrealistically so...

Any realistic mech, using real world armour values and weaponery, is nothing but a large, lumbering target. You can´t hide it very well, it´s comparatively slow and cumbersome, it will use a lot of fuel unless driven by nuclear power, and will probably be mechanically very complex and thus a maintainance nightmare. You can´t armour it very heavily, otherwise you need to employ -massive- articulation mechanisms (which need to move quickly enough to rebalance the machine if it trips/tips, which is difficult if each leg is lugging around several dozen tons of composite armour all around.)

So, Mechs only work, I believe, when they cheat: magic shields, handwavium armour or super-weak weapons.

As i said, its all hypothetical. However i prefer to look at the Metal Gear concept and apply the canon version to its abilities. For example in Halo Master Chief is honestly barely better in game than an ODST from a gameplay perspective. However in the canon books they're portrayed as 50 gazillion times better in everyway possible.

So gameplay limits have to be set to allow the boss fight to occur, which is totally not representative of how terrifying it would be on the battlefield in real time without the constraints of gameplay mechanics.

Also RAY was designed to be a Metal Gear killer, so it should be able to destroy a REX, but in the interest of storytelling both were disabled.

dont forget the balance, even a hit that doesnt destroy the walker would probably knock it over and make it a sitting duck.

Indeed, however as Gekko and the Big Dog vid demonstrated that these are easy to get out of and are avoidable altogether with the right technology (and the right technological assumptions).

This has indeed gone completely off topic in a way not seen since...i dunno, name something for me. Basically i think the concept of a battlemech should not be underestimated as obviously the tech isn't there yet, and we can't think of what the "scientists" will think of next, but if it works as its design intends, then it would be a terrifying weapon.

[Commander-598 0]

A mech is basically a tank that is worse in every single way.

Bad mechs are like a tank. Good mechs are like oversized powered armor built to wield heavy weapons and not die to small arms fire. :)

Unfortunately most mechs are too large and slow to do more than die to enemy fire that sits beyond their effective range because it's designer doesn't actually understand how effective weapons actually are...

Pictured: A realistic depiction of the average mech fighting [goofy anime Space Nazi] tanks.

[Big Dawg KS 6]

Why on earth would anyone even bother to try and make a mech? What's the point? There are no benefits of the design at all, everything they could do can be done already and much much better by other technology.

A mech is basically a tank that is worse in every single way. And no we haven't built one so we don't know, but we haven't built tanks in the shape of unicorns either so they could work also? The design itself is inefficient and fundamentally flawed. And humans aren't an example of the design working, we evolved to fulfill many more tasks than to kill stuff and secure ground.

I bet when man first dreamt of flying machines, there were probably a lot of people that thought they'd be useless too. Of course back then I'm sure they could have never imagined what we were capable of designing.

My point is, stop trying to act like a know-it-all. I agree that these types of vehicles aren't very appropriate for the setting in ArmA 3, but these attitudes are stupid. The nature of warfare is changing, so 20 years from now a tank might be a totally different contraption than what we think of them now.

That said, BIS has chosen to take a fairly conservative approach to their future setting. All of you future-haters should be glad of this since it gives you a chance to continue to use real-world technology.

[arigram 0]

Arma 3 will most certainly not have Mechs...

[Big Dawg KS 6]

Pictured: A realistic depiction of the average mech fighting [goofy anime Space Nazi] tanks.

Lol, did they just mount jet aircraft to those vehicles as turrets? :p

[Commander-598 0]

Lol, did they just mount jet aircraft to those vehicles as turrets? :p

Basically. A rather effective escape system it seems...amazed how it even flies with that 175mm gun for a nose though...:p

[Innomadic 10]

Basically. A rather effective escape system it seems...amazed how it even flies with that 175mm gun for a nose though...:p

Macross Zero?

Arma 3 will most certainly not have Mechs...

No doubt...but you can't deny they are very, very cool

I'm a Metal Gear REX fanboy xD

That said, BIS has chosen to take a fairly conservative approach to their future setting. All of you future-haters should be glad of this since it gives you a chance to continue to use real-world technology.

Agreed, and it allows them to break away from making the same vehicles all over again.

I dunno about you, but making Abrams tanks all over again would be real stale..