Development Blog & Reveals

[OstiasMoscas 10]

Geez, you still don't get it.

And reviewers, yeah, they will care about it. And give Arma 3 a bad review.

Instead of writing non-sense like "you don't get it" explain to him exactly it is what he isn't getting..

Any reviewer with a shred of intelligence will do one of two things:

1) Have a separate review of the content available at launch and the single-player campaign.

2) Hold off on the review until until the single-player campaign is available and then do a complete review.

[Dwarden 1124]

Except the cutting out of the campaign to release it who knows when is just another big event in the miscommunication trainwreck that has been going on for many months now.

The fact that we've learned about campaign being gone from release not from an official dev statement in official sources but from 3 seconds in 17 minutes long video in a german mag one month pre-release added to all other things we've learned like that is revolting. This isn't even the first time BIS does that.

This can be forgiven for a modder doing something in his free time for free. But when a professional company that gets paid for their products does it again and again - how can you let this slide? Honestly?

Which I did a week ago: http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=12029

It's exactly the same issue as ArmA2 1.62 had and that was fixed in 1.63 beta. I've also asked several times if the fix was merged but there has not been any dev's response. And I do not attempt to discuss it here. But this is what silence does and I'm more than happy to discuss it in AI thread.

now that's response i like ... finally something to operate with :)

[OMAC 254]

How so?

I play A2, A3, and Iron Front in SP about 90% of the time, and I get defensive when people dis SP because I fear that BIS may someday get rid of SP entirely for Arma, and that would really chap my hide and bum me out. :( Please don't take what I wrote personally. I'm just an old-school armaholic who thrives on BIS and community SP content, and want very much for BIS to keep making it. I'm really looking forward to the A3 campaign, whenever it does finally come out. I'm eager to check out the "RPG elements" of it! Could be something new and cool.....

And for the record, I have finished ALL BIS official campaigns in SP on Veteran: Harvest Red, Silver Lion, Arrowhead, Crimson Lance, Black Gauntlet, Eagle Wing, and ToH career. Plus CWR2 CWC and Resistance. Even German and Russian campaigns in Iron Front (OMG that took 6 months and many gray hairs :eek:). After all that work, saying that I still like Arma SP content means something. Perhaps it means that I am partially insane, but whatever.

Edited August 4, 2013 by OMAC

[-ghost-tf 12]

Instead of writing non-sense like "you don't get it" explain to him exactly it is what he isn't getting..

What's the point if everytime you explain someone "what he isnt getting", there comes a new guy that doesnt bother reading the past arguments and skips most of the posts just to say: Hey guys, just wanted to let you know that I dont care about this decision at all, and thats why I will now have to stay here insulting the people that do care, because all this complaining is bothering me and its not like I can just ignore this thread you know?

[Varanon 892]

Instead of writing non-sense like "you don't get it" explain to him exactly it is what he isn't getting..

Why go over it again ? It's been said multiple times, and repeating it won't make it clearer.

Any reviewer with a shred of intelligence will do one of two things:

1) Have a separate review of the content available at launch and the single-player campaign.

2) Hold off on the review until until the single-player campaign is available and then do a complete review.

You got to be kidding. A reviewer will get a game, review it, and be done with it. Most professional reviewers work like that. It's a job for them, you know. They will judge the game by what's in at RELEASE. And we know that the release will not have a campaign. So what they will do is complain about the missing campaign and be done with it.

MAYBE some magazines will do an after-release review of the campaign. But that won't change the metacritic scores that the game received at that point.

[OstiasMoscas 10]

I play A2, A3, and Iron Front in SP about 90% of the time, and I get defensive when people dis SP because I fear that BIS may someday get rid of SP entirely for Arma, and that would really chap my hide and bum me out. :( Please don't take what I wrote personally. I'm just an old-school armaholic who thrives on BIS and community SP content, and want very much for BIS to keep making it. I'm really looking forward to the A3 campaign, whenever it does finally come out. I'm eager to check out the "RPG elements" of it! Could be something new and cool.....

And for the record, I have finished ALL BIS official campaigns in SP on Veteran: Harvest Red, Silver Lion, Arrowhead, Crimson Lance, Black Gauntlet, Eagle Wing, and ToH career. Plus CWR2 CWC and Resistance. Even German and Russian campaigns in Iron Front (OMG that took 6 months and many gray hairs :eek:). After all that work, saying that I like still Arma SP content means something. Perhaps it means that I am partially insane, but whatever.

No problem man. People are entitled to their opinions and to voice them! ;)

I've been playing these games since the original OFP and I haven't really touched any of the MP content myself. I stick to single-player whether it's the editor, campaign or the single mission (can't remember what they're called atm). I'm really looking forward to the ArmA 3 single-player campaign and it does suck that we won't see it on launch. I just don't think it's such a big deal, seeing as we still have a lot of content and a fantastic editor to mess around with. No doubt we'll see some amazing singe-player content from the community down the road as well.

Single-player content definitely belongs in the the OFP/ArmA series!

---------- Post added at 08:59 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:55 PM ----------

You got to be kidding. A reviewer will get a game, review it, and be done with it. Most professional reviewers work like that. It's a job for them, you know. They will judge the game by what's in at RELEASE. And we know that the release will not have a campaign. So what they will do is complain about the missing campaign and be done with it.

MAYBE some magazines will do an after-release review of the campaign. But that won't change the metacritic scores that the game received at that point.

I know of a few sites that have separate reviews for MP and SP on certain games, where the two reviews are published at different times.

They will be aware of the campaign not being a part of the game, and will review it accordingly.

It won't be an after-release review if the campaign hasn't been released...

In that case, if the campaign is reviewed at all, it'll be a separate review.

[Alwarren 2765]

and will review it accordingly.

That is what I'm afraid of, and BIS too.

[progamer 14]

Why doesn't BIS add something in game at release to tell the reviewer what to deal is?

[strangere 2]

I play A2, A3, and Iron Front in SP about 90% of the time, and I get defensive when people dis SP because I fear that BIS may someday get rid of SP entirely for Arma, and that would really chap my hide and bum me out. :( Please don't take what I wrote personally. I'm just an old-school armaholic who thrives on BIS and community SP content, and want very much for BIS to keep making it. I'm really looking forward to the A3 campaign, whenever it does finally come out. I'm eager to check out the "RPG elements" of it! Could be something new and cool.....

More like they get rid of whole Arma series. I wouldn't be surprised that Arma 3 is last Arma that we will see. Because you know something like Dayz is easier to make, you get less complaints, reviews probably will be better (Dayz mod was quite praised on gaming websites), bigger sales...

Anyway, i am generally surprised some people are still here. From reading this whole thread it seems that general consensus of "complainers" camp is that Dev team is lazy, incompetent, lacks the professional capabilities and is unable to move the series forward. I would be long gone if i would think that. I know, generalization, not all of you think that, but i've been seeing stuff like that a lot these days.

[St. Jimmy 272]

...you know something like Dayz is easier to make, you get less complaints, reviews probably will be better (Dayz mod was quite praised on gaming websites), bigger sales...

If you think Arma 3 is getting bashed, I just have to say to you that DayZ is getting bashed waaaaay more by people.

[froggyluv 2130]

More like they get rid of whole Arma series. I wouldn't be surprised that Arma 3 is last Arma that we will see. Because you know something like Dayz is easier to make, you get less complaints, reviews probably will be better (Dayz mod was quite praised on gaming websites), bigger sales...

Anyway, i am generally surprised some people are still here. From reading this whole thread it seems that general consensus of "complainers" camp is that Dev team is lazy, incompetent, lacks the professional capabilities and is unable to move the series forward. I would be long gone if i would think that. I know, generalization, not all of you think that, but i've been seeing stuff like that a lot these days.

+1

I think this accounts for a good deal of what could be called the 'apologists' to be honest. Looking with broad perspective over the course of the development of Arma3, even the layman can spot that this almost didn't happen -at all. BI was ready to throw the towel in for sure and ride off with madbank DayZ with far less stress and effort. Frankly the way they rallied after the imprisonment, loss of original creative content (Greece) and programmers -it's a small miracle we have what we do. As far as Campaign, once your original creative plans go out the window and you need to make a whole new storyline - I was pretty sure the campaign would essentially just be filler anyways. It's not as easy as just switching out a countries name for another -more like trying to change course of small river. On top of that you have people who immediately after Bug #10,341 gets fixed -jump down your throat about bug #59 and "How the f*ck could you miss this BI! Are you blind!!! Do you even have programming experience!!!!!!"

:eek:

In my business we call them 'trainer drainers' and aren't shy about showing them the door. 4 programmers watching the AI thread -that's fucking bank.

[windies 11]

+1

I think this accounts for a good deal of what could be called the 'apologists' to be honest. Looking with broad perspective over the course of the development of Arma3, even the layman can spot that this almost didn't happen -at all. BI was ready to throw the towel in for sure and ride off with madbank DayZ with far less stress and effort. Frankly the way they rallied after the imprisonment, loss of original creative content (Greece) and programmers -it's a small miracle we have what we do. As far as Campaign, once your original creative plans go out the window and you need to make a whole new storyline - I was pretty sure the campaign would essentially just be filler anyways. It's not as easy as just switching out a countries name for another -more like trying to change course of small river. On top of that you have people who immediately after Bug #10,341 gets fixed -jump down your throat about bug #59 and "How the f*ck could you miss this BI! Are you blind!!! Do you even have programming experience!!!!!!"

:eek:

In my business we call them 'trainer drainers' and aren't shy about showing them the door. 4 programmers watching the AI thread -that's fucking bank.

I see that a lot, saying that anyone complaining is calling the devs lazy or unprofessional etc...

The fact is that I really don't see that except from a very select few. Most people who have voiced disapproval about this are more upset at the decision, the precedent that the decision sets, the ramifications of the decision and how they will affect the game on release with the general public and less about how the old timers who are beyond branded with BI will react, as well as all of the other cut and axed feature's that have been promised and we are now learning will most likely not make it until some far off date or not at all.

It doesn't look good even to some people who have been loyal to BI for quite some time, so I'm quite sure they are right to question the ramifications of BI's decision to cut the campaign out of launch and how the game will be reviewed. I'm also quite sure that they payed just as much as I did, so their right to opinions and questions is just as valid as my right to opinions and questions, irregardless of positive or negative viewpoint or criticism/praise. The only people I see "Bashing" others are those who cannot view negative criticism as negative criticism and instead view any negative viewpoint as some horrible attack on the developers.

I also see the developers leaning more and more on the community for content and fixes as I believe others do to. Cutting the campaign out of launch and then launching the game as fully completed and released is really a slap in the face to the community, mainly because they are putting the burden of their development on to the community to fix it for them in the interim. It's one thing to encourage modding and community content to supplement official created content, but it's entirely different to rely on community content and modding for the lack of official content in your game. It's not really right and it sets a bad precedent for the future.

[chortles 263]

The fact is that I really don't see that except from a very select few.

They sure are hilariously vocal about it...

If you think Arma 3 is getting bashed, I just have to say to you that DayZ is getting bashed waaaaay more by people.

This is exactly what I thought as soon as I saw the corresponding part of strangere's post... whereas "the devs" can be treated as an impersonal entity, on the DayZ end it's "all Rocket, all the time" as the target. Unlike the Arma 3 devs though, Rocket seems to be allowed to be... colorful about pushing back (not bashing back).

It's also funny watching people remark on Arma 3 missing specific features that DayZ supposedly will when Rocket tells people that part of the reason they haven't publicly released DayZ standalone is because "because instability and core multiplayer engine requirements are not done. Until over 50 people can connect to the server, with acceptable server FPS and a high level of security, with zombies functioning in some basic way that they are acceptable - we are not ready to consider a public alpha" and "The game is not stable enough in multiplayer to play. That is the pure and simple truth. Until it is so you can't play it. Sorry", and on release dates he says now that "Until DayZ passes it's alpha milestone requirements it won't be released. The alpha is assessed on a monthly basis. I won't even utter dates in any context now less confusion occurs."

[mmaruda 20]

Why doesn't BIS add something in game at release to tell the reviewer what to deal is?

BIS can add something and I am sure that every reviewer will be firmly aware that the campaign will come later. The problem is, the reviewers job is to write about the game as a product and present their opinion in more or less objective way to tell the readers if the game is worth buying. Noone will wait for all the features to get implemented and all the promised stuff added. The reviewer is not a BIS fan by definition, hell, they can even not like Arma games at all. What they will write is how the product that is on the shelves and ready to be sold plays. If a game is crap they will write it's crap instead of saying "it's crap at the moment but will get fixed in a couple of months", because that is not something you can take for granted. Especially if the game was sold before release with a lot of features advertised that got cut out or delayed. That kind of thing actually suggests the devs are not so trustworthy from a possible reviewers standpoint. Not to mention they do not really give a crap about what kind of sandbox Arma is, how many mods it has, or what kind of trouble BIS has to deal with. They rate a product and what it offers out of the box. And people buy that product often because they read a good review. It's a market, you spend your money and expect to have fun, not wait for months to have a descent experience. BIS has been long enough in the business to realise that, so I do not understand the decision on cutting out features just to make a release.

I am not bashing at BIS, but we have all been here for quite a while, we are fans, reviewers mostly are not and there are some that actually made their names for being merciless towards game companies, if they screw up. With the current situation the release might turn into a spectacular failure. That means BIS will only make money of fans and not broaden their customer base which in turn will result in resources to further develop the game. Not to mention by the sound of what some people write here, a few fans could loose trust towards the devs.

I am starting to think that the project suffers from bad management. Someone mentioned that Arma 3 team is like 70 people and that is small compared to the big studios. Now the big star of this year's E3 was Witcher 3. They have 90 people working on the game. I am not trying to compare these games by any means, but clearly the 300+ dev team requirement to make a AAA title seems a myth.

[chortles 263]

That depends on your definition of AAA title -- I'm thinking "the annual holiday mega-franchises" like Assassin's Creed, Battlefield, Batman: Arkham <whatever>, Call of Duty.

[strangere 2]

If you think Arma 3 is getting bashed, I just have to say to you that DayZ is getting bashed waaaaay more by people.

I read through Dayz reddit and truth be told i don't think that Dayz gets bashed that much and if it does that it's mostly complains about RV engine or BI. But hey, i could be wrong. :)

Btw, yes i know there are people that have some problems with Rocket.

I see that a lot, saying that anyone complaining is calling the devs lazy or unprofessional etc...

My post wasn't meant that way (does this sentence make sense?Argh my english). I don't have any problem with complaining that is based on something. Don't take my posts that seriously i like to exaggerate. :cool:

Edited August 3, 2013 by strangere

[b00ce 160]

I think people are forgetting how terrible the release of ArmA2 was. I distinctly remember veterans of the community bragging about Dragon Rising and how it will be so much better and how they're just plying ArmA2 until DR comes out. Then Dragon Rising sucked and they all came crawling back. ArmA3 is better than ArmA2 by a long shot in beta; look how far ArmA2 has come since the days of it's release. It will only get better from here. Yes, it sucks that BIS delayed the campaign, I get it, But you will have a campaign eventually. When everything is said and done, you all will still be here and you'll all be playing ArmA3. Just like the release of ArmA2.

[Wiki 1558]

Am I the only one wondering about how long the campaign will be, the story and the gameplay experience (I mean in which we play different characters, just like in CWC)???

I don't really care about the campaign being delayed, as long as it IS a good one (not like ArmA 2 campaigns - All of them in fact, especially Harvest Red and Silver Lion) and as long as we don't wait too much.

What I care much more about - and what make me kinda upset are the axed features / or things made by the community that are NOT in the game whereas they SHOULD AND MUST HAVE BEEN!!!

---------- Post added at 12:17 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:04 AM ----------

Moreover, maybe the campaign was totally finished, then because of the greek incident they had to delete the whole thing and restart it from the very beginning...

We don't have all the informations, so instead of getting upset and angry, just wait for the explanations next week.

BTW, does anyone know when the sitrep/spotrep would be out?

[chortles 263]

I think people are forgetting how terrible the release of ArmA2 was. I distinctly remember veterans of the community bragging about Dragon Rising and how it will be so much better and how they're just plying ArmA2 until DR comes out. Then Dragon Rising sucked and they all came crawling back. ArmA3 is better than ArmA2 by a long shot in beta; look how far ArmA2 has come since the days of it's release. It will only get better from here. Yes, it sucks that BIS delayed the campaign, I get it, But you will have a campaign eventually. When everything is said and done, you all will still be here and you'll all be playing ArmA3. Just like the release of ArmA2.

A cynical view might be that announcing/admitting "no campaign at release" is actually truth in advertising relative to Arma 2's initial public release state... or that the "if it doesn't work to an acceptable standard (whose definition will not be publicly revealed) then drop it" rule also applied to the campaign. :p

Moreover, maybe the campaign was totally finished, then because of the greek incident they had to delete the whole thing and restart it from the very beginning...

I'm actually really inclined to believe this, considering the "different story" hints that were being dropped along the way during the alpha, including the bit from a dev (maybe pettka? maybe Moricky?) about the AAF being modeled on Malta's military, and of course the overt/explicit admission that the Greek incident is behind "Altis, not Limnos".

[Wiki 1558]

Maybe the rework of the campaign was part of the deal to free BIS dev.?

[*LK1* 10]

campaign? i don't care. pvp is the way.

/flame

[chortles 263]

Maybe the rework of the campaign was part of the deal to free BIS dev.?

Obviously we won't hear about that any time soon from the devs, but one thing people seem to keep forgetting is that legally Ivan and Martin are supposed to eventually return to Greece to stand trial, they're literally working-while-out-on-bail.

[zooloo75 833]

campaign? i don't care. pvp is the way.

/flame

pvp? i don't care. campaign is the way.

/flame

[kylania 567]

What is this pvp and campaign stuff you're all on about? I thought ArmA3 was just an editor with multiplayer mission preview?

[chortles 263]

campaign? i don't care. pvp is the way.

/flame

pvp? i don't care. campaign is the way.

/flame

What is this pvp and campaign stuff you're all on about? I thought ArmA3 was just an editor with multiplayer mission preview?

Excellent techniques, your skills are superb :icon_twisted: