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avibird 1

What is bohemia's real business plan/direction for the ARMA game engine in the future

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Regarding the DayZ mod, I have never seen the servers so full and I mean full! So this means that either a) a lot of new customers for BIS or b) a lot of new customers for BIS. Win, Win situation. End of the day you need Arma to run the mod...

Hey dale the main issue/concern I have is that most of the new customers don't give a rats ass about ARMA as a military game or the military simulation part. They just want a game that allows Interaction in a open world environment with Zombies,Werewolves and Vampires ok maybe not werewolvers and Vampires but you get my point. When I returned back to PC gaming for ARMA 2 ( I did not play ARMA 1 ). I was a little upset that most open game servers had mainly domination/warefare missions and the small coop missions from the OFP days were gone. If a player wanted a good small 6-12 player mission they needed to join a clan/group ect to find players because the whole public play changed with JIP and the development of domination/warefare type missions. I don't have time for the whole clan thing nor do I want to be in a clan it's not my cup of tea. Yes some groups are less over the top but they paly at set times. My real life issues sets my ARMA play time not the other way around. So domination became my main mission to play due to the fact you could find a game anytime to play and for the most part people played the mission with the military simulation as the main focus even in public servers. Now you only have DAY Z and zoobies with a little more focus on player vs player ( not a bad thing) but not within a military simulation framework.

I hope this does not change the main makeup of public play for ARMA3

I hope this does not change BOHEMIA'S outlook for game development in the future

I hope this does not interfere with the recutrment of real military gamers into our community.

I hope you guys don't rip me to much and try to understand what I am saying. Money is the evil of all Empires and it is going to be hard to keep the same focus for bohemia once they see the money line.

Edited by AVIBIRD 1

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]It's a mod.

it's popular now, you will see it weed out to less and less ( Still will have a strong following but none that it's experiencing right now )

So all of you cry babies that are thinking " OH NOES1111 MY FAV0R1TE MILSIM IS LEAVING1111."

It's not, It's a fad. There will still be ARMA 2 with ACE. As well, I believe that the ACE crew has said they will be making ACE3. Don't quote me on that.

Edited by Nike619
I done goofed.

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DayZ is only possible because of BIS's open ended approach. People shouldn't be upset about that.

It's simply revenue from a surprise source for BIS.

It certainly shouldn't discourage BIS from maintaining their usual course because without that course, we would never have had DayZ in the first place.

DayZ simply illustrates once again that you can do pretty much anything with the editor and a good idea!

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The mongols are invading !!

What you afraid of people playing a game for what it is, a game. Realistic or unrealistic what matters is gameplay, brought me back i left because game community distilled down to mil simmers more interested in role play than gameplay and public play consisted of nothing but evolution capture the island AI stomp fest, while pvp never really existed especially with how clunky it was.

Its just a game.

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AVIBIRD, I see your viewpoint about how the community has changed and how most of the DayZ kiddos don't give a damn about the milsim aspect of ARMA, but I like how ARMA is open ended and allow the possibility of doing what ever you want to it. My preference to be old school coop that is. Unfortunately for your part, the only way to find some classic coop is to be part of a clan/group/community (unfortunately, most of them I've seen is a bit too strict and over the top for people with less time to play with). I have seen one community that you don't need to be registered with to play (Comrades in Arm <although I only play with them on Sunday in the morning because they play at night in Europe so mornings for me>. You should try playing with them if you like some old fashion OPF style experience).

As for public servers, its never organized most of the time because its a pub. People hop on here and there all the time. Hardly have I've seen organized public games. Usually if you want something more organized and emphasis on the milsim section, you'll have to host it privately whether you play with a over the top hardcore group or a casual and friendly group that will still play the game seriously but will not discriminate you for being a busy man.

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[...] the tactical shooter population. As we know this population of players has been on a steady decline for years.

Do you have any independent and objective numbers about this? A lot of tactical games have moved to a broader audience, but this can be because of a multitude of reasons, for example they can get more sales in the broader market compared to the sales in the niche market. It doesn't mean that the # of people interested in real tac shooters is declining. And not everyone likes Arma, after my original Rainbow Six and Ghost Recon time it took me years to finally get into OFP/Arma. I know all my gaming friends from those times never got into Arma because it's more based on big scale military simulation and rather clunky and buggy, while those other classic tac shooters were more counter terrorist / small scale and less clunky games. I'm 100% confident that there still is a market for those type of games, I guess Takedown and Ground Branch will have to prove it.

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Lets face it, the video game industry has come a long way. No longer is Nintendo vs Sega vs Activision and whatnot from the 80's. Today there are hundreds of game developers all over the world. Its a jungle out there and only the companies who creates accessible games are going to survive IF they are lucky. Now having said that, there's a danger of "serving two masters". Already I've seen in other game forums the disappointment of their favorite game being "dumb-down" to cater a larger audience. Arma in my view is still safe from all this perhaps because the CEO of BIS still has a solid grip of the destiny of the company with minimal or without any asphyxiating influence from powerful publishers like EA or ZeniMax, inc., etc. has over their video game partners.

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Too many worriers here.

BIS makes simulators for the military, including the hardware parts. Whether these parts are out sourced or sub contracted I cannot say.

Now how many copies of a game would it take to buy just one working simulator including the hardware element and support contract for it?

So you can be safe in the knowledge that they will be continually developing the RV engine to stay ahead as they have competition these days and I would imagine it would be silly business not continue their domesticated version for the masses.

Sure DayZ has attracted a new crowd, but DayZ thrives as it is built upon the RV engine and the freedom it brings with it.

The biggest point to remember though worriers, BIS are their own publishing house.

Things only go tits up when some greedy money only orientated publishing company gets a hold of games and turns them into annually updated junkware to sell it to fickle kids who flock from one fad to the next.

At the end of the day the BIS team still care for what they are doing and still have 100% control over it, they thrive on creativity of their product and not just wealth (although I am sure affording a few extra beers in fridge doesn't displease them in any way).

They have gainfully employed a lot of former mod creators for a start, this shows me they have vision and indeed prefer using people who have decent ideas compared to some other companies who just listen to whatever kid shouts the loudest/longest on Twatter.

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Too many worriers here.

The biggest point to remember though worriers, BIS are their own publishing house.

That's a good thing, a very good thing.

Publishing companies have helped many small time game developers but they also have much blood in their hands. I still remember when Eidos, a game publishing company, almost destroyed the reputation of Tomb Raider; They certainly ruined the game developing studio CORE(the creators of Tomb Raider) All because they pushed CORE to finish the game before it was ready. When TR: The Angel of Darkness hit the stores, the fans cried Bloody Mary! The game was unfinished with voids of no meshes/textures, horrible horrible unresponsive controls and whatnot. It was a MESS, a fiasco like some critics put it of an unbelievable franchise. EIDOS in disappointment, dumped CORE and gave the job to Crystal Dynamics to take the helm since EIDOS owned the Tomb Raider trademark.

CORE was never the same after that and eventually disbanded. Some of the members tried to create their own studio but they failed. EIDOS eventually failed as well since their revenues were no longer stellar. They were bought by another company(not sure if wholly)but they still have the EIDOS trademark.

Edited by Lorca

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Isn't the milsim gameplay one of DayZ's trump cards? Don't we already have L4D and such for the less realistic experience?

The irony is that a lot of "newbie" players complain about the engine/realism/non-"twitch shooter" elements of DayZ, lol.

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The irony is that a lot of "newbie" players complain about the engine/realism/non-"twitch shooter" elements of DayZ, lol.

ROFL, as much as I wish there was a way to surpress the endless bitching and complaining that goes on in DayZ, some of the comments are hilarious.

Some of my Faves:

"Night is too dark. they should really tone it down" (Obviously only goes out during the day IRL).

"Why isn't there a tutorial" (I hope the actual Apocalypse has one of those or many people will be totally screwed :D ).

"I ran out of bullets, where do I get more".

"Why can't I fill my canteen with salt water (Lets be fair, at least he figured out that he had to fill the canteen when it was empty).

The list goes on and on.

And of course they all whine and complain that the game should be changed to suit their big green "plzmakeitsoezythatIdontevenhavetothink" button playstyle.

Heaven forbid they try to adapt to the game.

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Also, to be fair about the salt water thing, that was allowed up until a fairly recent patch.

Personally I think the DayZ hype will die down significantly when these new players start to realize that many of their complaints are engine/gameplay limitations and aren't going to get fixed. :p

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Also, to be fair about the salt water thing, that was allowed up until a fairly recent patch.

Yup, I've asked this question ingame as well. I wasn't aware that Rocket had changed it in a patch.

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Ahh well, I thought it was pretty common knowledge that you cannot survive on sea water but I didn't realize that you could actually fill up in the Ocean at some point so I guess that was a fair question.

And I agree with you Maverick, the 'instant grat' legions will abandon it when they realize that their whining won't change anything.

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One thing I don't understand is this hate coming from the ArmA community for run-and-gun games. Come on people, why the hate? Most of those players never heard from the ArmAverse! You can't change people's tastes. If one likes COD or BF3 or Dragon Failing, and think that is realistic let them be. I get tired of seeing this hate from the ArmA community everywhere I see a post, a video (or something) concerning ArmA or the ArmAverse. As some of you guys said, those who can't adapt to this game will slowly abandon, and those who can stick, will stay. Same goes for the Day-Z community. I saw several hate posts on their forums and honestly, I am appaled by this lack of respect for the new players. Remember, that YOU were once a greenhorn and even YOU felt the steep learning curve. But you stayed even if you whined and cried a lot. Remember, one shall receive respect based on one's performance and level of maturity. It should be earned, not demanded. We all had trouble with idiots on our servers before, and we will keep having untill someone steals the Internet. :P

I for one am very happy that BIS is getting the attention they deserve. I am a happy customer of theirs, and as long they keep me happy with their products, I will be a loyal customer. Same goes to the forums. No need to worry about being filled with a bunch of whiners and idiots, because the moderators will keep them in check IF needed. So stop worrying about "ArmA losing what it means to be" or something like that. It is a mod, and if you don't like it, don't play it.

This goes to all the haters and whiners.

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I for one am very happy that BIS is getting the attention they deserve. I am a happy customer of theirs, and as long they keep me happy with their products, I will be a loyal customer. Same goes to the forums. No need to worry about being filled with a bunch of whiners and idiots, because the moderators will keep them in check IF needed. So stop worrying about "ArmA losing what it means to be" or something like that. It is a mod, and if you don't like it, don't play it.

I'm one of the few Arma 2 fans, I suppose, who is happy of this attention BIS is getting. Sure, it may not be what BIS or the fans were expecting--or wanted-- but in business terms this attention has put BIS on the map and they should, of course, do all they can to take advantage of this "free" propaganda. I'm happy because Arma will always be a military game despite the zombie mod which, if it becomes very popular, will branch into its own; a separate entity powered by the Arma engine.

Look, Toyota makes cars and if people all of the sudden start buying more cars because they love a particular color Toyota gave to their cars, I doubt Toyota will all of the sudden throw away their car manufacturing business just to get into the paint job business.

Edited by Lorca

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the only thing that would do good in ArmA would be an Idiots Tutorial. for real idiots really. And this is not meant to punish or sth. the new dayz and cod crowd. I was once also an idiot years ago, and I bite myself through, but I had been so happy for an idiots guide ^^

and when we startet learning with OFP it wasnt all so complicated. Imagine how ppl feel like when they buy arma II as their first tactical shooter what they feel like!

and even ofp wasnt so hard, cause i was an experienced rainbow six player who was used to think before shoot gameplay all the way..

we had so much good pc games in 1998 - 2002

the ppl of today only know run and gun. give them some time.

Edited by tremanarch

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the only thing that would do good in ArmA would be an Idiots Tutorial. for real idiots really. And this is not meant to punish or sth. the new dayz and cod crowd. I was once also an idiot years ago, and I bite myself through, but I had been so happy for an idiots guide ^^

I'm not an idiot in general, but I'm thinking of putting together some sort of guide for raw recruits. I am still somewhat cannon fodder, but I learnt a huge amount from these forums, & collating that information could help other newbies & reduce (hopefully!) the number of replicate posts asking basic questions.

@Landmine & Lorca: +1

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Does it occur to anyone that the reason DayZ exists in the first place is because of what the RV engine can do? And the RV engine does what it does because of it's original game design. A hugely successful mod does NOT reduce this.

As far as future developments goes - I wouldn't be surprised to see maybe a small cut-down version of the RV engine that has only the assets needed for the DayZ game. Sell it as a standalone, cheap, easy Steam download, already configured for DayZ usage = profit.

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As far as future developments goes - I wouldn't be surprised to see maybe a small cut-down version of the RV engine that has only the assets needed for the DayZ game. Sell it as a standalone, cheap, easy Steam download, already configured for DayZ usage = profit.

Yeah, the Dayz mod is a perfect candidate for becoming a standalone game. But don't be surprise either if in the future Dayz standalone game surpasses Arma in popularity and profits. Life is full of ironies and Dayz came out of the womb of irony. And suppose Dayz does become a very solid game with a big following, I doubt that BIS will "cut-down" the RV engine for Dayz, at most it would be as good as the Arma version.

Edited by Lorca

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Yeah, the Dayz mod is a perfect candidate for becoming a standalone game. But don't be surprise either if in the future Dayz standalone game surpasses Arma in popularity and profits. Life is full of ironies and Dayz came out of the womb of irony. And suppose Dayz does become a very solid game with a big following, I doubt that BIS will "cut-down" the RV engine for Dayz, at most it would be as good as the Arma version.

Yeah for a while I had imagined that a cut-down RV game might have been considered for a pure DayZ release, no editor and no non-DayZ assets (soldiers, vehicles etc) but then I got to thinking that DayZ has perhaps already done its job in selling itself, in that players need to buy Arma:CO already. Be unfair to then release the non-beta as another pay for game :)

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