Was Arma 2 more popular ?

[Tankbuster 1746]

If by popular, you mean units sold, then DayZ (standalone) is BI's best selling product. According to wikipedia's list of best selling PC games, it sold 3.5 million copies and It's 32nd on that list. Arma 3 was some way further down the list ahead of Flashpoint. Arma 2 didn't make the 1 million mark and therefore doesn't make the list, but you could argue that it was later 'rebranded' as Combined Ops or Arrowhead (Yes, I know that's not strictly the right nomenclature) and may have been have been counted as different games.

[chrisb 196]

I would expect A3 to be more popular. BI put effort into make the game more accessible for a wider range of players. I think it did what it was meant to do.

 

A2 on the other hand was really the last of the ‘niche’ the series had, it looks like that, to me anyway.

Dayz helped BI out tremendously I would imagine. It brought players that weren’t into mil-sim style gaming into the series and with that, the whole ‘Life’ side of the game sprang up too, plus the other formats hanging around.

 

All the different games that can be made/played with the sandbox is great. It gives the title/series more legs, certainly that a niche player-base (however fond of the series) could ever do (financially wise).

So the series or format continues.

 

That said, all the players/groups I know still use A2OA, but that is because of mods that are only available for the title. Plus there are a few other things concerning A3, that keep some players back from moving on. That may change though for some players later if things in the game change.

 

I think, now the niche has gone, a lot of that player-base went with it, or stayed in previous titles. But that is always the case, isn’t it.

 

I don’t really care which is more popular. The only thing that matters to each player, is whether or not they like the title they are playing. If your happy with that, then who cares about numbers.

 

[gibonez 18]

Then again Arma 3 also benefited from the added exposure from Dayz.

 

Due to Dayz a whole gigantic group of people who had never even had arma in their sights bought arma 3 immediately.

 

Still don't buy the accessibility leading to bigger sales theory especially since Arma 3 is by all means less accessible than arma 2.

 

Arma 3 has fatigue, uavs , eden and a whole bunch of other more complex good features that are not super easy to grasp and definetely more complicated than their arma 2 counterparts.

[Tankbuster 1746]

You say 'less accessible'. I say 'more feature rich'

[Rich_R 1087]

I guess this pretty much finalizes the discussion

 

https://twitter.com/ondrejkuzel/status/731946295561224196/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

[germanske_norge 43]

If you're talking about actual Milsim players? Arma 2/OFP, the server browser in Arma 3 should be retitled to "Wasteland and Arma 3 Life Server Browser"

 

That being said, Arma 3 is certainly more popular overall. 

[kocrachon 2]

I guess this pretty much finalizes the discussion

 

https://twitter.com/ondrejkuzel/status/731946295561224196/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

 

 

Remember, ArmA 2 was not Steam exclusive, and functioned without Steam. So many players, especially a lot of European countries, were more likely to buy non steam copies. So that doesn't prove ArmA 3  had the most. I would venture to say that the massive boom of DayZ back when it was an ArmA 2 mod would have put ArmA 2 in the top 10 spot. 

 

 

Honestly, I think this game would get a huge boom from modders if they added a common language to the game like C# / Python / Perl for people to work with. For work I script in python. I really don't want to deal with also keeping up with SQF/SQS. If they made modding more practical I think we would see more mods and mission makers and things would boom.

 

On that note. I do think ArmA 2 might have been more favorably viewed. Most people migrated from ArmA 1 - ArmA 2 right away, because ArmA 2 was generally an improvement. ArmA 2 - ArmA 3, a lot of the bigger milsim communities waited to migrate. Some were unhappy with the future setting and wanted to wait  for modern weapon (My group was in that category) and some were unhappy with steam workshop being introduced. ANd a lot of people were happy with ArmA 2 and didn't want to upgrade.

 

I think ArmA 3 is doing fine now, but I do think there were some mis-steps that slowed down its launch/growth. But overall I think people view ArmA 2 more favorably so it may appear ArmA 2 did better than ArmA 3, but I don't think that is the case numbers wise.  

[nettrucker 142]

Still playing a lot more ArmA 2 than ArmA 3, but if you ask me specifically why? I can't give you a straight answer. I think I simply like ArmA 2 more and that's it. I stiil havent played all modded stuff available in ArmA 2. In particular the CWR MOD is giving me a blast, like back in OFP times

Just my 2 cents

cheers

[krycek 349]

Not sure how popular A3 is,but all I can say is thank God for guys like CUP team otherwise I would have returned to A2 long time ago.

A3 content wasn't bad,but its diversity,design decisions and "if it doesn't work perfectly we cut it" coupled with excuses that they're some kind of indie dev that doesn't have resources(meanwhile they have multiple games in production,studios and even bought some IPs) really left a bitter taste with this whole game.

[I give up 152]

Arma 2 reminds me when I was a happy guy.

Anyway, thats past.

[PuFu 4600]

http://steamspy.com/search.php?s=arma+2

 

have a look. by sales, A2 was above in any case, much due to dayz.

 

here's dayz standalone:

http://steamspy.com/app/221100

[nettrucker 142]

http://steamspy.com/search.php?s=arma+2

 

have a look. by sales, A2 was above in any case, much due to dayz.

 

here's dayz standalone:

http://steamspy.com/app/221100

 

 

 

I don't believe these figures to be accurate. ArmA 2 and OA were  NON steam titles in the beginning. A lot of people myself included have bought the game when it was not bound to Steam and I gonna keep it that way for sure I don't hand over my keys to Steam no way. And that goes for all BIS games prior to ArmA 3. But back on topic. Notwithstanding ArmA 3 has  a lot of improvements it's an old turd in a new shiny box. It has still issues dating back from OFP times which will never ever be addressed. maybe they can't I don't know. I lost hope that they would ever fix the AI driving issues, I waited only 15 years to get it somehow addressed I ain't gonna hold my breath over it any longer. Why they removed the first aid modules is still beyond my understanding. Jesus I used them in any mission I made. It is punishing for every mistake you make. If you run and gun you will be more rolling around on the ground rather than play the mission.  I for one am still playing ArmA 2 especially with MODS  and that ain'y gonna change very soon.

Cheers :681:

[war_lord 934]

Mechanically, Arma 3 is a much better game. It's the bizarre decision to go with a setting that's not sci-fi enough to enjoy as pure escapism, and far from realistic enough to take seriously that angers me. And honestly a lot of it feels really lazy. 

[djotacon 190]

Arma 2 was the reference into the simulation scene, but out of this scene the "casual players" dont know nothing about about the game.

 

Reading the STEAM comments about Arma 2 was: "clunky", "human tank simulator", etc.

 

Now Arma 3 has not only the milsim fans but also players that never play this kind of games.

 

In popularity terms Arma 3 is the "game" of war surpassing older other games in terms of qualtiy and playability.

[3D_vet 29]

If you want a super external opinion of a newcomer (not new to video games in general) I only heard of Arma as it was mentioned always as a very realistic simulator. I was not really interested in a simulator ("real" situations would have much more to do with actual daily professional, official training during many years, and psychological trained capabilities, as a more key factor than weapons realism to emulate reality there, among other millions of things...plus most of us would hate to be in the middle of a war (I think so do most soldiers)...) That was years ago, never tried the game...and if you want a very tiny stat/example... I got interested again about the saga, thanks to DayZ!  So, all is due to Youtube's vids about it, and even more, the quality of a TV Show like The Walking Dead, that surely has spawned the interest on zombies' theme.  That no matter what, it always sells well.. IMO, might be a little overdone, now, and beginning to go down, so, maybe not so much about zombies like a year ago, but rather the survival game modes/free roam worlds, etc, game mode that it helped to revive.

 

PD: Also, from a commercial point of view, the "casual"  or just typical FPS game styles do sell tons more...The target market is huge in comparison,(let alone that the fremium model has been also succesful) Market-wise, is still way risky to develop it as it has been in the saga, even if people think is not realistic enough. Is almost an evolution law that companies try to look for a way to maintain themselves by having a reasonable profit. They must! Otherwise salaries are not paid by art of magic. I'm guessing the military theme is still in good numbers,(COD was huge in its day) and the saga is all about that, having built loyal customers. Even so, if there's some slight shift for playability (I've played very little, but I would never ever call that "casual" gaming, lol.. and am quite good in other FPSs), I'd say it could be still a very valiant position by the company...even counting on the small shifts.

 

BTW, the numbers upgrade in players -which, btw, is the main source of survival for ANY game/company...- might have also benefited from the outrageous closing of BattleField Play For Free, from which I come from, in which I played since beta times till the end, and would have never moved from there... That's a non simulator game, but extremely fun...still, militar, though definitely non realistic. But needing quite skill.  I have already found, in just some days, some guys coming from there...I mean, in 2 days, i find old gamers from there... too much of a coincidence... I know Arma has grown a lot, and it has its own big population. But a little bit comes from there, too. The community was big.

[angel24marin 34]

I prefer to play Arma 3 instead of Arma 2. (I must say that I'm young in the series, I saw dayz, that interested me. After play Arma 2 Free I liked the style and brought Arma 3 in Alfa (2 days before entering beta with a correspondent increase of cost).

IMO they wanted to do a conflict like Israel vs Iran. (Merkava tank, Named APC, Tarvor, Mediterranean theatre etc)

But the public opinion wouldn't see it with good eyes so they try something new (instead of USAF vs Russia or more Afghanistan ). I don't dislike the 2035 settings but prefer if they are more close to RL. (Example, I like all the weapons selection of Apex, but with the VTOLs and Type 115 I have mixed feelings. They are cool, interesting and I like it but at the same time I feel in the Attack of the clones.)

Also,i don't understand why people don't like Steam workshop. It make the life a lot easier for me as I can't join a serious Group of playing so I play mostly SP missions. I only have to enter steam, see a few missions and play.

[dragon01 902]

ArmA3 is probably more popular, but it did suffer from the misaimed futuristic setting and a lot of non-BI meddling. I think that the reason they made up a rifle and renamed all others was that at some point after A2's release, some rules changed about depicting real equipment in media that made fake names necessary for copyright purposes. Also, the "Lemnos incident" with BI's devs might have caused a major shift in focus from real-world entities, while at the same time ensuring that'd it'd be Greek forces that play the main villain. Add to that some medicore writing (not outright bad, but it could have been handled better) and you get a game that really didn't realize its full potential.

 

In short, BIS shouldn't let politics get in their way again when they make ArmA4. A3 would've been much better if they stuck to the original concept of Israel vs. Iran (note that it still got banned in the latter, so the change didn't really work). If game developers have to make such changes because they fear lawsuits, then some laws need to be changed.

[3D_vet 29]

Politics can ruin it all, bad press, etc. If a game falls in a bad place due to that..... I know that well...IMO, if that was so, sounds like it was surely a wise decision.

[dragon01 902]

That depends, actually. There were games that got so much bad press that everyone bought them to see what the fuss was all about. :) Politics are a double-edged sword, though. There were cases where a political misstep turned an otherwise good work into a flop. IMO, politicians should keep their squabbles to themselves and leave art to the intelligent people, but you know how it is.

 

In the end, I think that being known as "A game that filpped Iran off" wouldn't have been that bad for ArmA3. Especially seeing as "CSAT" didn't exactly fool the Iranians, who banned the game anyway (which is funny, considering they're not particularly evil, just antagonistic. AAF are the bad guys, CSAT are just the ugly ones ;)). Israel could have been tricky because it's rather controversial itself, but I think that unless they obviously took sides in the Palestine debate, nobody would've had problems with that, either (well, except Hamas and some Palestinians, but these guys are lucky if they have water to drink, nevermind gaming computers). I appreciate that BI isn't big on taking sides in political issues, but I say they shouldn't let politics restrict their artistic options, as well.

[3D_vet 29]

Still, happens every day, for every company. I've worked at a bunch, game developers and others about regular applications production. All is related...is not the actual politicians, but...investors... media channels denying promotion of certain contents.....there's much more than an artistic view..An artist is writing this, lol....If there's a risk of a game being put down after the huge release effort, companies tend not to take chances, after all is their plate of food...Some companies would be dead in the water if happens to them just one time.. Of course, there are cases, like Carmageddon in the elder days, that one got very good sells (unsure if also meant real final good profit...), but some countries totally banned the game, or imposed some heavy modifications which forced special versions for those countries, which ended much worse than if had been done differently... As a game artist, graphic designer, and illustrator, I can tell you: In ten companies, even being a bit of a rebel, to pull your own artistic view over commercial or politics based limits, or, expect that a studio is going to be able to impose their artistic criteria over higher powers which they depend on (I know nothing bout  this company's situation and internals, btw), well, that often can be too much to expect, in my experience...

[drebin052 324]

IMO they wanted to do a conflict like Israel vs Iran. (Merkava tank, Named APC, Tarvor, Mediterranean theatre etc)

But the public opinion wouldn't see it with good eyes so they try something new (instead of USAF vs Russia or more Afghanistan ).

 

Digressing a bit here, but I'm not sure where you got the idea that it was some "Israel vs. Iran" that the devs were going after with the 2011 iteration of A3. Nor was "public opinion" the reason why they dropped the original settings. Virtually every single asset on BLUFOR we have now that is based on the Slammer chassis was originally meant to be used by OPFOR; even the M-ATV Hunter wasn't a BLUFOR asset until later into development.

 

The main reason why OPFOR (then-named as the Iranian Armed Forces) had so much Israeli-made hardware was because the original storyline (still set in the mid 2030s) had WW3 already raging for a good decade. Most of Western and Southern Europe; Turkey being the first country to fall, has already been conquered at this point and is occupied by Iran, while Israel and every other Middle Eastern country that had hostile relations to Iran were similarly annexed long before the war had started,

a feat made possible in no small part due to Iran using the seismic device to destabilise those hostile countries with "a series of natural disasters and earthquakes", and then invading assisting the country for "humanitarian" reasons.

 

Co-incidentally, this major plot element is reused in the Apex Protocol campaign; simply replace Turkey with Tanoa and you have the 2011 storyline in a nut shell.

 

But they dropped the idea of NATO vs. Iran and swapped it to NATO vs. CSAT after the "stuff" that went down in 2012. As a result, they changed most of the OPFOR line-up to BLUFOR instead while other things like the TAR-21s were chucked onto the FIA, AAF taking BLUFOR's F2000, the creation of the Katiba and MX, etc. This is why it was never "Israel vs. Iran".

[dragon01 902]

Interesting, I don't remember seeing those screenshots. I suppose I didn't follow A3 closely enough early on. If so, it was an interesting idea, but I suppose it'd have been hard to properly clobber the Greeks in the pre-2012 universe. :) Still, such a rapid course change mid-development wasn't good for ArmA3. Perhaps it's that the change itself wasn't in the right direction, but the fact is that it brought about a lot of the game peculiarities in the equipment lineup.

 

BTW, the CSAT Slammer looks... interesting, so does the Hunter. I wonder if anyone ever thought about recreating these skins...