Thank you BI [2018 Roadmap Update]

[mmm 35]

"Open World" could mean a number of things, I'd expect the less ambitious kind, consider where the game is in its life cycle, and the fact its not a paid DLC. As much as I'm excited about SP, especially official "Open World" SP. I just don't think the back bone is there for a coherent, consistent dynamic open world experience in this iteration of ARMA. IMHO much has to do with player's inability to meaningfully command AI in SP(even if it is technically speaking quite elaborate already) and just AI in general. Still I'm eager to see what the "experiment" is about and what they actually do differently to deliver the "Open World" gameplay.

[lexx 1364]

I'd expect something similar to the bad ending scenario of the vanilla campaign. Whole island is accessible, ai is spawning in certain areas, there are a few tasks to accomplish, etc. and then it ends.

[mmm 35]

As far as openness goes "Game Over" was as much as it gets in official campaign. With save enabled I once played to the into the second night until the mod I used gave in rendered the session no longer playable. There were actually some events going around the island even if they are simple trigger based on your movement. Too bad there's no interaction with the Bluefor you run into and saved from the enemies. Not too dissimilar to your patrol's where its only real purpose is to salvage some equipments, where every living person you run into is an enemy. And the orbat seems to be just another hint at the final official mains campaign as a mere vestige of a far more ambitious, open world campaign that never came to be.

 

Well at least one can hope, since they called it an experiment there's at least a chance they could do something differently than they have been. I hope its not a shallow one man army thing, but again leading can be no less frustrating with vanilla command.

[Varis 34]

Remaining major hopes for multiplayer experience would then seem to be to 1) community to wrap up the best potential into a really good game mode 2) new assets and vehicles from 3rd party DLCs

 

Tanks DLC was the #1 thing I had to actually wait for. ARMA3 has already achieved so much and with 500 hours total clocking I'm only starting to piece together how great a game it is. Though "platform" might be a more accurate label 

[lexx 1364]

I'm using this thread for the new roadmap update.

 

The following part got me and forced me to respond:

Quote

That means that, unlike as it perhaps was in previous years, it will be more difficult for us to already share specific plans well in advance.

LOL. (I rarely use 'lol' nowadays, but just can't hold it back here) We barely get any info on anything planned ever since... even before Apex. Seriously. BI, you don't give out information on *anything* unless it is about to get released in a month or will be on dev branch in three days. If this is good or bad practice is a different issue entirely, but Jesus... it's not like you're showering us in intel.

 

Quote

We’ll want to carefully balance sharing our ideas versus managing your expectations and be careful about making promises of which we’re not sure whether we’ll be able to deliver.

Yeah, about that... Remember how folks expected like animations and melee and tactical knifes and shit from the TacOps-DLC? Or how folks were bummed once they saw the Apex content outside of Tanoa? That was because you never shot down any of such crazy talk with some actual real info. People are in the dark up until before the content gets released, and by then the expectations went wild already. Shit, I've read from people expecting "The Old Man"-scenario to be some MGSV-level stuff. You want to carefully manage expectations? Then just say... something, I don't know.

 

This is not a rant post (well, maybe a little bit). I know how shitty it is to have uncertain plans and you don't want to share anything until you are really certain.. but the above quotes just triggered me and I had to let this out.

 

Other than that, thanks for the update provided. At least it's good to know that we should not expect the announced scenario to appear within this year and that there's still the option of more official content in the future.

[Callsign 128]

14 minutes ago, lexx said:

You want to carefully manage expectations? Then just say... something, I don't know

This x 1000. I'm feeling more and more that these Intel briefings are just becoming 'we are doing somethng but we're not going to tell you about it' updates, which are pointless for BIS to write, and frustrating for the community to read. I definitely think BIS can be more specific without necessarily giving away too much. They could at least promise small and over-deliver, which would stop the wild speculation.

[froggyluv 2136]

Underwhelming.

 

Lets just juice the heck outta Arma 3 until its bone dry and maybe then we'll think about an Arma 4 if one of the community mods doesnt magically morph into a new DayZ/Fortnite etc...

 

Unless someones working on a new way to upgrade the entire firefight experience -im pretty unimpressed and probably grabbing my spurs and head out West for Some console Redemption. Just too much 'Go here, encounter 10 enemies in Flock formation laying on the ground,  magically rotating and shooting your head on sight. No soldier emotion, variance of animations, reactions, rate of fire, random act of courage, lunacy or cowardice -all just too samey for too long now. Hopefully BI you'll one day allow your AI to lets its hair down..

[Malcain 35]

Not a single word about bugfixes and polishing. There are so many issues existing since release, those which are fixable without switching to new engine, I had hopes they would be addressed, but I guess I was wrong.

[EO 11277]

Quote

Now that the Arma 3 platform has entered more stable waters and no major changes to core mechanics are to be expected, you can say that we’ve moved into a next phase for Arma 3. One which, in many ways, is about experimenting. This involves stepping out of our comfort zones, embracing more creative freedom, and relaxing our grip. That certainly also applies to our “Old Man” (codename) project – a free open-world singleplayer scenario for Apex owners, which we first discussed in our 2018 roadmap update in June. Originally, we were aiming for this to be ready for a release at the end of the year, but over the past few months it’s become clear that this was not realistic. Building an open-world scenario, with original gameplay, that offers you freedom, but also provides enough guidance, comes with a lot of new design challenges. Those will take more time to solve, and right now we’re not sure yet when we’ll be able to meet our goals for the “Old Man” project.

 

Pretty disappointed "Old Man" has been put on the back burner, another blow for the Single Player base, when this carrot was dangled back in June i took a full bite. Reading between the lines I'm not so sure it will ever see the light of day...it's a very guarded and circumspect statement from BI, especially when it seems to have been replaced at the last minute with a regurgitated 3 year old MP mode. I do hope they can overcome these design challenges...

 

 

 

 

[Imperator[TFD] 444]

Looking forward to Warlords and the ADR97 making into Arma 3.

I'm hoping Warlords scratches that good old warfare itch I've had since A2 days and the glory that was BECTI.

 

As for all the negative feedback up above, particularly relating to communications, it seems BI are damned if they do and damned if they don't.  If people in the community want to build up unrealistic expectations about things that have only been hinted at then that's on them.

[Wiki 1558]

I don't like open world very much.

However, curious about that "old man" scenario - though I don't expect much about it.

 

I would have prefered a proper linear scenario to end this.

 

As SP player mostly, I gotta say I am quite frustrated with ArmA 3.

And, short of few people like lexx, there are not much good SP community made content.

[joostsidy 685]

I think the news update is fine. Unless you're a newcomer, you know the drill: arma 3 is complicated, there are issues, but there are also many cool things that you don't find in other games. Just take it as it is and have patience. Next year we'll see what they come up with.

[haleks 8212]

Goodbye "Old Man", there goes my expectations for an actual SP mod set on Tanoa...

[jeza 5416]

Personally pov is that good that they have more content coming and great for those mod devs which will get the opportunity to earn from their work in the future however, there still is the elephant in the room which they do not mention (maybe deliberately?) Arma 4. I am almost spent with my time in arma 3, it has been great but 5 years and 1500hours worth is enough (for others its not fair enough), Id like to be playing a3 now in the way I was playing armed assault in which we'd be playing coop/sp together on TS and be speaking about arma 2, something new to look forward to and how its going to improve on what we are playing now. They did say recently that it is not currently in development, which I dont buy and 'we’re not expecting to announce a potential new Arma title in the next years' that part depresses me, two or three more years with nothing concrete to look forward to. But the positive side is the SP content they announced which hopefully will keep me entertained (unless its tanoa life SP - jesusgod just the mere thought) and the previously mentioned 3rd party stuff should be good for us players and potential moddevs, and who knows maybe we'll get FarmA 2 in the mean time 

[Rich_R 1087]

21 hours ago, jeza said:

however, there still is the elephant in the room which they do not mention (maybe deliberately?) Arma 4.

 

Ive been depressed by the lack of news as well but have come to a theory which gives me hope.

 

BI are facing high expectations for the next Arma. Expected engine (graphical) improvements, better AI, ensure women are in the game and add back some features (realism) lost when we went from 2 to 3.

 

Add to this the features being brought out in DayZ (streams, etc) and fit it all into a sandbox world that can be moddable and handle the number of players the series is known for, it’s a tall order.

 

And to be fair, we, the player base don’t make it easy. The community is so quick to hang their hat on the mention of a feature, claiming it’s the end of the world if the feature doesn’t make into the game or the developers take it in a different direction. Why should BI give us an indication of what’s going on?

 

Lets not even talk about the arguments about what era it should be set in.

 

Two other things they may looking at, portability of Arma 3 (and thereby Arma 2 content) as well as an easier system for terrain building.

 

like all good things, Arma 4 will come.

 

Or they could abandon the series for an XBox title. Who knows :)

[Harzach 2517]

Bummer about Old Man. I don't play a lot of SP Arma, but sometimes I get a hankering for it and can never find a scenario that I really enjoy. The open-world theme appeals to me, so I was feeling optimistic.

[redarmy 422]

BIS have their reasons for being vague about the future,it would seem.

 

I for one can only speculate.But i feel that they understand the importance of Arma4...what it will mean for an ever growing,constantly more popular franchise that is constantly reaching out to new people.The more you are in a spotlight,the more you are reluctant to say much as it carries alot more weight than it did before.

 

I feel they have handled Arma3's life quite well,with some exceptions.I believe that they have had an amazing relation with the player base,when compared especially to some other publisher/developers out there.

 

As was said above,there was many bug fixes and polishing that could and really should have been done on the current engine.

There were some "basic" and "expected" things that either didnt make it into Arma3 or made it in late(too late for some peoples liking)...such as vehicle interiors...which are fantastic btw...finally.

 

How in the world they never implimented a SP revive or semi fleshed out medical system is beyond me..To me THAT is so basic,and basic systems like this should be included into Arma3 now(better late than never) and utilized in such a way that it is polished and ready for Arma4.

 

The fact they made a revive system for MP and ignored SP really pissed me off-as it made me feel as if they didnt want to "deal with" the AI...look,AI gets alot of stick in Arma3,but i find it acceptable as this is unscripted and no game out there iv played comes close to Arma3's AI,which also have improved in the last few updates...was taking the MP revive and applying it to AI so hard?It would have made many people who are easily annoyed at the AI system in Arma3 a little more forgiving and appeased...

 

Why,in the game files there are weapon acc mounting animations,but they were left out of final release?These immersive,and mechanical functions as well as others like female faces are what should be defining Arma ,to be another feature/function in a already open sandbox where the terrain is believable , and immersive.(accurate star map at night for example)

 

BIS you can align the cosmos...But you cant get my medic to do the only job i need him to do?!

 

I think its a side effect,that a game that offers so much,delivers so much,causes us to EXPECT so much more...because at the end of the day,this game drives our imagination,wether creating a script,mission or whatever,we are always tweaking,looking for a new effect,a new plot,a new something,in a title that believe it or not already offers so danm much,that i personaly could wait half a decade or more for Arma4.

 

 

[stburr91 1006]

On 11/7/2018 at 10:38 AM, lexx said:

I'm using this thread for the new roadmap update.

 

The following part got me and forced me to respond:

LOL. (I rarely use 'lol' nowadays, but just can't hold it back here) We barely get any info on anything planned ever since... even before Apex. Seriously. BI, you don't give out information on *anything* unless it is about to get released in a month or will be on dev branch in three days. If this is good or bad practice is a different issue entirely, but Jesus... it's not like you're showering us in intel.

 

Yeah, about that... Remember how folks expected like animations and melee and tactical knifes and shit from the TacOps-DLC? Or how folks were bummed once they saw the Apex content outside of Tanoa? That was because you never shot down any of such crazy talk with some actual real info. People are in the dark up until before the content gets released, and by then the expectations went wild already. Shit, I've read from people expecting "The Old Man"-scenario to be some MGSV-level stuff. You want to carefully manage expectations? Then just say... something, I don't know.

 

This is not a rant post (well, maybe a little bit). I know how shitty it is to have uncertain plans and you don't want to share anything until you are really certain.. but the above quotes just triggered me and I had to let this out.

 

Other than that, thanks for the update provided. At least it's good to know that we should not expect the announced scenario to appear within this year and that there's still the option of more official content in the future.

 

There is not doubt that the updates always seem to include little in the way of details, and now we're getting even less.

 

Worse yet is the fact that we're now getting updates that contradict previous updates.  

 

 

 

On 11/7/2018 at 3:18 PM, EO said:

 

Pretty disappointed "Old Man" has been put on the back burner, another blow for the Single Player base, when this carrot was dangled back in June i took a full bite. Reading between the lines I'm not so sure it will ever see the light of day...it's a very guarded and circumspect statement from BI, especially when it seems to have been replaced at the last minute with a regurgitated 3 year old MP mode. I do hope they can overcome these design challenges...

 

 

 

 

 

I too am very disappointed that the "Old Man" project that was promised has now been delayed, and replaced with an MP mode, an old gun pack, and BI character models that I have absolutely no interest in. 

 

 

 

On 11/7/2018 at 4:45 PM, Imperator[TFD] said:

As for all the negative feedback up above, particularly relating to communications, it seems BI are damned if they do and damned if they don't.  If people in the community want to build up unrealistic expectations about things that have only been hinted at then that's on them.

 

Imperator[TFD],

 

My expectations are based solely on what BI told us they would deliver.

 

I was very excited when BI told us they would do a proper SP conversion of the Apex campaign.

 

I was extremely disappointed to hear BI canceled the project (after a full year of myself, and many others waiting for it).

 

BI told us that they would deliver a new SP campaign this year to make up for the canceled Apex conversion. Now they tell us the project is not going to be delivered this year. Worse yet, they provide no timeline for the project whatsoever. 

 

My expectations are not unrealistic, BI is not delivering on what they told us they would.

 

 

On 11/8/2018 at 9:42 AM, jeza said:

Personally pov is that good that they have more content coming and great for those mod devs which will get the opportunity to earn from their work in the future however, there still is the elephant in the room which they do not mention (maybe deliberately?) Arma 4. I am almost spent with my time in arma 3, it has been great but 5 years and 1500hours worth is enough (for others its not fair enough), Id like to be playing a3 now in the way I was playing armed assault in which we'd be playing coop/sp together on TS and be speaking about arma 2, something new to look forward to and how its going to improve on what we are playing now. They did say recently that it is not currently in development, which I dont buy and 'we’re not expecting to announce a potential new Arma title in the next years' that part depresses me, two or three more years with nothing concrete to look forward to. But the positive side is the SP content they announced which hopefully will keep me entertained (unless its tanoa life SP - jesusgod just the mere thought) and the previously mentioned 3rd party stuff should be good for us players and potential moddevs, and who knows maybe we'll get FarmA 2 in the mean time 

 

 

This is my greatest disappointment with BI.

 

I cannot comprehend how Arma 4 is still at least  a "few" years away.

 

What is a "few?" A couple is two, so a few is three, or more?

 

Is Arma 4 at least three, or more years away?

 

For me that is completely unacceptable, short of a complete expansion being released in the meantime (we know that isn't happening). 

 

I cannot  comprehend the business decision to not start the development of A4 years ago, and having an A4 beta release sometime in 2019. 

 

What the heck have I been supporting Arma for with my DLC purchases if they weren't developing A4? 

 

Very disappointing.

[jeza 5416]

That is assuming that, that actually is the case :)

[lex__1 422]

On 08.11.2018 at 1:45 PM, joostsidy said:

I think the news update is fine. Unless you're a newcomer, you know the drill: arma 3 is complicated, there are issues, but there are also many cool things that you don't find in other games. Just take it as it is and have patience. Next year we'll see what they come up with.

I will not be surprised when in the future, we see old problems. These problems, in due time, did not allow players of Arma2 to play Arma3 and which created leakage of players from Arma3.
Everything that I saw in updates of Arma3, this solution of some problems with addition of new problems, besides, the total number of problems did not decrease.
It approach of BIS to the work, at me raises great doubts about future Arma4. To create Arma3 with an array of problems, with a promise - we will consider it, etc. I, since December of last year, do not play Arma3 as game problems which different level matters and collision with problems has constant invariable systematicity.
It was much made in Arma3, good and beautiful work, but - as a honey barrel which can be spoiled one spoon of shit.