Why the fascination with Evolution?

[-SoF-Max 0]

I am just wondering why is everyone so fascinated with this Co-op evolution crap?

This isn't the OFP I started playing years ago where there was tons of CTF, Hold, and Deathmatch maps on a majority of the servers.

I mean right now there is nearly 107 servers playing some version of evolution. 3 Hold, 1 DM, and 1 CTF. And just a few other scattered game types.

So at my count right now a 107 playing evolution co-op crap and 17 servers playing some other game type.

What happened to the Hexenkessels, the St. Peirres, Urbans, Bunkers, and other close quarter competitive maps that actually require some skill in killing another person not some crappy AI.

Don't get me wrong I love a little Evolution or Berzerk but like 95% of the server playing evolution? I don't get it. There is almost zero competitiveness right now and I only see about 350 players plus or minus a few playing right now. That is ridiculous for a video game only a few months old, and less than that in the stats. Seems this game is DOA (Dead on Arrival)

Seems like the same things that plagues OFP and Resistance have plagued this game but even worse this time around. No real admin interface, horrible dedicated server setup (LOAD THE WHOLE FREAKING GAME?), and horrible marketing. I was hoping they would have changed some of this stuff 5 years later but no, this is OFP:RESIS with different Islands, a little better graphics, and couple new things.

I have to say I am very disappointed in a game I loved to death and hope they would make some major changes that would be for the better, guess I was wrong.

[Jimboob 0]

Join a league is all I can say. Heh

[-SoF-Max 0]

Join a league is all I can say. Heh

What the hell type league a freaking Evolution League?

I want to join a league but it doesn't appear to me enough clans or servers are playing anything but EvoFreakingLUTION!

[Kevlar2007 1]

I think you should post this in official Disappointed thread but I completely agree with you [soF]Max!

[smellyjelly 0]

Evelution is fine, I like it because I'm familiar with it, but it doesn't really have much meat. It feels like there were just a bunch of enemies placed in a city.

I think the side missions and friendly AI needs to be taken out, but keep the optional objectives, like blowing up the radio tower.

There should be sounds, I know there is carnival music in Armed Assault. It would be cool if there were different senerios to make it not so repetitive. Civilians are good, but I've only seen them in one city so far. It'd be awesome if there were a few civilians driving around the map realisiticly.

[Sleepdoc 0]

Max,

As a very new player to ArmA (and a guy who never played OFP), Evolution has a very important "evolutionary" purpose.  In other words, evolution is kinda slow and allows new players like me to meet with experienced players and learn the many layers and complexites of this wide open architecture at an approachable pace.

I think as a new player (actually I know), i will evolve (yep.  Pun intended) into wanting more and deeper and varied experiences.  ArmA strikes me as a game that will be around for a long timme to come.  And right now, people are still cutting their teeth on it (like me).  and just as importantly (and thank god) expereinced players (the old OFP crowd) are coming into Evolution servers and teaching us new guys the many things and strategies that can be done in this game.   Evolution is a great sandbox and meeting place for the old guard to indoctrinate the new guys.

So I think Evolution is popular becuase the game is deep and many are still learning.  and Evolution has proven to be a great place to learn at an approachable pace.

I'll bet that in 6 to 9 months from now, you will see less Evolution servers and start seeing more sophisticated and varied server mission styles including the PvP stuff you crave.

[xnodunitx 0]

I think you should post this in official Disappointed thread but I completely agree with you [soF]Max!

That wouldn't make sense since this would be a user problem, not a game problem.

In truth talking about this won't solve anything,we can't really control what other players want to play so theres not much point in debating about it, just take whatever server you can find if it makes you happy.

From what I'd heard from many, most prefer evolution because just that, you are fighting against AI, usually it gives the first display of teamwork. I have been to a few and found myself dissapointed on how everyone was going single and nobody ever spoke on the coms.

But if the players feel up to it, there can be some great teamwork..and I think thats what its more about to be honest. From what I'v seen in many games, people are more into teamwork if they are not playing against actual enemies..makes little sense to me really but thats just how it goes.

Not to mention various people were against the whole idea of CTF, saying it was arcade as you can pretty much find it in all games. So..I don't know what to tell you other than to do some searching for people who don't want to play in evolution all the time.

[maddogx 13]

There are already two or three threads like this in the multiplayer and user mission forums. I believe they even have the same name.

[4 IN 1 0]

i for one love COOP and hated Evolution as it simply being over played, if its not that over played i would like it a bit more

[Mak 0]

Not only do I support the continuation of this thread, but I also agree that eVolution has to go. I'm sure it took a lot of work and such, but all it is, is a bunch of small missions bunched into one big island of Sahrani. I'd like to play some more Close Quarters Battles maps like some others have agreed with. Why do we need excessive amounts of vehicles? The maps only encourage vehicle to vehicle combat with hundreds of choppers and tanks they have at the main base... Not only that but blowing up radio towers at every city gets very old, especially playing against the same AI.

Where are all of the 8 vs 8 or 12 vs 12 CQB maps?

[OldGeezer 0]

I don't mean to insult anyone, but I not only never play coop type games, but I can't even understand them. Whenever I want to play against AI, I play the single-player portion of a game (usually the main reason I buy a game). I've always been of the (admitedly possibly wrong) opinion that coop is generally played by those who do not fare well against human opponents. Sure, AI can be extremely hard to defeat in a game like ArmA, but it's hard because it can detect you instantly and can reliably kill you from a great distance if it is programmed to do so, presumably to make up for the fact that the AI can have a difficult time walking around a rock or crossing a bridge, much less devising a clever strategy...at least in a game like ArmA or OFP or Ghost Recon where you (or the AI) can't just run and jump around shooting maniacally ala Quake or Unreal Tournament. Playing against humans, at least to me, is the whole point of multiplayer gaming, with human allies working as a team being an excellent, but secondary feature when possible.

I used to run a Ghost Recon server regularly (fanaticaly for a while) way back when -the original GR, not that newer crap- and I usually found that people asking to switch to coop were usually the ones on the bottom of the scoreboard. Not that they're bad players in general, obviously they do well at coop which can be exceedingly difficult, but it's an entirely different type of "difficult", and I've already gotten sick of that type of "difficult" in the single-player portion of ArmA (an enemy that has amazing aim and superhuman detection skills). Not that I totally suck at it or anything...I think I'm most of the way through the campaign so I can take on the AI, but unlike OFP, I'm not really finding it all that fun...not fun enough to play it all over again after each patch to see if the absense of all those bugs makes a difference. I feel bad for some of the Europeans countries who played the campaign when it was at the alpha stage [ducks behind cover].

Anyways, I find Coop is pretty much the same as the single-player game except your teammates aren't idiots (relatively speaking at least).

Getting my ass handed to me because a human snuck up on me by crawling behind cover would be refreshing in ArmA, but I wouldn't know because every time I check, the few servers that are local (have acceptable pings) are invariably playing coop. Maybe I've been unlucky the few times I've tried so far, but I know where you're coming from...I figured the multiplayer aspect (all humans) would be where ArmA shines. Maybe with time human vs human will become more popular. Maybe someday someone will create a must-have mod that excludes coop mode entirely

[4 IN 1 0]

I don't mean to insult anyone, but I not only never play coop type games, but I can't even understand them. Whenever I want to play against AI, I play the single-player portion of a game (usually the main reason I buy a game). I've always been of the (admitedly possibly wrong) opinion that coop is generally played by those who do not fare well against human opponents. Sure, AI can be extremely hard to defeat in a game like ArmA, but it's hard because it can detect you instantly and can reliably kill you from a great distance if it is programmed to do so, presumably to make up for the fact that the AI can have a difficult time walking around a rock or crossing a bridge, much less devising a clever strategy...at least in a game like ArmA   or OFP or Ghost Recon where you (or the AI) can't just run and jump around shooting maniacally ala Quake or Unreal Tournament. Playing against humans, at least to me, is the whole point of multiplayer gaming, with human allies working as a team being an excellent, but secondary feature when possible.

I used to run a Ghost Recon server regularly (fanaticaly for a while) way back when -the original GR, not that newer crap- and I usually found that people asking to switch to coop were usually the ones on the bottom of the scoreboard. Not that they're bad players in general, obviously they do well at coop which can be exceedingly difficult, but it's an entirely different type of "difficult", and I've already gotten sick of that type of "difficult" in the single-player portion of ArmA (an enemy that has amazing aim and superhuman detection skills). Not that I totally suck at it or anything...I think I'm most of the way through the campaign so I can take on the AI, but unlike OFP, I'm not really finding it all that fun...not fun enough to play it all over again after each patch to see if the absense of all those bugs makes a difference. I feel bad for some of the Europeans countries who played the campaign when it was at the alpha stage [ducks behind cover].

Anyways, I find Coop is pretty much the same as the single-player game except your teammates aren't idiots (relatively speaking at least).

Getting my ass handed to me because a human snuck up on me  by crawling behind cover would be refreshing in ArmA, but I wouldn't know because every time I check, the few servers that are local (have acceptable pings) are invariably playing coop. Maybe I've been unlucky the few times I've tried so far, but I know where you're coming from...I figured the multiplayer aspect (all humans) would be where ArmA shines. Maybe with time human vs human will become more popular. Maybe someday someone will create a must-have mod that excludes coop mode entirely  

if you dont want to insult ppl you better TRY to understand what COOP really is

as i may not play PvP as much but I understand what they are, and will NEVER try to excludes anything that the game brings with, even dm have its rights to stay as long as ppl likes it

[SHWiiNG 0]

Personally, Co-op is the only multiplayer mode i play, now that i go on servers that i am familiar with and most of the time end up playing with the same people.

ARMA is my opinion is not really a fast paced shoot-em-up deathmatch style game anyway. Therefore games like Hexenkessel do not feel right on Arma IMO, but games like good old River battle in OFP would be very welcome one again.

But seriously for deathmatches, capture the flags we have other games like COH, MOH, CSS, BH2 the list goes on

[stobbsy 0]

You could always learn to make your own mission of whatever type you want to play.

I find it hilarious that people say there is no variety, that theres nothing to play except evolution but cant be bothered to learn how to make missions themselves or make missions.

99% of missions played in Operation Flashpoint were player made on the coop side anyway. Never played CTF/DM really so cant really comment on it.

People are relearning how to script in Armed Assault and some of the stuff that worked in ofp, wont work in Armed Assault.

[4 IN 1 0]

thats why i only think that ppl play too much evolution, just simple as that

[charliereddog 9]

two things, the people complaining generally have low post counts suggesting they don't have a background of what Coop can do, and secondly they don't seem to know how to make a mission themselves.

I've found Coop to be the best experience possible. However, Coop doesn't have to be a Player v AI game. On the other hand, I think Coop has become synonymous with serious, strategy/tactical gaming too, rather than a twitch fest DM or CTF game. There's no reason that Coop's can't be two sided, with dynamic objectives for both teams. I made a couple of such missions for my old teams, but its a lot of work and I'm not sure JIP would help that sort of mission making, as well as getting enough players to make a decent experience.

[4 IN 1 0]

yep huge PVP coop is a good thing in OFP and ARMA, i personally have a taste of giant objective match type mission which yours/both side foucs on taking objective instead of killing ppl and gain counts

but it seems to be a little OT here

[Maddmatt 1]

Personally I like both PvP and coop, but I am also sick of Evolution. It is a good map, but people are just playing it too much and don't seem to want to try something new.

New players can just as easily be guided along on other missions, I have seen it happen. My clan guided a game reviewer for a local magazine through Desert Ambush, as well as played a couple PvP maps. It turned out pretty well. So the 'new players' excuse is rubbish.

Evolution is good, but it's played too much and other good missions are being ignored.

I notice there is usually a Bezerk server around with a decent amount of players.

[4 IN 1 0]

Personally I like both PvP and coop, but I am also sick of Evolution. It is a good map, but people are just playing it too much and don't seem to want to try something new.

New players can just as easily be guided along on other missions, I have seen it happen. My clan guided a game reviewer for a local magazine through Desert Ambush, as well as played a couple PvP maps. It turned out pretty well. So the 'new players' excuse is rubbish.

Evolution is good, but it's played too much and other good missions are being ignored.

I notice there is usually a Bezerk server around with a decent amount of players.

you hit the subject rigth on target

OT: another problem for me not enjoy other games as much as OFP and ARMA is that almost all of them lacks decent COOP mode, RS3 is the only game other then OFP which have a coop mode that works

[BloodOmen 0]

Im with you that Evolution is far too over played.

But thats what comes with the new Generation ( Players who only played ArmA ) .

What scares me is the mass of people thatll probely play the " RPG " style games ... I dont mind them but its gonna get overplayed.

I agree with Max that like in OFP we should have a mixture. Not this one map Evolution. Im sure its a great map and im not trying to give it a bad rept or the creator, im just saying that it would be nice to have a variety.

We need more CTF/TDM/DM/C&H Maps & Leagues. Oh and we also need more Coops, as in Coop Missions not one coop map.

Maddmatt is right on hte Berzerk maps, i find them alot more fun. Hes also right in saying that Evolution isnt a map thats gonna guide players by meeting OFP Vets, you learn by playing not which map you play

Thats just my say

[celery 8]

Evolution is a well made map but I couldn't imagine playing it more often than once every two weeks, the AI is such a dull opponent. I'd like to suggest everyone to broaden their minds and try out different game modes even if they seem weird or hard. Avoiding change (i.e. only playing Evolution or Berzerk) only stalls progress.

You could always learn to make your own mission of whatever type you want to play.

I find it hilarious that people say there is no variety, that theres nothing to play except evolution but cant be bothered to learn how to make missions themselves or make missions.

99% of missions played in Operation Flashpoint were player made on the coop side anyway. Never played CTF/DM really so cant really comment on it.

People are relearning how to script in Armed Assault and some of the stuff that worked in ofp, wont work in Armed Assault.

There are dozens of PvP missions just waiting to get played, quite recently a CTF pack of 25 quality maps was released, yet only a handful of servers are playing them. Actually not even many coop missions get a turn to shine under all those Evolution games. The children's saying "make a better one yourself" is getting old. Not everyone wants to spend their time fighting with scripts to make a working map but they have a right to express opinions about maps. Besides making a PvP map is not as easy as making a coop mission which at its simplest is a player team, enemy units and a trigger that ends the mission (sometimes not even that).

two things, the people complaining generally have low post counts suggesting they don't have a background of what Coop can do, and secondly they don't seem to know how to make a mission themselves.

I've found Coop to be the best experience possible. However, Coop doesn't have to be a Player v AI game. On the other hand, I think Coop has become synonymous with serious, strategy/tactical gaming too, rather than a twitch fest DM or CTF game. There's no reason that Coop's can't be two sided, with dynamic objectives for both teams. I made a couple of such missions for my old teams, but its a lot of work and I'm not sure JIP would help that sort of mission making, as well as getting enough players to make a decent experience.

Don't fool yourself, it's not coop anymore if there are two opposing teams with human players on them, no matter how many AI. Admit it, you are a lowly PvP gamer!

[Maddmatt is] also right in saying that Evolution isnt a map thats gonna guide players by meeting OFP Vets, you learn by playing not which map you play

That's right, you only learn to play Evolution in Evolution, the game mechanics are way different compared to other maps. Many newbies think that the whole game is like Evolution and get confused in other maps.

[Wardude1987 0]

While I love COOP I am sick of Evolution.

Say for example there are 30 populated COOP servers at a given time. Well then on average at least 25 out of 30 are hosting Evolution.

Maybe its because the editor hasent been released but I think its time for some new COOP maps ...

[SeppSchrot 0]

I ask this question to myself every time I open the multiplayer browser and sort servers by player numbers.

I play ArmA not that often, and even less often I play Evolution, but, from my POV it could be:

1. Evolution is something that seems to work well. This is -at the moment- something exceptional in the ArmA universe. It is not a conversion from OFP but built from scratch with ArmA in mind.

JoinInProgress, persistent battlefield, reminding of points...

I am not aware of any other mission which takes use of all ArmA strenghts while sailing around it shortcomings and bugs.

2. ArmA's original repertoire of war equipment favours the West-Side. Thus, East vs. West player confrontations in a e.g. CTI scenario can't be fair, and therefore not much fun.

In a Coop however, where the shortcomings of the armory is compensated by superhuman AI, it doesn't bother that much.

[Maddmatt 1]

...Maybe its because the editor hasent been released but I think its time for some new COOP maps ...

Did you not notice the mission editor button in the main menu?

Anyway...

There are plenty of other good PvP and coop missions, the problem is just that people don't bother to try them. Maybe if most of the servers deleted Evolution then people would realise what else is out there

When you join a server before a map has started, then request to play a different map. If you choose Evolution, then you are just making the situation worse.

I actually think this is a bit serious, have you ever seen an online game where so many servers were playing the same map? Surely by now most people have seen everything Evolution has to offer? I have captured every town and even seen the end.

[The Susser 0]

I see the small maps as a complete waste of ArmA potential. I play Arma for the huge environments and the mixture of vehicle and infantry combat. The maps being hosted are a reflection of the OFP/ArmA player base. The majority like co-op and CTI. Where the whole map is being used with multiple objectives. Evolution provides a unique RPG style of play and people are playing it alot due to the constant updates and honeymoon period.

All I can say is stop moaning and go and host your own server with the maps you like because ArmA caters for all game modes and if there is something you want to play and it ain't there, well go and put it there. I got bored with BF conquest mode (bezerk) years ago playing BF1942, DesertCombat Eve Of Destruction, Forgotten Hope ect.