Information from Digitex!

[mac81 0]

What's so great on bodies flying 5 meters after being shot from M16 ?

Nobody said that bodies should fly 5 meters

Ragdoll physics doesn't necessarily mean that BF2 crap. Some new games blend anims and physics together for a pretty realistic effects. GRAW on PC had some decent death effects.

Death anims in ArmA don't look very real, and they are very repetitive. I've seen them all hundreds of times already.

I know ragdoll physics can be demanding, especially in a game with hundreds of people in a battle at once. But they can be "LOD'd" in ways to keep the performance hit down.

Of course there are other things to focus on. Ragdoll physics would be great, but not absolutely necessary.

Agree with you about some good effect and stuff of Graw that should be good to see also in ArmA, but for the death effect i think that ArmA is quite good enough maybe some effect more but the way the units die when their're heated is quite real.

Maybe sometimes it takes a little frame for a unit to fall on the ground after being hated this is not so real but at the end is good.

Consider also that you are talking about games that have different situation.

In Graw you play like in a box and you will engage enemy most of the time at short distances so is good to have various effect for the death in ArmA you can engage enemy at hundred meters far away using a scope and maybe you will not get near to that body so wy have soo much effect.

At the end in game like Graw you have less troops to fight at the same time so at the end of a fight you will see on the ground not more then 5-6 mens "that also disappear after few minutes leaving on the ground only ammos and weapons wich is not so real" not an entire infantry squad of 10-12 units!

That's why ArmA seem to be repetitive from that point of view.

That's my personal opinion.

[Spindry69 0]

Even if they don't adopt ragdoll they should increase the variety of death animations and walking/standing/crouching with a gun animations. This would go a long way to removing the bot like look of the AI.

The AI using cover sounds REALLY promising.

I hope they listen to people and smooth out the movement/ changing posture animations a little. It might be realistic but it's not much fun running around feeling like you have a fist up your arse.

[LtCmdrBoon 0]

a massive thanks to for the translations

All sounds promising. For sure the AI, as we coop a lot. Nice graphical stuff, bonus on the multicores & Dx10.

Dedi Server also multi?

I believe a C130 is in Arma2 although not seen it mentioned in these posts. Would be nice to fit a server full in the back for a massive paradrop, and not limited to 15.

[ebns72 0]

@Ragdoll performance affecting performance-

It doesn't do so very much if done well. The latest mount and blade update had ragdoll physics, yet used some tricks to improve performance.

The result- medieval battles with far more people than Arma ever has in a mission with ragdoll physics, plus half of them with horses falling with ragdoll.

So, it definitely IS possible.

On the other hand, I'm REALLY happy to see dynamic destruction is back. It's looking SO awesome, even if not completely physics-calculated as before. I'm just wondering if buildings could be reduced to rubble piles? It's also reallly great to see "free" campaigns will be coming as originally promised.

Some things I'd love to see for the free campaign:

-Base time, hanging around base on or off duty; sleeping/resting

-Actually retreating and the campaign keeps going minus that territory you retreated from (I.E., there is no such thing as failing and mission and having to start over.

-Other battles dynamically calculated, even if they aren't present in-game at real time (just so you don't feel like the only one in the war)

-Dynamic team members; would love to see a FFURSLX-like system where people can get critically wounded and you have to medevac them at which point they rest for a few days, others get fatally wounded and they get replaced with greener replacements, etc. With no RPG stats, we could get a great Ghost Recon/Rainbow-Six like system going as well, so soldiers are unique and are not just defined by a single skill bar.

EDIT: Instead of making a new post...

I expect the above to be DEFINITELY in-game.

Now for my Stretch wishlist (I.E., wishful thinking)

-Dynamically destructible terrain that lasts (would be incredible for battlefield atmosphere to see scorched earth, or AT LEAST grass turning to dirt and grass disappearing

-Trees that can burn. To improve performance, it could be made so forests blocks burn at a time rather than individual trees. Nothings says war like burnt foliage.

-Generally speaking, I like lush forests that can be converted into ashtrays. That's really immersive if you patrol by a spot of forest that got hit by a heavy artillery strike and is nothing more than a clearing with craters and the remains of burnt trees on the ground.

[ExtracTioN 0]

Hope we get a better human alike sound system for Arma2 from videos it is still the robot like Arma 1 sound.

[SaBrE_UK 0]

Quote[/b] ]I.E., there is no such thing as failing and mission and having to start over.

That would b be great!

[Spoock 3]

youtube videos by Hotel007 (Tomas Papezik) link - high possible quality

[Guest]

youtube videos by Hotel007 (Tomas Papezik) link - high possible quality

Youtube videos which are in an exe file?

[Spoock 3]

no, this videos are original and exe soubor is archive (rar)

[NeMeSiS 11]

Why the hell would someone save something in a .exe? Thats just horrible.

Quote[/b] ]Actually retreating and the campaign keeps going minus that territory you retreated from (I.E., there is no such thing as failing and mission and having to start over.

That would be awesome.

[Guest Ti0n3r]

Cheers spoock!

[Spoock 3]

no, only my choice - you dont need extra program

[Deadfast 43]

Don't worry guys, it's just a WinRAR Self-Extracting archive. There's no nasty crap in it

Thanks for the video Spoock. YouTube quality is terrible (hell, I couln't even see the hare he was pointing at) .

[NeMeSiS 11]

Omg, the rear view mirror in that car works!

EDIT: And yeah, thanks for the better quality videos, still i think that .exe is very annoying. (Windows can open .zips by default right? Might as well make a .zip then)

[Deadfast 43]

EDIT: And yeah, thanks for the better quality videos, still i think that .exe is very annoying. (Windows can open .zips by default right? Might as well make a .zip then)

Yes, but .zip would be like 120 megs I guess

[dmitri 0]

The building destruction is very promising. It isn't dynamic, but it's a good alternative and is easily achievable in the engine. Hope they manage to implement this with as many building's as possible..

'Bout the ragdoll debate..I don't see BIS changing their animation system pre-ArmA 2 release. The time taken to implement it is better spent on improved simulation (damage modeling, AI, many small details that'll set it apart from arcade shooters) - rather than yet more eyecandy.

[sanctuary 19]

Was that a soldier <span style='font-size:9pt;line-height:100%'>reloading</span> the grenade launcher on his scar rifle <span style='font-size:9pt;line-height:100%'>while walking</span> crouched around 2:20 of the ArmA2_Invex07_trailer.avi , or are my old eyes betraying me again ?

[Mr_Tea 0]

Yeah, he reloads while crouch walking sideways.

The videos looking very promising, but that was the same for ArmA pre-release videos.

Let`s wait for the demo, and the first big patch before we buy it.

[The_Captain 0]

About ragdoll: I would expect ragdoll deaths to be difficult to synchronize in MP. In most games with physicalized ragdoll deaths, the ragdoll effects are client-side. In arma, bodies and their animation states need to be transferred over the network. Dynamically transferring ragdoll body positions would be difficult if all clients would need bodies to stay in the same positions (to interact, get equipment, etc). (I expect this is why vehicles rust/burn when they die instead of blowing apart into pieces...)

[Sosna 0]

After watching the videos I am overall impressed

Things I really liked were:

House Destruction effect - very impressive, if most buildings can be damaged and destroyed in that manner I'll be satisfied. There needs to be a lingering dust cloud after destroying a chunk though

Lighting - Looks good so far, but I havn't seen it in a cloudy/darker environment yet so I can't fully judge. Objects in shadows still seem to lack ambient shading...

Glass/reflections - A nice addition, looks good.

AI Behavior - So far looks vastly improved.

Forest - Looks amazing, I was pleasantly surprised at the size from the Hind video. Seems to not hit performance drastically.

There are some glaring things that need to be updated though, IMO:

Blood - the little floating reddish cloud looks awful, IMO OFP did it better. The best example I can name is the blood effects from the ECP mod. Also, some kind of ragdoll would be nice, seeing bodies in the same repetitive predictable poses kinda detracts from the game.

Audio - Effects need updating. The speech seems the same, which is not not good. To be honest I preferred OFP's speech without "that" and "at". With less words it somehow sounds less robotic.

HDR - Still behaves like a camera, not like a human eye. Needs some tweaking.

Overall looks promising, Arma 2 has my hopes up

[dmitri 0]

Was that a soldier <span style='font-size:9pt;line-height:100%'>reloading</span> the grenade launcher on his scar rifle <span style='font-size:9pt;line-height:100%'>while walking</span> crouched around 2:20 of the ArmA2_Invex07_trailer.avi , or are my old eyes betraying me again ?

Knew something 'bout that bit was different, didn't click though.. nice catch.

[stakex 0]

About ragdoll: I would expect ragdoll deaths to be difficult to synchronize in MP. In most games with physicalized ragdoll deaths, the ragdoll effects are client-side. In arma, bodies and their animation states need to be transferred over the network. Dynamically transferring ragdoll body positions would be difficult if all clients would need bodies to stay in the same positions (to interact, get equipment, etc). (I expect this is why vehicles rust/burn when they die instead of blowing apart into pieces...)

I don't see why it would be so hard.... several games have had ragdoll that worked fine in MP. Far Cry which is almost 3 years old had quite realistic Ragdoll that was synchronized very well in MP. I don't really think the MP aspect would be the big issue becuae it IS possible to do good ragdoll, and do it in MP.

[Barely-injured 0]

Nice videos so far so good,

By the way the trailer seems to have alot of it shot in rhamadi island with the updated ground texture and maybe some shots in porto or am i mistaken?

[mr_centipede 31]

i would like to give my 2cents on ragdoll:

well, ragdoll does kinda look cool... but since ravenshield, i dont like it much, mainly because of no more blood decal on the bodies, like rogue spear.. ie no gore effects (yeah im sick... hehe ) i dont know if it related to the ragdoll, but it seems linked. graw with ragdoll also dont have blood decals

just my 2 cents

and on blood decals, i think rogue spear was the best... you can see where you bullet hit the tangos... not predefined as in arma or ofp... and guess what, rogue spear also use death anim. so ragdoll and blood decal probably linked?

maybe arma2 can incorporate dynamic blood decal ala R6:Rogue Spear

[sickboy 13]

I don't see why it would be so hard.... several games have had ragdoll that worked fine in MP. Far Cry which is almost 3 years old had quite realistic Ragdoll that was synchronized very well in MP. I don't really think the MP aspect would be the big issue becuae it IS possible to do good ragdoll, and do it in MP.

Well I dont think FarCry had to synchronise 150 AI Units on each side and a lot of other vehicles etc all battling on a large scale area. Thus im not so really sure how ArmA would coop with ragdoll effects in MP.