Latest ArmA2 & ArmA2:OA Press Coverage | NO discussion here!

[SGT_2AD 10]

http://pc.ign.com/articles/981/981088p1.html

[Zipper5 74]

I really don't understand peoples' issues with the pistols. I've never had an issue with them and I don't see what's wrong with them. :confused:

Perhaps some people are far too nit-picky.

[rusty75 0]

Hi all,

I have just picked up a copy of the german magazine 'Gamestart XL', May edition. The people from Gamestar got to play an extensive part of the Arma2 campaign! Also, a release date of May 29th is mentioned. I am not sure how 'breaking' this news is; but I thought some of you might be interested to see a translated version ofthe magazine so that is what I did, in this post. But maybe I am telling old news, forgive me if I didnt find that out in this unstructured jungle of a forum.

But, first off let me explain the word 'disappointment' in the title <EDIT: This was a moved message from a separate post that had the word 'disappointment' in it> because this IS a personal interpretation and I do not intend to sound pretentious or anything. Especially not against a title that has had so much effort and time in the making. But I used to be a huge fan of OFP and have anticipated it's sequel for years. When preparing for ARMA it got clear that this game inherited some of the weaknesses of the (absolutely great) OFP title. Mainly, AI pathfinding and related. It's only in the words of BI themselves, where they were saying that 'Game2'was going to have AI that was so intelligent you cannot distinguish it from human players. This raises a high bar and since Arma didnt quite get there I put my hopes on Arma2. The review translated here just indicates strongly that AI is showing the same issues still.

for me this was a disappointment which led me to translate this article and post this message. The remaining part of this text is the translation.

In the middle there is some spoiler about what happens in the campaign, it is probably a central thing in the campaign so skip it if you dont want to see it :)

And apologies if I made incorrect translations, I'm Dutch not German nor English :)

==============Review - May 2009 gamestar XL ===

The vehicles don't operate. Well that's a good beginning. After all, everything was going to be different this time around, and better - just like the fans of OFP had already wished for -before- the release of ARMA. However the beta of the official sequel, Arma2, crashes, as soon as we so much as touch an airplane, boat or tank. One week later the error has been fixed. A command key had been mapped incorrectly - just a grain of sand in the big machine.

However of these grains there are still many, and it is only a few more weeks until the planned release date. Until then, all of these issues should have been removed from the, by itself, very convincing clockwork.

Between Arma 2 and it's predecessor Arma lies a world of differences, in many aspects. However nothing has changed in the basic game's principles. <... some basic explanation about the differences to shooters like COD> the enemy most often appears only as a tiny heap of pixels at the horizon - that's all you will get to see of them.

Campaign

Arma2 returns to the initial setup of OFP. A big point of criticism for ARMA was that you were constantly playing with a different character, thus there was no 'identification' with the soldiers as you went through the campaign. Arma 2 returns to OFP's approach and gives you a strong ability to identify yourself with the game's characters in the shape of team razor, who will comment on things that happen and who will often save your life - and vice versa.

================SPOILER=============

If one of them dies, the mission is over. Later in the campaign you will be able to switch between characters freely, from snipers to 'specialists in the rough jobs' (?).Initially still very upbeat, tone and mood of your fellow soldiers will change in the course of the campaign, affected by events that take place.

For example, SPOILER: <the discovery of a mass grave that we really totally accidentally stumbled upon during an earlier campaign is clearly occupying the soldiers for a long time>END OF SPOILER

Also the way in which you behave to the civilians is changes how they react to you. SPOILER: <for example, we were pointed to the existence of the mass grave because we helped a doctor and his wife by instead of ordering a bomb dropping on a target enemy installation, going in and blowing it up, after having personally saved the lives of the two.> END OF SPOILER

Already without these events , the atmosphere is 'grabbing you by the throat', (dark atmosphere) which is done in a successful way. It is pressing and engaging at the same time ('packend sowie drueckend').

You can save the game as often as you want (but depending on level of difficulty).

Later the missions will be over many kilometres and split up in smaller parts.

The campaign is done very well. It is very dynamic and cohesive.

You sometimes can choose what to do first, and sometimes other teams will then have solved one of your tasks already.

<...>

<some story about a dropping to kill some people>

Helicopter lands, grass is pressed against the ground.

<in front of their eyes, the building explodes, compromising this mission>

====================END OF SPOILERS ======================

Intelligence???

In the path towards the release of Arma 2, BI have consistently bragged about the intelligence of the soldiers, which should make it difficult/impossible to distinguish between human players / AI <this last line I added myself - it is a bold statement from them from around 2004!!>.

Soldiers would navigate even better through the landscape, which would allow for more teamwork. And indeed, AI colleagues try to avoid open fields and occasionally take cover behind walls.

But that is about it.

Group movements, suppressive fire, saving wounded, all these intentions fail more often than that they lead to any form of succes. The AI is suffering from many foul-ups ('Aussetzern') and still cannot negotiate a simple corner at many times, without stopping and having to reorientate themselves.

Too often the actions of the AI seem random and are not understandable, and the atmosphere is suffering from this. But not only that, because more than any other title, in Arma2 we are on our own in a big world, and we're depending on the computer. Even apart from the situations where our AI colleagues regularly walk straight into enemy fire, and we can only play the role of field medics, later in the game you will have to command special troops, and even full infantry units, tanks and helicopter groups. Especially in those scenarios, the AI is not able to deal with the tasks that the scenario commands from them.

Frustration and helplessness are the consequence.

Troop command

The command system has been overhauled completely, and now is context-dependent. If the razors take place in a vehicle, we just need to press the spacebar, point to a jeep and confirm the order with the mousewheel. Although this system works well with a small team, the control over larger groups quickly becomes too compromising ('fummelig').

As a workaround we had to switch to the classical real-time steering through the tactical map. However here, any visual feedback is missing. The commander-in-the-field idea cannot convince us (yet).

On the positive side, controlling a vehicle, one of the 'sorrow-childs' of the series, has been improved and works quite well. Especially choppers and airplanes can be controlled very well and easily, after some practice. Realism is far too be found, (naturally).

Realism in simulation is mostly limited to weapons ballistics, sound, and functioning.

In other words, tanks still get stuck behind tiny trees, walls are however easily thrown down and break apart in huge blocks.

The atmospheric impression of the game is disturbed by these details all too often.

Graphics

Also the graphical display is full of contrasts. On the one hand, the visual detail in the gaming world reaches very high to photorealistic levels at times, thanks to dense vegetation and very good lighting effects. Also does Bohemia make excellent use of the 'unsharpness filters'. However the game hardly has any dynamic light sources at night, and transitions between animation sequences seem very static all too often. To add to the issues, the vegetation is switched off after several hundred meters of distance. The result is that we will hardly be able to find enemies that are hiding nearby, but those that are farther away are very easily visible, standing on empty textures. In other words you do not need the help ofthe identifcation tool (which 'draws boxes' on spotted enemies in range of you or a team member) for enemies at larger distances.

Minimum Specs

But this is all assuming your hardware will cope with the requirements to begin with. Dual-Core is an absolute minimum. A large monitor is a prerequisite.

Despite of our fast PC, we thankfully made use of the 'schummelunterstutzung' because the comments of our AI colleagues were utterly useless for the most part, and the sound system, although better than it's predecessor, still suffered from extreme mixing problems at times.

<spurbare erschutterungen samt bildschirmwackeln laesst Arma2 im Gegensatz zu OFP2 vermissen, was die Wahrnehmun weiter erschwert.>(<i guess, ofp2 does a better job at constant framerates).

Conclusion

How well Bohemia will be able to deal with all these balancing issues for the solo campaign and multiplayer, (there will be a coop mode in the campaign as well); we will find out in the test that (hopefully) is appearing in the 8/2009 issue of this magazine.

We are going to see either a masterpiece or a medium-to-heavy catastrophe. In between those two extremes, hardly anything seems possible; since such a complex title will only function if all gaming elements fit together. Well this is by far NOT the case at present, although in theory, Bohemia is packing everything into this title that should bring it to the legendary status of Operation Flashpoint. However, The time is ticking.

Final verdict: VERY GOOD.

so...

if they were not able to fix these AI issues in the 8 odd years since OFP, then they are certainly not going to do it in the 20 days that are still left until May, 29. Which, I fear, will give us a better looking, more complex, version of the same. Ai that is not so Intelligent.

If I were to have any, tiny, voice in this, I would say: drop the 29 May release date!, and give it 4 more months...

We have waited now for so many years, so maybewe can wait a little longer for this to be fixed:

- AI should be able to cope with whatever the campaign demands from it

- AI that knows how to drive a truck through a village, also when in a column.

- AI should not walk into enemy fire and AI -should- be able to use suppressive fire.

- Sound should really be a coherent thing.. so you can use it for orientation.

- Please no 'tank gets stuck behind tiny tree', and 'wall crumbles into 3 pieces' stuff..

- these controls for commanding bigger groups.. contextual interface seems troubled here!

- transitions between animation sequences seem too static.

- vegetation switch-off makes nme units far away easily visible

- Please make this AI do it's job..

- AI, AI, AI,AI.....

- AI !!

I hope this was for some of you interesting, and sorry if I put my own worries into this document a bit too often or something. I'm just worried. Within reason I know you can only ask so much of an unscripted environment but in my view 'next gen' would mean a true advance in AI

:pray:

Rusty

Edited May 9, 2009 by rusty75

[maddogx 13]

This is basically the same as the Gamestar preview video for Arma2. The gamestar editors themselves have already conceded that some of their judgements were based on not-yet-implemented features in the preview version.

While I'm fully prepared for a potential disappointment on May 29th, I still see no reason to be pessimistic now. :)

[Laqueesha 474]

http://pc.ign.com/articles/981/981088p1.html

Nothing new to report. :)

[MQ-9 Reaper 10]

This had already been posted by mr. g-c in the ArmA2 Press Coverage.

You want me to have a heart attack ?! :icon_evil: (I thought it would be something new, that's what I meant)

Edited May 9, 2009 by MQ-9 Reaper

[dkd 10]

Have you seen that vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRhhG_IS5k0

[Maio 293]

Never saw it before . Thanks !

[Laqueesha 474]

Have you seen that vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRhhG_IS5k0

No, I have not.

Thanks for posting it; even though it is in Russian, there was still a lot of new footage that I haven't seen, or many other people have seen, for that matter.

[sidhellfire 0]

But, first off let me explain the word 'disappointment' in the title. I used to be a huge fan of OFP and have anticipated it's sequel for years. I couldnt be bothered by ARMA, due to the lack of improvement in some very essential fields- things that were going to be fixed in 'Game 2', right?

That's where I've stopped reading.

Yet another "i know better" OFP fan who thinks that any other improved thing is not an improvement since his imagination allowed him to believe that technology is sooo advanced that there are no boundaries, and thus everything must be ingame or it will be crap. Unlike OFP which was perfect bug-free software which had no flaws which would render the game unplayable.

The funny thing, that ArmA in technical terms is better in EVERYTHING than OFP, yet inherited some annoying aspects.

Now you dare to say it will not meet your expectations - NOTHING WILL. IT'S GOD-DAMNED GAME NOT AN ULTIMATE ECSTASY APPLICATION FOR IRRATIONAL WANKERS WHO THINK THAT WE LIVE IN STAR-WARS TECHNOLOGY ERA.

ArmA is better than OFP, ArmA2 will be better than ArmA, and thus OFP also. FACE IT.

Yet it won't turn you into a man, since you must grow and educate by your own and that's it! Don't come back until you will reach that higher level of existence, that will allow you to to share with thoughts other than pure bullshit. I know there's a lot of hype over Game2, but hell it's natural and nowhere-near the noise about the stupid template-like shooters on UnrealEngine based games or any other idiot-dev-friendly software environment for wannabe-an-entertainment-software-engineer.

[Laqueesha 474]

I'm just so disappointed over how the review is bashing the AI.

So the previewer is lying to make BI look bad?

Edited May 9, 2009 by Laqueesha

[Yoma 0]

I'm getting tired of these "the ai sucks balls" threads.

People that don't get the basic principles of ingame ai say the worst things just because they are used to fully scripenhanced crap that looks like it's AI but rather is AS (advanced scripting).

Show me any other game where you can drop a couple of opposing squads in the editor and they fight it out dynamically like in OFP, Arma and most likely Arma2 and then you may have a point. Sure it's not perfect, but it's DYNAMIC. In fact it's a lot more AI and on a bigger scale then any other game out there i've come across.

Also if one has never played Arma (patched up, yep it's a continous process) one cannot compare OFP ai to Arma's ai. I personally think

Call me a fanboy if you like, but just prove me wrong with an existing comparable game. Don't compare with dreams, compare with reality.

[Scrub 0]

Yup, thanks! I noted the AI that the player shot at with some Russian weapon reacted immediately to the first near miss.. Didn't help too much :p but it was nice that he started running for his (very short) life.

[GepardenK 0]

Im already happy about the AI in arma1. Sure I hate all the bugs, like soldiers getting stuck in buildings, but the AI itself is very good I think. I love how they play by the same rules as the player, and dont feel like a scriptet enemy/ally/dragon boss etc (like the COD4 AI amongst others).

So as long as the AI in arma2 dont get stuck that often, I will not be dissapointed....

Edited May 9, 2009 by GepardenK

[Mafia101 0]

Have you seen that vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRhhG_IS5k0

Oh nice, you can now see clearly this is February build: 4/2/2009

There I pretty much footage, I hope someone translate it :D

[Laqueesha 474]

Yup, thanks! I noted the AI that the player shot at with some Russian weapon reacted immediately to the first near miss... Didn't help too much, but it was nice that he started running for his (very short) life.

That's a very good sign, and it gave me a better impression of ArmA 2. Also, before that scene, there was a scene where the player shot at an enemy in a cross street behind some barriers. The enemy soldier kept running toward cover behind a house, which is very good. The fact that it was a February build was great news too.

From personal experience in ArmA 1, after getting shot at, an enemy soldier would either,

a.) Go prone 1-to-2 seconds after getting shot at,

b.) Slowly pivot on his feet (as if he were doing some Michael Jackson dance moves) toward the player and fire around ten rounds, the last few killing the player.

[Scrub 0]

And Yoma, you are speaking only of infantry? Lets add the AI getting into a tank, plane, or helo.

[Horus 83]

Good vid..ArmA 2 with BF2 music lol

[maddogx 13]

Have you seen that vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRhhG_IS5k0

Thanks! Always nice to see some new ingame footage. Would be nice to know what the guy was saying though. :)

[lapa 1]

Great find dkd,

The gameplay certainly looked a lot better now the game was played by someone who most probably had played OFP before and knew how to use cover, crouch and go prone and not play the game like your average FPS game.

[nodunit 397]

Even better that the AI already come with the tanks, planes and helo's with a few simple clicks and are ready for action.

[Raphier 0]

funny how gameplay could look a lot better, when the preview code is same for everyone! I found the 3rd person more immersive than FPV. More things were happening in terms of animations.

[Sinistercr0c 0]

Err, isn't the thread originator just guilty of believing something someone else wrote and presenting the original article as a translation to back up his view that the AI aspect of the game 'might' not be as great as he'd thought/hoped?...

not sure it neccessitated the vitriol spewed forth in some of the responses to be honest....

[rusty75 0]

I would argue that on a quad core CPU you CAN improve pathfinding over that what can be done with a 400mhz pc from 2001.

For some gamers the ultimate is the unscripted AI in OFP/ARMA and knowning all the AI weaknesses that still exist, if BI announce 'NexGen AI' then this creates expectations, I would argue.

BI themselves have often announced that a major difference of this 'nextgen' game was going to be the fact that you cannot make out human from AI players. Well if the first Preview (<edit!> )then deals with that assumption then this is disappointing. All I need, personally, is Malden with middle-aged graphics and AI that can scare the crap out of me. I do not believe such a game exists and it would be nice if Arma2 is going to be there and take up that market.

Edited May 9, 2009 by rusty75
Nowhere do i intend to dispute the legacy of BI and what they've created. All I hope for is a final push by BI into the AI.

[nodunit 397]

Hmmm...here's an idea, we wait for to judge the AI on a more finalized video rather then early press preview which was said to not have this and that by the developers.

I understand everyone wants to voice their opinion and speculation (lord knows there is plenty of that going on right now) but is a thread like this really necessary? There is already plenty of griping about the AI in various threads several hijacked by it while there are two sitting threads dedicated to the AI.

Edited May 9, 2009 by NodUnit