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

[Mavericko 0]

I doubt the AI tactical behaviour will change with the skill level. Only reaction time and accuracy probably.

What I'm talking about is all those "MicroAI" and "Mega centimeter precision" features that BIS was talking about. Like AI squad lining up on corners, covering each other, using lean to see if the street is clean, then smoothly moving to cover. No previews talk about these features, not even "Micro AI" is mentioned. Running in the middle of street and getting slaughtered is hardly a precision.

Also, "Default" is the difficulty most of us will play. You'd expect the AI to be programmed optimally for that difficulty.

Yes in these videos they looked like morons but keep in mind that there have also been video where the AI were covering eachother, taking cover behind...cover and so on

[mr.g-c 6]

I doubt the AI tactical behaviour will change with the skill level. Only reaction time and accuracy probably.

What I'm talking about is all those "MicroAI" and "Mega centimeter precision" features that BIS was talking about. Like AI squad lining up on corners, covering each other, using lean to see if the street is clean, then smoothly moving to cover. No previews talk about these features, not even "Micro AI" is mentioned. Running in the middle of street and getting slaughtered is hardly a precision.

Also, "Default" is the difficulty most of us will play. You'd expect the AI to be programmed optimally for that difficulty.

100% true!

I watched that city fight videos now a couple of times and i'm really disappointed... the AI seems to be as stupid as ever.:rolleyes:

I really hardly can see any improvements... it gets even worse as the guy then moves away from the street at that "garden" and this black guy with AK standing there, already saw the people incoming fricking 15m in front of him, but he takes like 1 minute to align his weapon towards his enemies... lol... no reactions at all.... i remember the same behavior from Arma1 and i am annoyed by this since ever.

I have an idea, instead of using general direction, why don't use nearby objects as reference? I mean "contact left, near the house, 300 meters" don't sounds so bad!

Also the squad should take squad leader facing direction as front at all time

Yes that would also my preferred version... contact left, contact ahead, etc....

Very good point! We use same talking mechanism when playing ACE Realistically....

[vilas 473]

But let¡s face it, I'm going to buy ArmAII, even as a way to thank BIS for all the good moments with OFP and ArmA (although this has the shitty levels near the good ones). ArmA may be a crap, but between this crap and OFP:DR/CoD4/Crysis (not saying that are bad games), I'll stick with the crap.

Arma 1 was crap as software, till 1.08 was not working longer than 15 minutes , althought new PC was bought specially for it in Dec. 2006 :/

if A2 will not work on my AMD dualcore 6000+, 8800GTS 512 MB, 2 GB ram, Asus M2NESli MB than i will be very very agry, cause bying new PC during economical crysis and monthly payment of many people here in my Eastern Europe as 300 USD is something i cannot imagine

for me Arma1 worked since patch 1.08, and is worse now in 1.14 than on 1.09b and 1.08 (less FPS, sometimes loosing textures to LOW)

BIS fault is that their product use word "ultimate military realism" - than me, as customer - expect not only good working software (no lags, no ctd, no loosing textures, no cubic models and 5 FPS after 15 minutes) but also "realism" which sometimes is higher in other games

but Arma has one and most important advantage - modding ability, addons, mission editor - it makes it's competition poor

but i am angry on BIS ignorance for realism (DSHK on T72, AKS74U with PBS1 silencer, 1972' RPG18 instead of 22/26/29, wrong AK107 and RPK models, M24 in hands of Marines instead of M40A3, multiuse M136 and many many errors) - cause BIS wastes chance to have the best game in the world, which could be A2, if it was more realistic

for example Russian army has in real 300 T90 and 3000 T80, 10 times more T80 than T90, but in A2 we will see T90 instead of T80 ...

than "ultimate military realism" on box - would make me happy

than A2 would be the best game in the world, not only "beautifully looking screens"

cause of course BIS show they are super artists, Arma1, and Arma 2 look super, exciting and top-notch and super again

but...

but this felling is wasted when software looses textures or for example you have for example wrong MG on turret of tank

BIS Chernarus is super enviroment, civilians, cars, textures - all looks super

and for people who not care about realism - for sure it is top

but for people who buy product with "military realism" written on box - there are other expectations

and i remind - in 1999 there was a game Avs.P , than we had many things like thermovision, which is must in modern tank

it was 10 years ago and in A2 there is no FLIR in vehicles althought action is not in 1960 :(

first thermovision sights Leopards had in 70's, first T80's from 1978 had thermovision too as i remember

only for sake of beauty Chernarus - i hope on my PC - A2 will work, otherwise only CWR will left for me to play in "such type enviroments"

for sure BIS are top-artists (graphicians), i wish to see product that will not cause problems like i had till 1.08 patch in A1, i hope this game will work since day first, not ... first minute of playing 30 FPS, 15'th minute of gameplay - memory lack, 5 FPS and grey-brown cubic models without textures

or 14 restarts of game because of "disc orginallity check"

yes - it was record - i had to restart 1.02 for 8-14 times to launch game cause "disc check took too long, try again", i had to search for crack to start legal game, cause it was not working, crack was not found, so i quit Arma for few months, cause simply Starforce not allowed me to start game

in 1.05 i had no textures in game, all was brown-grey

in 1.07 i had ctd after 7-15 minutes

i hope A2 will not second errors of A1, cause A1 was for me - mistaken product

Edited April 22, 2009 by vilas

[mr.g-c 6]

but i am angry on BIS ignorance for realism (DSHK on T72, AKS74U with PBS1 silencer, 1972' RPG18 instead of 22/26/29, wrong AK107 and RPK models, M24 in hands of Marines instead of M40A3, multiuse M136 and many many errors) - cause BIS wastes chance to have the best game in the world, which could be A2, if it was more realistic

I absolutely agree!

Bis really could make "the best game" in the world, the ultimate sandbox whatnot, still there is very little to no attention to detail and especially realism.

Like i said before, kiddie shooters have FLIR/Thermal optics, kiddie shooters have missile targeting systems, kiddie shooters have so many other realism features which never scared anyone away (as they are in a 5-day playing throw-away kiddie-shooter) - but then like Vilas said perfectly valid:

"you buy a game titled as the "Ultimate Military Simulator" and you get LESS REALISM THAN FROM KIDDIE SHOOTERS :rolleyes: "

This is really unacceptable, we really should call it "FALSE ADVERTISINGS/BLINDING" .

I really hope they read this here, i really do....

There is still very much to fix, thus a release in May or June would be IMO result in something "non-good/only average" again.

[noamles 0]

its like reading the same posts from 20 pages ago, and the same from 40 pages ago. we get it.

[Raphier 0]

I absolutely agree!

Bis really could make "the best game" in the world, the ultimate sandbox whatnot, still there is very little to no attention to detail and especially realism.

Like i said before, kiddie shooters have FLIR/Thermal optics, kiddie shooters have missile targeting systems, kiddie shooters have so many other realism features which never scared anyone away (as they are in a 5-day playing throw-away kiddie-shooter) - but then like Vilas said perfectly valid:

"you buy a game titled as the "Ultimate Military Simulator" and you get LESS REALISM THAN FROM KIDDIE SHOOTERS :rolleyes: "

This is really unacceptable, we really should call it "FALSE ADVERTISINGS/BLINDING" .

I really hope they read this here, i really do....

There is still very much to fix, thus a release in May or June would be IMO result in something "non-good/only average" again.

But, kiddie shooters have huge budgets, And I think BIS has gone to the point they cannot afford more features...(ofcourse even I want plenty of stuff in Arma2, and have been disappointed lately with A2, but we need to be honest here, BIS is not Activision or EA)

Edited April 22, 2009 by Raphier

[Mavericko 0]

Vilas, can't speak to your problems with ArmA 1, I started playing arma when it was in 1.05 and I have never had any problems with it, though I have not played 1.15, staying on 1.14.. anywho, BIS have said that they were essentially ashamed of the crappy versions of ArmA 1 and that they are doing a much better job on ArmA 2

[Benoist 0]

I have an idea, instead of using general direction, why don't use nearby objects as reference? I mean "contact left, near the house, 300 meters" don't sounds so bad!

Also the squad should take squad leader facing direction as front at all time

Unless you say: "The green/yellow/wood/destroyed/two-story house" that would be even more confusing, not in an open ground, but pretty much in a city/town (or towns, since BIS didn't catch the concept of "city").

[Mavericko 0]

I also think alot of people is failing to see the bigger picture. Granted, the Javelin does not work as it should, yeah mabye CoD 4 have a slightly more realistic Javelin however, in CoD 4 you cannot drive vehicles or pilot aircrafts, you cannot make your own missions or have even close to the same mod community. In ArmA you can do so much more stuff then in most.. "kiddie shooters".. I could go on but I think I made my point, I'm just gonna leave it at that.

[Zipper5 74]

This has turned almost into the release of ArmA.

People saw the screenshots, the videos, the updates, and were like "Wow, that looks amazing! It's definitely going to be a great game and a great sequel to OFP!" Then the game was released and everyone got annoyed at the bugs and certain things that were not shown in the videos (and rightly so, they were pretty bad in v1.00). Instead, it's happening prematurely upon release of these videos. Everyone likes it in the short-term, but as they use it more and more, they find its flaws. I think this community is quite susceptible to hype.

[mr.g-c 6]

Hmm you can see the so called "bigger picture" from other sides.... with VERY LITTLE EFFORT many of the things could have been fixed.... community guys make such things in their free-time....

And BIS.... do i really need to telly you this? -BIS has VERY TALENTED Model/Texture Artists (just look at the awesome models/texture/Nature overall), so don't tell me they couldn't fix all that very quick and easy.

- No-one asks for ultra detailed firing sequences/Modes and whatnot like in the Javelin Video i posted (although its really nice), but does there really has to be a normal mildot reticle?

Really a damn lame auto-lock?

Where is the Problem to script flight-paths like the community did (Mando missiles for instance)?

- M136/AT4 Single shot: Should be fairly easy to do... community only fails to realize it, since Arma1 Engine is bugged and crashes to Desktop when you replace the launcher with a "empty" one while the round is still alive

- FLIR/Thermal Images: Add a new model-state similar to the "night-time" to the models and apply a new glowing shader, use "setaperture" like or modifiy it and code in the engine that whenever you activate the "FLIR Device" the models new shader starts glowing - Problem solved, very little effort - BUT WAY WAY BETTER THAN HAVING NONE AT ALL!!!!

In a game "Ultimate Military Simulator"...

- Dshk on T72?, awesome Modelers/Texture artist quick replace it. Silencers at weapons where they don't have to be? - remove it!

Wrong AK107 Gas-cylinder, remodel it! All could be fixed rather easy.....

EDIT:

But, kiddie shooters have huge budgets, And I think BIS has gone to the point they cannot afford more features...(ofcourse even I want plenty of stuff in Arma2, and have been disappointed lately with A2, but we need to be honest here, BIS is not Activision or EA)

Well the point is that the creators of kiddie shooters simply deliver a more rounded product (i'm not talking about its replay-ability nor about its modability) for its purpose and together with mass-media advertising hypes, they simply sell millions of copies.

To your point with no money for new features:

Where is the point then in wasting costly time to code thing like head-wiggle/wobble effects which no-one every requested.

I'm pretty sure many people will get like seasick from it and will disable it, on top of that i think also rather heavy engine changes have been made to achieve this.

Bis could simply make it one time "right" at least at the things they are including... i'm sure this will be honored by game magazines ratings and thus resulting in much higher sales.....

Edited April 22, 2009 by mr.g-c

[cross 1]

g-c there are many many steps involved when you are developing a game ... this is no secret. And they cost money, many developers' minute costs money.

Therefore, it is sometimes just not as easy as releasing an addon or doing some random changes whenever you feel like it or being demanded.

It may be a simple job but there may be other concerns holding them back...maybe as simple as a prioritization or as serious as legal, royalty or ratings issue like when more realistic means higher age rating.

Things get complicated when you create and sell a product commercially, quite different to non-commercial free add-on creation. ;)

Edited April 22, 2009 by Cross

[Raidar 1]

Tell me one kiddie shooter with: Some kind of realistic ballistics, weapons/gear with character and different handling, such a hudge variety of possible things and so on. Most kiddie shooter got one feature they hype as realistic, no question why it doesn't scare people away with it. It's a game with a little bit of everything, you can't just have everything... Someone want's CQC, someone flight simulator, real time strategy, tank simulator, immersive action, realistic forests, gear like IR, artillery simulation... Yes i know, i want everything in one thing too, but i may be happy with what is coming, and may be not, we'll see. My experience with military gear comes back to Stgw 90, MG 51/71 and HG85. My experience is that i can hit a static man sized target at 300-400m with one quick shot, the mg is an old piece of crap and it's much easyer to throw a hand grenade in real live than in arma. But the one and only game in which i can use a rifle nearly like this is arma...

I don't understand, if you don't like the style of the game, why bothering talking about how everybody wants the game chached to something else (referenced to your self and some other people). As soon a detail is solved, an other gets the major problem and everybody starts to repeat itself (like the KORD on the T90, which is just a visual detail). It's allways about the details because the whole thing is hudge and complex. Yes to solve a detail isn't much work, but everybody got his own little detail he wants to solve...

It's not possible to make it right for everyone, at the end it's definitly the taste of the developers, which desides what will be. Like ACE, seems nobody plays still plays ArmA, but i'm not convinced of ACE.

Doesn't anybody ask himself why nearly nobody does projects like BIS? Because they are much more work intense and as a trophy less people care about it. But the people which care about it, care so much, it really gets a personal issue...

(I heared that Armed Assault was an unwanted child, they had do release something... When it got released i firstly didn't realized it, it suddenly was there)

One thing i really have to critizise is the PR of BIS, but it fits to their style to try doing something right and get lost in the details (and you want different details fixed)

I know, i repeat my self all the time myself... But it makes me confuse that so many people think they are much better in what BIS does than BIS itself.

Edit: Someone mentioned that BIS should do more what the community wants and that BIS just lives because of the community. I think it's the contrary: BIS gave thi birth to the community and if they would do everything the community wants, it would be a hell of a mess. But some things i really don't get why they don't implement it, but they have their reason for sure.

Edited April 22, 2009 by Ra!dar

[Serclaes 0]

Nagging Mr g-c? Remove!

Seriously. I have no problems with somebody pointing out "errors" but your constant nagging is irritating. Even more since you do not seem to read what others say or simply ignore it because you deem it an inapropriate solution for something that could be changed "with VERY LITTLE EFFORT".

You know why community guys make stuff in their free time? Because they have free time. But go ahead, nag on until we have a disposable M136 instead of an unfixed bug.

You know whats not round? ACE is not round because its a damn beta. A DschKm instead of a PK, is not poking a hole in game flow. Neither is the fact that when you fire a M16 in burst mode, you have to click once, instead of keeping the trigger pulled as IRL.

On your M136 i have another addition. What happens if you carry more than 1 M136?

[Placebo 28]

mr.g-c & Vilas, please dial down the rhetoric. You can very easily make your points without posting such venomous rants.

[PhilippRauch 0]

hehe, the tension grows since release date comes closer ... or what :D

:p I will have my fun anyway ... even with a bugged ArmA2 ...:292::pet6::angel:

[CarlGustaffa 4]

12 O'Clock is to the front of the squad.... how much harder could it be?

1) I'm behind this wall to secure the rear of my squad. Leader takes a left and reports 12 O'clock. How am I supposed to know which way that is? The compass (if even enabled) will reorient itself, but never have I seen any contacts reported in the updated direction.

2) I've just respawned, and heading back to my unit. He reports something at 12 O'clock. How am I supposed to know which way that is? West I would know since I knew were we were last.

3) Squad leader in front turns and come towards us, maybe for medical attention or something. The sniper yells contact at 3 o'clock. However, 3 o'clock is now in a different direction since the squad leader turned and controls the squad direction, and he is now facing the other direction. The actual 'squad direction' (as seen from the players perspective) didn't change.

The old system might work better when playing singleplayer, with all the cheats enabled. But in multiplayer, as I said, I have yet to play a game where full movement discipline is performed. Any automatic contact reports, and I still feel as blind as a bat. They're not useful at all. For those who play like a unit, these things are usually turned off anyway and resort to TS communications.

To make matters worse; reveal is/was by default keybound to the optics toggle key (right mouse button). Which ment that every time someone toggled their optics they might reveal something and report it, even if server autoreporting was turned off. With an angle system that didn't work well enough, it just added to the confusion instead of being helpful. And to make matters worse still, you have to resort to addons just to make them shut up (complete radio silence). Addons that might not be very welcome on all servers.

Ok, enough of the bashing. BIS knows my/ours (too strong? :)) feelings on certain points. However, they should know that they must also be doing something right since I/we come back and back and back :D

[lwlooz 0]

Hello,

Even tho I am going to make myself unpopular could people please stop with this damn "Well,the community made it,so why can't BIS?"

This is flawed in 2 ways.

First , the only reason the community can do it is because BIS gave them the engine capabilities to do so.

Second , community solutions usually have downsides that people ignore in their constant "Hoorah, another limitation broken!!" jubilee choir , a statement that of course is in ignorance of the first point as well.

As for the videos and the AI , it was sort of inconclusive to me personally. While the AI could have some bad individual reaction speed , I didn't see nearly enough especially of the the friendly AI to see how they perform in combat. The guys he mowed down on that street seemed to be walking there in "AWARE" mode , but I could be mistaken.

It remains to be seen what the AI does in combat mode and if that is effective. The AI of course will by no means be a perfect killer and it should not be (It needs to make mistakes).

But I fully agree if BIS has made no advancements (where technically possible) in the AI analyzing its situation better and acting more as a group in ArmA2 , we haven't come much further. But as I said, that is to be seen.

Edited April 22, 2009 by lwlooz
Typos

[xl FallenAngel lx 10]

I'm sorry if this video is old but... It depicts the 'command interface' more precisely :)

is the link. Again, sorry if this is old... Have a nice one.

[stanko 10]

But, kiddie shooters have huge budgets, And I think BIS has gone to the point they cannot afford more features...(ofcourse even I want plenty of stuff in Arma2, and have been disappointed lately with A2, but we need to be honest here, BIS is not Activision or EA)

I think this is the biggest problem - the more features / open-world reality etc. we expect, BIS have more problems to solve before releasing their product.

In this case, it's not that much about budget. Even Rockstar didn't manage to make perfectly polished GTA4, even though it's the highest budget game today. Because like ArmA2, it contains too much content to be released without any "problems".

[NoRailgunner 0]

Think that BIS is now fixing and polishing their masterpiece, maybe they are able to implement few things or update whats too old (eg RPG-18) and got upgraded or replaced (RPG-26/27 is the standard AT for russian infantry).

Would be nice to see two AI units operating with the RPG-29. Same goes for medics/corpsmen using stretchers or other AI units that really working together.

Hope to see some unscripted (Micro) AI presentations/teaser - maybe later some kind of "AI development story" from OFP - ArmA - Arma2?? :)

[Takko 10]

- Dshk on T72?, awesome Modelers/Texture artist quick replace it. Silencers at weapons where they don't have to be? - remove it!

Wrong AK107 Gas-cylinder, remodel it! All could be fixed rather easy.....

Sorry to say that but youse nuts. For a single Gas cylinder reUWV's, reMapping and remaking of the level of details?

Who'd do that.

As long as its possible to have a DSHK onboard a tank, why not?

Maybe the CHDKF has its own tank version as a lot of armies do?

Screw-picking

Where is the point then in wasting costly time to code thing like head-wiggle/wobble effects which no-one every requested.

I'm pretty sure many people will get like seasick from it and will disable it, on top of that i think also rather heavy engine changes have been made to achieve this.

I'm sorry, but a lot of people requested it after seeing the first videos where it was included. THIS would rather backfire than a DSHK on a T90.

What has ACE to with that here? ACE is a huge success no matter if it is a "damn beta" and adding to a very very large portion of players the features they every dream of in BIS games!

Ha ha , yes but ArmA 1 and ArmA II is even a bigger success. So why aren't you happy as well?

I will have my fun anyway ... even with a bugged ArmA2

correct

Edited April 22, 2009 by Takko

[CarlGustaffa 4]

On your M136 i have another addition. What happens if you carry more than 1 M136?

For now... You don't. Which makes that one shot oh so much more important as well. You pick a SMAW if you want multishot capability, or let a squadmate take the other M136 or leave it in a vehicle nearby. Carrying multiple M136s is possible in real life, but I don't think it is the norm.

Another point is that with multishot M136 everyone becomes 'Tank killers'. The term AT Specialist didn't have a purpose in ArmA, since everyone could do his job. With a singleshot M136, I can let all squad members carry an M136 without causing overkilling tendencies like we see today, and let only the AT Specialist (or assaultman more likely) have access to the SMAW.

The point is having a disposable system that works. That way modders can 'with ease' create any type of disposeable launcher they want, and still be able to call it realistic. ACE have reloadeable M136 not because they want to, but because disposable solution caused too many crashes. Why? Because a disposable system doesn't exist within ArmA. The M136 is a perfect excuse to make it happen with ArmA2, and in the same process provide modders with the configs needed to duplicate it.

[odjob 0]

Could we get this thread back on topic please.

Having to look thru several pages of ranting wether the correct type of machinegun is mounted on a specific tank etc to find news about Arma2 is getting frustrating :rolleyes:

[Placebo 28]

This thread is for discussing new ArmA2 Press Coverage, not for "I want this, I want that" and other such rants, that's what the suggestion forum is for.

mr.g-c I deleted your post as it's nothing more but rhetoric and ranting and has nothing to do with the topic of the thread. I tend not to like being ignored. This time it's a warning, next time it will be a full infraction.