MBot

Nice video. Personally I was hoping to finally see the new firefight gameplay, which will be the core of the game. But I guess it is not yet ready for the public and will be presented later. Looking forward to that.

As it sounds ArmA already has a pretty good basis to simulate the effects of mortars and artillery. Now lets hope that also the AI reacts properly when under fire. If done right, this will have a pretty large (and interesting) impact on how infantry combat plays out.

Nice. I never really payed attention to it, because there was hardly any indirect fire in native OFP and ArmA. I just remember those hand grenades, that would kill everyone in the same house, regardless of room or floor. So I just thought when explosions get really important with mortars and artys, there needs to be a good damage system for that.

Artillery and Mortars will be great. What I hope is that damage calculations of exploding shells will take into account exposed area and cover. The way I understand it, shrapnel is the biggest killer of mortar and artillery shells, so stance should affect the chance of taking damage from a nearby explosion. I think it will have some interesting effects on game play, when mortar fire wont necessary kill infantry units easily, but force them to hit the dirt and pin them down.

Excellent interview, very informative. Thank you very much to all involved. Of course now I have even more questions...

Basically Ivan said that the terrain resolution of Arma II is not high enough for trenches or ditches. He also said that they added more objects instead to provide cover. So yes, it probably stays the same as in ArmA, but with some more rocks, stone fences or stuff like that.

That hits it very well. ArmA had lots of hills and valleys, from the island point of view. From the point of view of an infantry-man looking for cover it was basically flat. Judging from the screens and the latest interview, I guess this will stay the same in Arma II

Q: Does the AI in Arma II leads subordinate units different depending on their class, for example rifleman, machine gunner or marksman, and do those units act different depending on their class?

Agreed, ditches next to roads and generally much more "micro-terrain" that provides cover would be important features. After all, the new micro-AI will need a place to find cover

Micro-AI, suppression, cover and animation/movement system haven't realy been shown yet, only talked about. The GC08 presentation was mostly about graphics and the world (which we knew was going to be great anyway). Considering the former will by the core-gameplay of Arma II, I am looking forward to some exciting and major relevations in the comming months (or at least I hope they will come).

The amount of vehicles is incredible. I especially like the large selection of very fine helicopters. Makes me wonder what more is in the bag for us. A shame the OV-10 isn't in service with the Marines anymore, would have made a fine plane for stock Arma II.

Did anyone who attended the GC08 see if some of the vehicle variants are mortar carriers (LAV-M for example)?

I think this is a very important suggestion. It has a large effect on the subject of suppressive fire and cover. The current 3 stances are very limiting regarding the use of available cover. Basically it has the same importance to gameplay as leaning, its simply "leaning" on a vertical rather than a horizontal axis. It would be a pitty if the new micro-AI would be partialy "wasted" because it simply doesn't have the movement options to utilise a large amount of the available cover. As an extension of the concept, one could even allow to further duck from the current prone position. Thus pressing itselfe against the ground to present a minimal target, at the expense of being able to move or shoot.

It's kind of off topic, but in case you are interested in the subject... With SACLOS or ACLOS guidiance, target speed and range are not needed to know for fire control. All that need to happen is that the optical system is tracking the intended target. The fire control computer will then guide the missile in a way that it stays in the center of the optics and will eventually collide with the target or proxy fuse close to it (like a TOW). The optic can be pointed at the intended target automatically by radar or FLIR or manually by TV. In manual mode, all the operator has to do is point is optic at the target and the missile will be guided exactly the same way like in automatic mode. So chaff is really of very limited use against a Tunguska. Fist the chance of chaff to actually brake a solid lock of a ground based radar in a look-up situation is quite slim, second the Tunguska has still the ability to track targets by IR and TV systems. ECM would indeed be of better use at least against the radar tracking. In the end the Tunguska is a effective weapon system that basically creates a no-fly zone in its engagement envelope for aircraft that do not use terrain masking to their advantage. Flares indeed suite better to a ArmA environment since they are effective against Iglas and Stingers.

The Tunguskas missiles use command LOS guidance with the fire controll being by radar OR optical. So chaff and flares wont help anyway.

Ah, a very nice video. This looks very promising. There is still a lot work to be done, including making to movement of the AI look more natural. But BIS are certainly on the right track there. I stay tuned

A very well thought out post, I very much agree. Aswell as with your previous well made post earlier in that topic, lecholas. I don't think it would be a bad idea to design every single object in the world with predefined cover points attributed with informations about directions and strenght etc. After all this is not so unrealistic at all, it kind of mimics the human reaction. As a first reaction to danger we don't make LOS calculations where the best possible cover is. We just see some sandbags then dive for it, simply because we have the predefined knowledge "sandbags=good cover". Only once we are there we start to finetune our position according to the specific situation, finding the best possible cover our obstacle can provide. Wouldn't be such a approach be feasible to our game world? The workload to define such cover points in the creation of each object would be managable. This would at least cover objects placed on the map, terrain cover itselfe would be a different matter.

I think liljb15 makes an excellent point and I am surprised by the "head-into-sand" attitude that many have shown here. Cover is one of the most fundamental apsects of the last centurys infantry warfare, yet is almost completly absent in OFP/ArmA. How this can be defended is completly beyond me. Also the comment that surpressive fire is overestimated realy made me smile, considering that the US forces in Iraq spend about 250'000 rounds of ammo per confirmed kill ( http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article314944.ece ). The realism of infatry combat has always be my main complaint about OFP and I realy hoped ArmA would improve this. Unfortunately it failed to do so. Now I hope for ArmA2...

Signed!

Todays GameStar TV had a report on OFP2. I haven't seen it myself, but here is a small overview from Lightman: http://hx3.de/communi....t173602 Thanks Lightman for his summary. Rough translation: -It seems the screenshot is indeed in game graphic. See also the graphic familiarity with Colin McRae Dirt. -The development team is 150 men strong and the title is in development for 2 years. -According to codemasters this wont be a ego-shooter a la BF2, rather a full blown simulation with embassy on novel AI features and team leadership. -The battlefield should reach a size never seen before. -The player should experience a in depth story and care about his teammates. -On this years Games Convention in Leipzig OFP2 will have it's first grand presentation. Please keep in mind that this is a translation of a summary of a report about the impressions after a talk with the programmers of OFP2... Sounds interesting. Edit: Too slow

Good post, I completly agree. I have also hopes for OFP2, because this is another chance to see a game with that sort of gameplay. Considering that there has been almost zero gameplay change and few design improvement from OFP to ArmA I got a little less enthusiastic about Game2. While this seems to strive for another revolution in the scale of games with RPG elements and a dynamic campaign etc., after ArmA I wonder how willing BIS is to improve the core gameplay and design of the series. So Codemasters might bring in some fresh ideas with OFP2. Even if it wont be as large and free as OFP/ArmA it wont bother me as much. I would gladly change some of the large scale for a better core gameplay. Let's wait and see.

I will play the product that has the better gameplay. Frankly I don't care who makes it. Looking forward for more facts about OFP2. After checking a trailer of Collin McRae Dirt, which is based on the same Neon engine, I am not so sure if that first picture is a render after all ( reworked perhaps, but it looks out of the engine ).

Good news Competition is always a good thing. By the way there is no indication in that article that OFP2 will be a BF type game. It says something like "As you can expect from a Operation Flashpoint, you get a large scale single- and multiplayer war-simulation in a current scenario with that game. The gameplay should be as realistic as possible. A large selection of military disciplines will allow you to find your own role in the battle. The graphic engine will be a shooter-variant of the Neon-engine. Screenshots and videos of Colin McRae Dirt can show you what the engine can handle." They also say one of their editors has spoken with the programmers and will talk about his impressions tomorrow on GameStar TV.

I think that MP will never substitute for good AI, as human players simply can't take up all roles in a game with the same professionalism and discipline that the AI potentialy can. After getting fustrated by SP I have been playing MP for the past few weaks, searching for the "ArmA is all about MP" expierience that I have heard so many times about. In those many hours I had a hard time finding some good gameplay. First the vast majority of MP games are still coops, so AI obviously still plays a large role here. In those massvie coops that are very popular right now, the real challange is to organise logistics. There is lot of waiting involved, lots of driving around and almost zero teamwork. The combat itselfe is mostly about hunting AIs that are lieing on streets or walk around a bit. The only true challange they provide are their shooting skills. Additionaly there is the massive fustration caused by thousands of idiot *human* players that try to spoil the fun for everyone else ( teamkilling, destroying vehicles ). I also seeked some good player vs. player action, but I couldn't realy find it. All I found are CTF and BF2 style fragfests with almost zero teamwork involved. Of course this can be fun, but other games - dedicated to that style of play - do a lot better job at it. Thats not why I brought ArmA. I have not found a place where there is good and tactical team vs. team action. Someone will say "join a squad" now. That can't be the solution. Playing in a squad takes up massive amount of time, you have to make trainings to learn ( or teach ) the tactics, make apointments days ahead so everyone has time etc. You can't simply load up the game and have fun with a team of professionals against a enemy of professionals. Plus I am already involved in a Lock On squad and simply have no time to enter a dozen of squads/clands/etc for all games that have no decent AI. So as a conclusion and to come to a point I think that MP can be a aspect of a game, but will never replace the options singleplayer and a good AI can provide. Especialy for a game like ArmA that calls itselfe a realistic combat game/simulator, AI provides the professialism that a all-human MP session will never have ( well, if the AI would be decent that is ).

I very much agree with that. The AI seems to be limited to a degree by their behavior and movement abilities. They don't use all the movement options that the game offers, they are inefficient in using these options ( robotic behavior ) which means they generally are slow in doing things, they suffer from the overall clumsy and unresponsive movement/control/animation system of the game ( the player does too ) and they suffer from the sloppy collision detection of the game ( respectivly they avoid getting close to objects ). All this doesn't help to display some of the nice AI features the game has, but rather gives the impression that the AI is generally quite dumb. The whole issue relates to some key game area and is therefore not easily fixed. The collision detection and clumsy movement for example. The other day I was moving trough a wall when I went prone out from a sprint. I have several times got stuck between two objects, got stuck and jittered when moving up a stair, could not turn around because my weapon stuck on a object etc. Trying to sidewalk ( strafe ) trough a small clearing of a wall is next to impossible because the gun keeps stuck. No wonder the AI tries to stay away from objects ( and potential cover ). When you walk along a house with AI following in close column formation, they actually follow you 2m displaced on the road. And they refuse to enter large parts of cities altogether, because they seem to be made out of large objects rather than terrain ( Paraiso and Ortego ). The rigid animation system keeps adding to this with difficulties to go prone where you want out of a run because it varies how many steps your character keeps running etc. All this problems are rooted in core areas of the game and are therefor hard to fix in my opinion. Still I think it would be important because without a solid foundation it will be difficult to create a AI that not only is smart but also acts believable.