Hi
I have bough ArmA, original game what I dont do very often. I mean I not play in games at all. The only original games I have is OFP and ArmA. But I feel raped after playing ArmA for 1 month.
I understand that ArmA was developed as "better looking and working" OFP. But in fact it is piece of non-realistic FPS. Now we have ArmA 1.05 and I only hope that this game will be playable faster than with path 1.96 or higher, the same as OFP. Otherwise it is waste of our and BIS time.
So what I hate in this game in comparison to OFP ?
1) HDR.
I dont understand what this effect improve. In Oblivion and HL2 this only make screen blury and unrealistic bright light sources as sun and sky. Here is much worse. My screen go dark when I see sky and go too bright when I see grass only. On some maps I dont have it (maybe becouse of the time of day) but on some maps I cant play. Maybe Im blind but on real world when I see sky or watch into direction of sun my view dont go dark. And if sun is low, I can put cap of sunglasses and no problem. BIS trying make Arma more realistic than real world. But this make game harder and lower playability. I tested game on GF7600GS and R1800GTO.
2) sounds.
Some sounds of shooting like all M16 and M4 sound like, hehe, some sounds You make when You eat wrong things. Funny, unrealistic.
3) tactics map.
This is totaly messed up. Why BIS decided to make it like this ? Icons too bright and changed from this used in OFP. Map not looks like map, its hard to see where You are. Names of spawn points like in Battlefields maps (ah yes Berserk maps) are tooo small, so I must zoom in to even see the name of spawn point. Sometimes I must see even 2-3 s when this damn map close. Nice, in this time You can be shoot 10 times. Why vechicles stop when I open map ?
4) Weapon change time.
I think that animation of change riffles into LAW/RPG and hand gun to riffles should be faster. It killing my nervers when this guy moves like snail and tank drive in his way but no, he is not hurry, he have time to push all buttons on gun, put it back, take LAW from back, put it on and start aim. This is fight, there is not time for dance like this. Also moving and change our possition anch changing view from 1st to 3rd should be immediatelly like in OFP. This take chance of survive on the battlefield. Why change view take half second ? When I hit key it should change view immediatelly. Also entering/exiting vehicles is maybe realistic, but it have nothing common with the battle reality. Enemy shooting my man but no, he is not hurry again. He have time to jump out vehicle that will blow any second, stand straight, take his weapon from back, and say hello to the 200 bullets that fly in his direction at the same moment. Very realistic. Bravo. Realistic stupidity.
5) Grass
Yes finally we have plants, grass and other s***t in the game. No more naked textures. But this kind of 20m range "fast growing" grass was good in Oblivion when You dont need to hide or shoot from down position. Here its impossible to see anything through it when You lie in the grass. And it not hide Your white azz dear americans soldiers becouse You use some kind of arctic white uniforms in european battle areas. Where are green/brown camouflage clothes ? No money for uniforms? And at least this grass only lover FPS. Should be possible to turn it off in options.
6) driving
I have tryed to drive fast and precise but Im unable to drive some of the jeeps/civil cars. First, why it not hold my direction of turn ? I mean when I turn mouse left in OFP it keep the direction and angle of turn. Here when I move left it immediatelly turn left and comeback to zero/null/0 position. Why ? So maybe someone can explain me how to turn using mouse instead of using mouse+coursors? When I use only keyboard it is also not very precise.
7) flying
I not tryed yet any plane becouse Im too scared to enter any of them becouse my experiences from using helis are amazing. I have tryed all tricks and keys but cant find a way how to turn this shitz from left to right or even aim anything on the ground. Turning right/left remind me using a plane, not heli. It looks like BIS forgot in his run for reality that helis have also trail rotor that make possible to turn heli left/right. Flying is funny but totaly not useful. Ofcourse its possible to hit anything with not aimed rockets, but its far from this that is in OFP. In OFP I can hit a man into his left eye from 200m and high of 100m. Here I even cant aim tank and cant see any infantry on the ground. Unplayable.
8) final
I cant understand why this two games made by the same team? is different like this ? Or OFP is not in possesion of BIS anymore so they cant use OFP good sources/examples? Why ArmA dont use excelent, good working elements of OFP that was tested for years and works like on any other game. Map, move, flyings engine and much more. In fact ArmA could be only OFP with new textures and effects and some more objects and islands and this could be one of the best games in history. Ready to play from v1.0. But now we again must learn everything from beggining and waiting for next patches to fix things that was fixed years ago in OFP.
So finally when ArmA will become an excelent game it will be old grandma not worth to buy or play the same as OFP now (for new kids). This will happend also with OFP2 ? Game that should be "most realistic ground battlefield since Operation Flashpoint 1" will be again a sucking brain, kids FPS, that will change into strong and realistic and playable game after 2-3 years of patching ? No, no thanks.
I like to comeback to OFP game or even a BF2. I was surprised how good prepared Battlefield 2 was from begining. I still play sometimes in version 1.0 and there is nothing wrong or working wrong. Sound, graphic, reality or movement is perfect and after 1-2 days of training You can be really good. So this show me that it is not impossible to make good working game. And BF2 authors do not have a excelent working example for their BF2 like BIS have OFP for his ArmA or OFP2.
But life is not perfect so this explain everything. Hope to have many OFP servers for next few years. Becouse in ArmA I play only becouse I must use my 20euro and becouse I must try to learn how to use this game and want to discover all this new elements that was implement in this game. But ArmA cant beat OFP with USMC equipment on Tonal islands. Things usual there will be for long years impossible in ArmA. Thats sad.
I WANT MY MONEY BACK.
