SpiritedMachine

This software is no longer under development. ArmA II Launcher - Current Version: 1.4.1 Webpage Download ArmaHolic Page Fixes: Fixed an issue where the launcher always started ArmA 2 when using the launch delay timer, regardless of whether you selected ArmA 2 or Operation Arrowhead. ------------------------------------------ Original Post: There are some features that I have found are missing from the current game launchers, so I've decided to create my own. The main feature that I've implemented is the ability to create your own 'groups' of addons. For example, you want to group together all the map addons, weapons, effects, and so on. Create a group, name it however you want, then drag & drop the appropriate addons into your group. Then, you can activate or deactivate entire groups, as well as individual addons. The screenshot below shows an example: Download v0.5

Today I am officially announcing that this software will not be developed any further. Thanks for all the support over the past (almost) 4 years. For those of you that haven't moved to Arma 3 yet, I hope it continues to work well for you. For those that have, I see that there are some new launchers out there that look great, such as the one from Major_Shepard. I wish you all the best. :)

The re-write is taking longer than I expected. I'm basically re-writing from scratch, so the code is much cleaner but of course it will take much longer than a copy/paste conversion. I'm going to have to take back my statement about releasing the updated build this weekend. It's a little hard to keep myself motivated considering I don't play anymore, but your kind words are nudging me along! :D

You're right, the comments section will stay. I have decided to auto-detect whether A2 and OA are in the same directory or not, and adjust the startup parameters automatically. If game mode is set to OA and A2 is installed in a separate location, it will be automatically added as a 'mod'. I will cut it down to only 2 game options this way. I might add another checkbox that overrides that behavior in case someone REALLY doesn't want to load A2 content for some reason.

Does anyone use the Description/Comments field? I thought it was a good idea at the time I created it since a lot of addons have acronym names, but I personally haven't used it. Should I get rid of it for version 2.0? Screenshot of current progress:

If you right-click on the icon in the taskpane there is an option called 'Reset Window Position'. I added that because this problem is fairly common, but I have never been able to track down what causes it. Hopefully I can eliminate it in the re-write.

Just FYI I am in the process of re-writing the launcher in C#. I am making improvements to the interface as well as the code behind the scenes. I hope to have something released in the next few days. If you have any suggestions for changes that haven't been mentioned earlier, now is the time to let me know.

Aha, that is the answer. All of my ArmA 2 purchases were through Steam, so I really don't have much control over how they are installed. How about you guys?

I did some testing with my launcher and Alpinestars'. This testing was to decide whether 3 game modes are necessary. Here is what I found: If you launch Operation Arrowhead without any "-mod=" parameter and you have ArmA2 vanilla installed (probably 99% of users), it will load the ArmA2 vanilla content. (I checked this by going to the editor and seeing which maps were available) If, however, you launch Operation Arrowhead with mods and you do not include vanilla ArmA2 as a mod (which is what my "ArmA 2 - CO" option does) it will not load the vanilla content. There was no way for me to use Alpinestars' launcher and play Operation Arrowhead with vanilla ArmA2 content loaded. Am I missing an option somewhere, or a workaround? Was this a complaint from people? http://download.avidesk.com/images/arma2launcher/arma2launchdata.png (164 kB) From my testing, it seems to me that it is either worth keeping the Combined Operations option, or have some kind of auto detection to add the "-mod=C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\arma 2" command line parameter automatically if vanilla A2 is installed. But, that would prevent the user from playing Operation Arrowhead without vanilla content. Maybe it's a non-issue, but I don't like hard-coding things that could be an option, forcing the user to do things a certain way. What I did discover, is that I can get rid of "-mod=Expansion" when Operation Arrowhead is selected. It doesn't seem to do anything except tell the executable that mods are being run, and thereby preventing vanilla A2 content from being loaded. I spent way too much time on this, I hope I at least got my point across. Please let me know what you think..

I'm not sure what you mean in item 1. Has the beta functionality changed so that the existing 'Run Beta" checkbox doesn't work anymore? If BI has changed the way the beta exe's are handled, I will have to do research on that. Back when I was still playing, I played the beta and the launcher handled it fine. I guess number 2 is self explanatory, I can do that. I guess the reason it is not that way now is I seem to remember that it was possible to play 3 different ways. ArmA2 vanilla, OA standalone, or OA with ArmA2 content. I'm confused by the whole ACR situation. I have no code in the launcher now that detects BAF or PMC. It must have more to do with the way the OA executable detects them. I think that is what Gnat is getting at above.

It was written in VB.NET, but in the past year or so my language of choice has become C#. Hearing from all of you is making me want to rewrite it in C# myself. I'm not sure about ArmA3, I haven't given it any thought before now. If I were to update the launcher, a list of things that aren't working correctly would be very helpful. Do most of the problems have to do with the latest DLC? (All I have is Operation Arrowhead, I never ended up buying BAF or PMC before I quit playing. I didn't even know about ACR until this morning.)

Hello, I am the author of this software, it has been a long time since I've checked these forums. I just wanted to check in and say hello, but also to apologize that the software has not been maintained. I haven't played ARMA2 for over a year, and the launcher has been out of development for about that same time. It's hard to believe that it is almost 3 years old already. I didn't imagine that so many people would still be using it to this day. It was working well at the time that I quit updating it, but since then I'm sure several things have changed. Judging by what I have read in more recent posts it doesn't behave the way it should. Use it at your own risk. Unfortunately I do not have the time to make updates/fixes right now, and it is probably unlikely that it will be developed any further. I may post the source code if anyone wants to continue its development. If I do, be aware that the code is messy because it was one of my first hobby software development projects.

You can sort the load order under the "Addon Options" tab, either by drag/drop or using the up/down buttons.

Yes it works for any type of installation as long as you select the correct executable when it asks you the first time you run it.

If the mods are somewhere other than the Arma2 or OA directory, the entire path has to be there, or the game doesn't know where to look to load them. It has nothing to do with the launcher itself, that's just the way it has to be.

Yeah I didn't think about that. I have A2 and OA installed in different directories, both from Steam. If you have everything in one folder that would do it.

Hmm, same as what mine shows. And you're saying that loads Arma 2 content, like Chernarus and Utes maps? That's odd. The launcher has never really proven to be bug-free, so maybe it's not that odd after all. lol

For whatever reason, it is normal for Arma 2 to show up twice. For me the expansions menu reads this way if I have no mods selected and run with CO selected: Arma 2: British Armed Forces (Lite) Arma 2: Private Military Company (Lite) arma 2 Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead Arma 2 Long story short, you don't have to worry about it. When you play with mods by using a launcher, the expansions menu in the game is disabled. ------ I would like to see how you have the launcher set up. What does the mod string show if you have all mods turned off and game type set to OA? Normal operation shouldn't load Arma 2 content if OA is selected. I just tested it here and it only loads OA content.

That's strange. Whether Addons is capitalized or not shouldn't matter, I know I have some capitalized and some not, but they all show up. I'll try to recreate those folders on my machine and see what happens.

That's something I wasn't aware of/didn't think about. I'll look into fixing that. Thanks for letting me know. ---------- Post added at 05:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:55 PM ---------- Could you show a screenshot of your file structure, down to where these addons are? Sounds like maybe the file structure isn't quite right. The launcher searches inside of your arma 2 or arma 2 operation arrowhead folders for addon folders that contain a subfolder called "Addons". The PBOs, etc would be contained in that folder. If it doesn't contain a subfolder called "Addons", it doesn't get added to the list. Like this:

The error message said that access was denied to a particular folder. I don't think it was a problem with the launcher but there must have been some kind of issue with file/folder permissions on your system, maybe to do with being logged in as an administrator.

.NET is more or less a part of the OS. It's not a running application or anything that will clog your system. The launcher requires 3.5, but 4 should work also, it is the most recent version that MS has released. And especially if you have .NET 2 installed already, there is really no reason to avoid a newer version simply because it's a Microsoft product.

Right-click on the icon in the system tray and click reset window position if you can't see the window.

I have changed the description for some of my units for a multiplayer game. In the lobby they show up fine, but in game, when you aim at a player, it shows the name of the type of unit you placed in the editor. "Rifleman", or "Saboteur", etc. Can you change that name somehow? I've searched for this and couldn't find an answer, maybe I just didn't search hard enough. Thanks in advance.