instagoat

http://o.canada.com/2012/11/07/are-video-games-getting-too-accessible/ Interesting question to ask. I think they are. The game should become more usable, more intuitive, but should not have entry levels lowered.

Great job on these. I am seriously looking forward to Arma 3 though, that will put an end to the hundreds of models addon makers have to produce to make differently equipped variants of one and the same rifle. Will you also do bolt animations on the appropriate rifles? I know it looks kind of weird without the hands doing anything, but I like those on these rifles because it gives me a visual cue for how long until the rifle is ready to fire again. Again, great job, I´ve been looking forward to these a while, can´t wait to see more!

I think it won´t necessarily be the systems that will be replaced, but the equipment they will carry. The air force plans to operate B-52s until something like 2050. By then the planes will be nearly 100 years old. And I believe that certain new technologies will find their way into military use, and re-shape the battlefield. Small, stealthy, self-contained and automated drones scouting over the battlefield using small thermal cameras for example will for example revolutionize reconnaissance. However, most technologies will, probably, find their way into civilian and commercial use. An example of a robotic system is here: http://www.riemurasia.net/jylppy/108424/Robotteja Military technology will probably develop rapidly in a threat environment, especially with a new cold war brewing between the SCO and NATO, particularily over the pacific and asian sea regions. By 2035 it´s not unlikely to expect aircraft carriers operating ship-based versions of the Pak-FA, J-20 and J-31 fighters. At least russia has announced the development of a stealthy bomber aircraft, possibly to rival the B2. Air warfare will dominate the future battlefield, because due to the -massive- lethality of modern air based weapons, the side that cannot establish air dominance will essentially loose all ability to move and fight in any coordinated and sustained fashion. The second gulf war has proven this, but we´ve known it at least since the normandy invasion, and particularly the later ardennes offensive.

The closest we have to that are the DesignMastery M4s, which have a non-overlay ACOG. However, while render to texture scopes would be possible in Arma 3/TOH, nobody has done them for TOH so far, and Arma 3 will not include them for performance reasons.

Mostly, because of the difficulty of predicting things. I have been looking around on youtube and the wikis for panels by professionals and experts, as well as documents, on how reliably you can predict the future, and these guys make a good point here: Basically, the summary is that you can´t estimate the impact of the things you´re able to predict, and you´ll always miss the interesting developments. Case in point: no science fiction up to the development of the internet predicted the development of an equivalent. Makes me wonder if a more conservative outlook isn´t warranted. Basically, in the short term, we will always expect too much, and in the long term, too little. So I think it may after all be realistic for evolved 2012ish gear to be used in the timeframe. However, I still believe that certain key technologies will be developed far enough to become public mainstream, ie, production facilities at home, power production and storage developments, etc.

Looks like a better looking F-35, due to heavy F-22 gene input. No matter the looks, what mattes in the end is performance. Obviously still a prototype, but by now it is evident that the stealth superiority of the US is a thing of the past. 2010 was the date where all legacy fighter designs, as well as the Eurocanards, were pushed to obsolescence. I think it would be sensible if the US ditched the F-35, restarted the F-22 program, and also made an export F-22 available.

I think the problem is that previously, BI´s record as far as releasing playable releases has been a bit stained. OFP was buggy at release, not unplayably so, but it took a long time (even after the release of Resistance) to clear everything up, and even then, issues remained. Arma, same story, along with shoddy production values, particularily regarding the Queen´s Gambit addon. Arma 2 was, again, pretty much the same story. Especially the german release was difficult to stomach, and for me the goodness of Arma 2 only arrived with Arrowhead. So far, a lot of bricks have been thrown (unintentionally) into the path of Arma´s success by BI. Not enough publicity for Arma after the success of OFP and the split, a bugged release, a mediocre addon and then on to Arma 2, which had well intentioned and revolutionary changes, but all those were (again) hampered by quality control issues, overengineering (particularily in some missions. I´m looking at you, Manhattan.) as well as lack of a clear line as to what the game was really trying to be. It did pretty much everything, but nothing very well. I hope Arma 3 will be different in the respect that it will actual completely know what it is doing, and not flop about like Arma 2. A game can´t be a shooter/rts/ecosim/tactical rts/life simulator/navigation trainer/wildlife simulator at the same time. I am exagerrating a bit, but there were certain things Arma 2 could´ve done without, and would´ve been better for it. I hope they will handle things better for Arma 3. The crux though, really is Advertising. BI are relying too heavily on publicity trough gaming websites and magazines. However, people who do not care about the game in the first place will not read the article and/or check the websites. New people need to be drawn in, and they best not be introduced first to the archived disaster messages about Arma 2s botched germany release (which are still first in line when searching for Arma 2 on youtube, at least for me.) Without a good, active, and concise PR campaign, Arma 3 will be another fish in the pond. Same for DayZ. If you don´t remind people that you exist, they will forget about you quick. I hope the devs and particularily the PR dept people are aware of this too.

I just remembered. AI needs also to be affected by the weight system, and conserve their strength (or not) depending on experience. That´d be rad, though I think it´s unlikely it´ll be implemented.

I´ve seen video. Thanks but no thanks: another dead boring, script-heavy railshooter? I don´t know why this gets such a bad score and COD doesn´t. Both are equally rubbish: they are not games, they are semi-interactive movies. I play games because I want to play a game. Not because I want to hold down W and leftclick to win, or stupid quicktime events, or laze X building to prevent scripted autokill by sniper. Arma 1 is miles better at its worst than any of these so colled "A list" games. They cater to the lowest common denominator as far as SP goes, and their hard core is a gimmicky multiplayer experience, far from the refined, truly sportive MP of a counterstrike or Team Fortress (prior to hats) or early Quake. Hopefully EA will stop producing this shit now and leave the soldier stuff to companies who can deliver, like Bohemia. Unfortunately Blops 2 will be another hit, and the mesmerized, graphics-lusting, gameplay-ignorant masses will meander into the stores by the thousands to consume another title with an overbearing, meaningless, pseudo-intellectual story and (yet again) gimmicky multiplayer. Oh, and it has a Zombie mode, that´s a seller, right? I have no hope for the big time companies to produce any innovative titles anymore. About the only things that are truly great about these games are the art assets. And even those often are, in fact, not, under closer scrutiny. And yes, I am going into full gaming hipster hate mainstream mode, here. I am just tired of titles that pretend to be "games", but in fact are nothing more than glorified railshooters, and whose entire MP challenge is unlocks, 1-shot-victory-gimmicks, flinch shots and achievements instead of great map design, weapons balance, tactical challenge, teamwork and generally great game design. Okay, I´ll stop whining. I really wish they would stop churning out these boring, meaningless trash titles as A-list games and start doing interesting things again. Or things that are at least fun.

The F-35 program's problems are too numerous to be discussed here, and some of the problems are so glaring that in a time of war the program would`ve been cancelled already in favor of a more workable solution. But to name a few things, the aircraft is grossly overweight, underpowered, overengineered, the sensor and weapons solutions have not been tested yet at all, many key weapons platforms have been removed from the support suite, the aircraft has neglible space for weapons, and due to airframe bloating to accomodate the weight increase has lost stealthyness from almost every aspect but the front. It is unable to supercruise, or even sustain meaningful times supersonic on afterburner to escape pursuing supercruising next-gen Flankers or PAK-FAs, it doesn´t have the airframe space to mount powerful AA radars comparable to those in the pipeline for the SU-27 series or the PAK-FA, or indeed the F-22, and to add to all these problems the development program is so troubled that the new leader has smashed Lockheed over their inabillity to deliver on time and on target. The progress in modern technology, especially electronics technology, sensors and weapons is extremely fast nowadays, so I think the 2020 ish line I drew on the chart pushed forward to 2030 is still realistic. Again, bar the geoengineering, possibly, as well as some more complex meta-material solutions and super-fancy camo technology. But I believe -many- things will be employed that people are only dreaming of now, because we are entering an age where we are finally able to actually design solutions for our ideas, instead of fumbling around in the dark like it was done in the 60s, where things like this were the realm of science fiction. Flying cars are not a matter of impossibillity today, but simple matters of practicality, for example. As such, I´m going to continue looking, I hope to make the first update to the first post on the weekend, or at the latest by the middle of next week. Cheerio Insta

In wartime, cost considerations usually go out of the window. Plus, many of these technologies entail improvements in production technology too, making it cheaper to produce equipment that would be top-notch today. For example, the housebound production automaton like I mentioned would enable common rebels to produce cheap-end factory quality rifles (your budget wal-mart AR-15, basically.) from template. It would probably be very slow, and some dedicated machinery would still be needed for some parts such as the bolt and barrel, but it would still increase the capacity of a rebel force to supply itself massively. Another thing to note is that the tech we see on the blufor side is -massively- outdated, which indicates that economically, the NATO countries and particularily the US are seriously on their back foot. Research by large military think-tanks indicates that the F-35 even today will fail to deliver on pretty much any promise it is making, and using that kind of underperformer in 2030 tells me a lot. So, whatever technology we will see, it will probably be seen on the opfor side and not Nato, apart from special forces who have the kind of budget allowance to purchase the good stuff. It is difficult to evaluate cost, but there are mathematical solutions to at least approximate what a given item will cost then, compared to now. That doesn´t account for economic developments, obviously.

A fair statement. I´m not going to start arguing about words here, I fully agree to the essence of what you said. Removing hurdles and improving the front-end, so to speak, is massively important. I do not believe, however, that we will see properly done tutorials like, for example like M1 Tank Platoon 2 had, where the game had videos, texts and missions for -everything-, as well as a 250 page handbook that ALSO explained everything, from controls to tactics. It even went as far as explaining doctrine (Purple and Opfor). That kind of material is what's needed to tie people to the game. Easy access, good usability, all without removing features from the core gameplay (which really is the reason why we all play the game. I think nobody would/should be bothered by better menus and detailed text and gameplay tutorials.) The issue, however, is time and manpower.

Didn´t read thread, just want to cause mayhem by going full semantics. "Accessibility" is wrong. The word you´re searching for is "Usability" Accessibility means to reduce entry and overall challenge so the lowest common denominator in the target audience can successfully use the product. Press A to win, basically. Usability means to improve interface, mechanics and documentation so that the lowest common denominator in the target audience, while not being able to "win" right out of the box, can learn the product successfully and become competitive at it, WITHOUT degrading Gameplay, Difficulty, Complexity or Mechanics (!). There is a massive difference. If you wanted to make Arma more Accessible you would need to do the following for example: Increase running speed, increase Body-protection at all difficulty levels, remove features that depend on heavy documentation (Squad command, advanced Editor features, advanced Mission features, formations, etc), remove features that are difficult for players to grasp or alter mechanics so concepts that are hard to grasp become less important (ie not punishing players running around in the open), and basically adjust, throw out or add features until the entirety of the game is enjoyed by the majority of your selected target group (In this case, casual gamers with an interest in hard shooters, but not too hard pls). Usability is completely different. Usability means that you explain what feature does what, and why, and what it is good for. You teach basics, move, stance, shoot. Then move up to simple cover vs concealment lessons. Then move up to advanced shooting, shooting on the move and specialised infantry weapons. Then move on to basic command (2 Units, you and one underling), etc, etc, etc. Usability also means that you have documentation on everything the players could ask questions about. For example, mil-dot scopes should be -explained by the game-, and not by dyslexcis (fantastic) book. Have some sort of ingame wiki, perhaps. You also need to teach players how to go about tackling objectives. Most players today are not familiar with the concept of getting a goal, but no way to achieve it. The closest one gets to that are games like Skyrim or GTA, where you have a mission marker, and you´re free to reach it how you see fit (while secretly still being railroaded trough clever level design). In Arma, people stand in a forest, get an X on the map, and then they are left to hang dry. Normal gamers do not know about reconaissance, military approach to terrain, employment of weapons, and most people also have no clue how to use the command interface to coordinate an attack with multiple vehicles, different weapon types against a multitude of different threat targets that all need different handling. I know how to use the interface and I can´t do it 90% of the time because the command interface sucks. That is the third important thing about usabillity: Interface. The Interface needs to be intuitive, self explanatory (or well documented if it can´t be), and as shallow and narrow as possible. It also needs to be extremely reliable (this is important mostly for context-sensitive stuff.). The Interface and backend for player interaction are also important because if players can hook up with each other (that is why I like steam, for example, I can just ask another friend who is in the same game.) and help each other out if they run into problems, and easily set up multiplayer games (there we get back to good mission and mission template design, and editor documentation.), share scores and missions with each other, as well as download addons (!). That´s my take on the whole Issue. Hope it makes sense :I Cheerio. Insta

As the saying goes, the only constant in the Universe is Change. And I stated in my starter that BI are being too conservative, and that the collection I am doing here is more intended towards inspiring Community members new and old into producing new content. If BI wouldn´t have wanted futuristic stuff, they shouldn´t have picked a date as far as 2030. It opens tons of possibillities, and holding the tech level of now at that date is very unrealistic. Stuff that will have been produced now will be as vintage then as north koreas Mig-19s and Mig-21s are today.

Funnily enough, the deactivated 7th ID has been completely reactivated this year. So Arma 3s authenticity is increased by depicting an active Combat Unit. Unfortunately they will be geared and trained towards operating in the Pacific TOP, probably in case the whole Japan X China thing goes south. http://www.army.mil/media/267489 This also gives incentive to make fancy reskins for the existing OA US Army units as light fighters. Interestingly, 7th ID is not a light infantry division anymore, but a mech. infantry running Strykers. Also, UCP all up in this female dog. I am wondering if the Iran pick is actually less realistic than Codies decision to make China the "Bad guy". The difference will be that it´ll be between Japan and China over Islands that have nothing but sentimental, nationalistic value. So, in a curious development of history, the pick of Iran and Greece becomes less politically inflammatory than the other choice. Thoughts?

It is true that most modern military computers are old and low performance compared to desktop gaming rigs, however, the reason for that is the needless overhead (the communications and interfacing tech isn´t advanced enough yet to warrant putting more high performing machines in there) in performance for their civil counterparts, and the fact that they are reliable. The spaceshuttles computers were basically modified 286s if I remember correctly. But it -ran-. However, once a computer technology rolls around that is just as or more reliable, is affordable and provides sufficient extra benefit, the legacy systems will be thrown out wherever necessary and new systems put in place. Especially with regards to modular computing and engineering, this will be important, because I think it´s realistic to expect that the current research into modular combat vehicles will turn out to be a good path to walk on. Also, the reason for the technological drive after 1960 slowing down is that by then, we had achieved all the easy things, and from then on only difficult things remained. In 1940, a handful of individuals single-handedly cracked the nuts: today, you have entire science operations with hundreds and hundreds of people working on them to solve problems. And just because a modern smartphone is kind of the same as a 1990s vintage mobile phone by appearance and job description, I think they are two entirely different animals. A smartphone is -massively- more advanced. A modern smartphone outclasses most 1990s laptop and desktop computers by performance, memory and versatillity. Things haven´t slowed down, they in fact have begun to speed up. The "slowdown" you mention is an illusion, because the basic problems were at heart down to figuring out a starting point. We have the starting point down, and now we actually have to use what we found out to build something new. Meta-materials are about constructing materials that nature is -incapable of forming-, for example. AI research is beginning to become relevant for government and industry alike, and Universities in the US are already now doing swarm-robotics with AI controlled drones for surveillance and disaster support purposes. New combat vehicles are also developed to very precise operating conditions. MRAPs for example will not be that useful in a continental, cold war, fulda-gap style scenario. On the other hand, AAVs and Bradleys do not work very well in an Urban, ambush and IED dominated guerillia war. Also, the automobile industry is not focused on progress, they´re interested in what sells. A lot of good Ideas were sold to them in the 70s and 80s, and then put in the bottom drawer. Some of these things are now pulled out because technology allows them to be fielded immediately and reasonable cost, and because the customer base demands them. Companies do not go towards what makes sense, but towards what the Customers want. And for the past 20 years, people wanted V8, 250 bhp BMW M limousines and fat SUVs. The Oil economy will see to that, gradually. I am more in favour of an optimistic view on technology, but I also think that a lot of the things (particularily on the geoengineering side) are a little too optimistic in that list. I also think that we are now getting into the difficult part of development: silicon based computing is already running into barriers left and right, for example, because of physics and chemical hard barriers. We still press on and find solutions, and break down barriers. And unless the world massively changed in the Armaverse, I think a more optimistic outlook on technology as far as the gameworld is concerned is warranted. Also: First post updated, Thanks again to MadDogX for the help!

Aaaah nice, thx. I know you guys put so much effort into these things being correct, I apologize for my doubts :( Again, great job, looking forward to seeing these lined up for finals once A3 rolls around. These will be the gold standard, sort of like Johnnys US SF were for Arma 1, I am pretty sure of that.

Great job, I am really impressed. Super quality models, super quality textures. The only thing that bugs me due to my love of slanted pockets is the CCU (Is it a CCU?) with the dual velcro strips under the pocket flap (not the modified BDU of the team leader). The pockets don´t seem to be angled at all: is this a different type of jacket, rather than an ACU/CCU prototype kind of deal? Would love to see these finished, you have my full mental support, if that helps any! Fantastic Units.

"Ethical" in the context of warfare means that it should not cause "inhuman" wounds and suffering, should not be indiscriminate by design (this is important) and not be used to cause mass civilian casualties in an instant or very short timeframe. However, warfare is not as clean as games make it out to be... I am repeating myself, but it bears repeating. People don´t just fall over like in Arma. There is lots of blood, screaming, bodily waste and shards of human beings involved. Incredible amounts of fear. If you watched the videos from Syria and Lybia (especially the Urban ones) you know what I am talking about. Arma is not designed to do this realistically. If it were, it would be the only Saving Private Ryan style Anti-War Shooter ever. War should not be glorified, like it is in COD, or even approached in a neutral fashion like with prior Armas. It should be a painful experience that should leave you sweating in your seat, with every emotion but joy or satisfaction.

I am just being realistic. There is -nothing- noble, glorious, fun or beneficial in warfare. I mean, the bouncing mines that are being introduced are technically illegal according to UN antipers-mine resolutions, for example. For a nation, or an alliance of nations, war may be an option, but at the bottom, the people in the way and who are involved will always loose in some fashion or the other. I met people, for example, who were affected by the afghanistan conflict both directly and indirectly, and for none of them it was a happy story. We should keep this in mind all the time, I think.

I´m still in the UK. I might upload something once I am back, if I can come up with something. Also I bought a british military issue UBACS. :I The pockets are hueg. Will make taking reference pics for poses easier, since the shirt of the BLUFOR is based on the BAF UBACS model instead of an actual crye shirt.

There is no such thing as "ethical" warfare to begin with. Certain weapons have been banned because of their impact on innocent bystanders, not active participants of the conflict per se. In a total war scenario, pretty much everything is fair game. Political correctness and Humanitarian concerns will go right out of the window once the war arrives at the homefront. Unless it´s a political warfare scenario a la vietnam, obvsly.

Helmet shape, hue of the Uniform, shape of the weapon, vest colour, direction they are coming from, gunfire noise. For example, if they have blue camo pants and green balaclavas, you´re dealing with Chedaki. If they have all green Uniforms with a greyish green and you hear kalashnikov or PK fire from their direction, you´re dealing with Russians. If they have greenish-brown-green Uniforms and brown vests, you´re dealing with Marines. CDF has russian-ish Uniform that is more pale and has pale green vests. When in doubt, hold fire and see if your friendlies are firing at them. Also, train. It comes with experience. Also, it is like real life. IRL, you -also- can´t tell who is who. That is why during gulf war, A-10s were blowing up Bradleys, M1s where also shooting Bradleys and trucks, and Apaches were blowing up Hummers and Trucks.

Hey, that´s a little unfair there... there were only three or four people TOTAL involved in the PMC art assets apart from the map. Only one of those I was told at GC worked on the art assets revolving around the Units themselves (which is why they have the kitbashed US army model with the pouches, which they used for the PKM gunner, RPG gunner and a handful of others, as well as the kitbashed AA-12 and Czech-vest dudes, and only two unique models with the commander and the engineer/frost model). If WarZ only had a single person or two working on their art assets, okay, but with a whole team, the -many- asset recycles they used either screams of a scarily low budget, low production value, or very little dev time up to this point. PMC was not as bad as people try to make it out to be. (That it also wasn´t excellent is also true, but for what it is, it is good. Comparing a small DLC like that to a fully blown game is apples and oranges too.) My two cents on that. Also: yes I am shameless BI fanboy. Though I can see where their problems are. I haven´t looked into warZ, the timing just seems suspicious, and the history of the guy behind it is pretty dubious too. BI has a proven track record: release broken games with great concepts, then fix them and do it better next time incrementally. The WarZ guy´s only claim to fame I could discern was the overland truck racing game. And that is doubtlessly one of the most shoddily made titles -ever- to hit the market.

Really great... so are these WarTS people now providing to us the same kind of entertainment codies supplied to us in 2008?