ArmA2

[Aleister Black]

Immediately following up with my second review of a game I'm playing to death right now:

ArmA2

Yes, it's an FPS. Or not really, actually. It is more often called a Military Simulator. Now I would never join the actual army. I even feel sorry when I kill an insect, so I suppose I'm not the right kind of guy for the army anyway. However, I do enjoy playing FPS games, and boy, this one took some getting used to! But now I'm used to this, I'm loving it!


Story
I would love to tell you about the story... but all I know is that it involves an insurgent group trying to take over a small former Soviet country named Chernarus. America doesn't like this one bit and sends troops to aid the Chernarussian government to restore order (you can see that the American attitude is perfectly simulated in this game ). However, Russia doesn't like this either and goes in to help the insurgents (another case of realistic attitude simulation), culminating in some big battles... or so they say.

I only played the first two or three missions because I got bored with the story, didn't like the voice acting (it is truly atrocious) and the glaring scripting issues in the campaign. I would have shelved the game... had it not been for multiplayer.



Multiplayer
To be fair, I bought this game for multiplayer anyway. I'm part of a gaming clan (not the competitive kind, just playing around for fun) and I often don't have the time to play any kind of singleplayer anyway because they keep asking me to join a game. I select the games I buy on the probability that a good number of clan members will also buy the game and spend some time on multiplayer with it.



I never suspected that I would have so much fun with ArmA2, though. I basically bought the game because I wanted something to fill the gap between Empire: Total War (god, that game lasted only a week or two before I discarded it) and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. When you're used to arcade games such as CoD, the fact that it only takes one or two bullets to kill you may put you off. When you ajust to it though, you will see that you are forced to employ actual tactics, and to think about what you're doing. Don't rush forward like Rambo, it will get you killed. Rather, sneak and probe and scout ahead, and you might just live through the mission.



When you're playing online (usually in a coop versus AI) this can get pretty tense. Missions can range from nighttime stealth operations to urban battles with armoured support. It is also very easy to make your own missions, and since we have our own server, we can make missions suited specifically to our preferred style of play.

The game forces you to communicate with eachother and work together as a team, and even simple missions can be very epic at times, when you're all engaged in a heavy firefight, armoured vehicles firing their main cannons and everyone shouting contact reports, a medic dragging a wounded comrade off the field to give him first aid in cover, a chopper flying overhead to provide close air support...




The Game
I'm not all praise though. The game can be a little buggy at times, and sometimes the AI is just frustratingly accurate and smart and invisible. But then, this is just like in real life I guess.

It looks great, and the game world is about 200-250 square kilometers, so there's a lot of space to walk around in. The sounds could have been better, but they are sufficient, apart from the horrible voice acting. The controls are a lot better than in the original ArmA.



Rating: I'm giving this game an 8 out of 10 as well. There's some things wrong in this game, but the company is known for ironing these errors out over time. Also, the multiplayer experience makes up for a lot in this game, as it is truly, truly epic to play this with your mates.



Some videos from my Youtube channel:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvkWYr2wk6Y

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ime-QmYJfBY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a310QC4s9I4

[Sephiroth]

from the screen shots you provided that game looks pretty steller xD

[Aleister Black]

It looks pretty sweet, especially when you're all into it and teamplaying and communicating and stuff. Really immersive. Sometimes though there are some graphic glitches like strange animations and minor clipping issues. Also I managed to turn over an M1A1 Tusk tank by driving over a pebble too hard. Strange collision+physics, I think.

This game is also very unlike CoD or any of those arcade shooters. If you try it (there's a pretty big free demo) be aware that you will need to adapt pretty quickly; Ramboing will get you killed very very fast.

[Sephiroth]

so i'm assuming this game is for PC.
If so how much does this game cost as I would probably only play the multiplayer.

[Aleister Black]

Yep, it's for the PC. I think it's about 40 euros. Don't ask me how much that is in US dollars or Canadian pounds or in shells or whatever it is you pay shit with over there. Do your own lookin'


Multiplayer is pretty good, but if I were you I'd look for a group to play with regularly. The normal servers appear to have a good number of teamkillers and lonewolfers on them, while on the good ones (tacticalgamer bravo server which is open, or my clan's server but that one's passworded ) you would get real teamwork, communication, stuff like that.

So get yourself a regular group to play with, cos the pubbies can be crap.

[Sephiroth]

alright. I'll see if I can find this game here in Canada xD

and we pay in dolor's xD

[Aleister Black]

You can always buy and download it off Steam. It'll take a while before it's downloaded I'm sure, but you won't have to patch it yourself; Steam does that for you, fully automatically, which is an added bonus.

[Sephiroth]

I have no internet money to pay for it off Steam xD

[Aleister Black]

Yeah, then you're dependent on game stores. I hope for your sake that they have it

[Sephiroth]

yea that's what im thinking. im having doubts though. But you never know they might have it.

[Aleister Black]

And, did you find any?


I'm getting really good with helicopters now. I flew a helicopter at 5 meters above the ground and at 250 kilometers an hour... I had to fly around trees and such. Pretty awesome.

[Sephiroth]

I never had the chance to look. As my small town dosnt have the stores that the city over does so i'll look into it when I got into the city sometime soon.