ARMA Gold Edition Review
I'm just commenting on this game after having played the single player mode without benefit of any mods or map editing features, which presumably add even more value to the game.
First of all, I'm not a fanatic about realism in a game, nor do I believe that sandbox games are necessarily better or more fun than linear games. I'm a fan of mindless, linear, run-and-gun shooters but tactical squad shooters and sims like this offer a nice change of pace as well as offering a more complex intellectual engagement with the game.
This game is a sandbox game of immense proportions (something like 400 square kilometers). In terms of environment, it boasts changing night and day, changing tides, speed of sound (you see an explosion before you hear it), Doppler sound (sound changes as a vehicle approaches and then passes you), and gravity effects on bullets (you have to shoot high for long distance shots), and time to target (bullets take time to get to the target, so you have to lead moving targets). From what I understand, even the night sky has accurate star constellations. These features, all by themselves, show that the producer of the game was dedicated to going the extra mile.
The game encompasses both air and ground fighting, so there are missions where you have to fly a helicopter in either transport or attack operations. I do not like flying simulators, so this was not appealing to me, but I was able to master the flying enough to finish the missions. If I can do it, anyone can. Only a few missions involve flying.
There are a lot of vehicles to drive and fight in. Tanks, trucks, Humvees, APCs, Strykers, etc, but mostly you spend time on foot, on your own, as part of a team, or as the leader of the team. As leader you command your guys (individually or as a team) using a set of nested pull-down menus. It's a bit cumbersome when you're in the middle of a fight, but it's probably the most comprehensive and realistic team command scheme I've seen. There's no doubt that I had only partially mastered it by the time I had finished the game.
The missions are fictional, modern day, scenarios where you have to destroy a convoy, assassinate a leader, clear a town of enemy, etc. Graphics are decent, but not even close to games like Crysis or Fallout 3. There may be technical reasons for that, so I'm not inclined to treat it as much of a shortcoming. The game ran smooth on my computer with everything set to max. I have a 3GHz Core 2 Duo with dual SLI-linked 8800GTS 512 GPUs.
Much is made in other reviews of the ease with which the enemy seems able to kill you from great distances while you are laying in the grass unable to see him. That's completely true and very frustrating. My solution for that was to enable infinite saves. One of the interesting features of this game is the ability to adjust several individual options in the difficulty level. Difficulty can be set to easy or hard, but you can tweak the various attributes that define those levels. While I started out playing the hard difficulty at its default settings, I finally changed to the easy difficulty level and set everything the same as the hard level except I enabled infinite saves. Being able to tailor the difficulty levels like that is another exceptional innovation that I have not seen on any other game.
I think the real value for this game is the unstructured approach to the missions. You often have to figure out, on your own, how best to execute a mission. There is a lot of replay value in the game because each time you play it, you will almost certainly do it differently and become better at keeping your guys alive.
Arma Gold comes with a set of individual missions as well as three story-based campaigns, one of which is quite long. I played this game regularly for three weeks to get through it, so I'm guessing there is a good 30-40 hours of fun here. At .49 I think it was a bargain. Definitely one of the most innovative and large scale military games there is. Be prepared for a bit of a learning curve (there are a number of training missions to help with that), some frustratingly realistic "bullets from out of nowhere", and some occasionally tedious traveling or sneaking around.
ARMA Gold Edition Feature
- New Story Based Campaign following plot of ArmA Combat Oprations
- Experience 10 new single player missions and 2 new multiplayer maps
- 6 unique characters
- Updated Graphics and landscape textures.
- 6 new vehicles including the Dakota DC2 airplane, Vodnik Armored vehicle and more!
ARMA Gold Edition Overview
ArmA: GOLD NK PC
ARMA Gold Edition Specifications
Experience the ultimate combat simulation again, with the Arma Gold Compilation Pack. Including the award winning ArmA Combat Operations and the expansion pack ArmA Queen's Gambit which adds a completely new story campaign and unique features to an already immersive simulation.ArmA: Combat Operations
ArmA: Combat Operations is a first person tactical military shooter with large elements of realism and simulation. This game features a blend of large-scale military conflict spread over large areas alongside the more closed quarters battle. The player will find himself thrust in the midst of an engaging and expanding storyline, fighting against smart, aggressive enemies who will continually provide a challenge over a massive landscape.Features:
ArmA: Queens Gambit will offer a new story-based campaign occurring 18 months after the ArmA: Combat Operations war conflict. In the same realistic combat simulation experience, you will be arriving with a group of seasoned mercenaries to help the government with a sensitive matter that the army cannot handle alone. With unprecedented freedom of movement, actions and tactics, the game will allow players to immerse themselves in battle with six completely new characters, new vehicles and seven original campaigns.Two new story based campaigns:
- The Rahmadi Conflict: Beautifly designed 3 large missions involving massive battles between the SLA, US and RACS forces within massive fortifications.
- Royal Flush: A group of seasoned mercenaries in 7 action/stealth missions hungry for one dirty goal. Just what is really waiting at the end of the road? New features of this campaign include equipment management including arms merchant.
- Urban Raid:Cooperative MP scenario designed for group of 6 battle-hardened Special Forces soldiers.
- Battle of Porto: A "capture and hold" scenario for forty players on a brand new and beautiful sandy island of Porto.
- Porto Island:designed for smaller multiplayer scenarios and offers perfect environment for intense battles in urban terrain.
- United Sahrani: United Sahrani contains new structures built since the original story of Armed Assault with dozens of improvements.
- Airplanes: DC3, A10*, Su34*
- Cars: HMMWV Limousine, MG mounted pickups, Motorbikes*
- Grenadelauncher:6G30
- Rifles: M16A4*, M16A4 ACOG*, M16A4 GL*, M16A4 ACOG GL*, AK74 PSO1*
- Sniper Rifles:M107*, KSVK*
System Requirements:
| Minimum Specifications: | |
| OS: | Microsoft Windows 2000/ Microsoft Windows XP |
| Processor: | 2.5 GHz Intel or AMD processor, or equivalent |
| RAM: | 512MB RAM |
| Video Card: | NnVidia Geforce 6600GT with 256 MB RAM, Pixel Shader 2.0 or ATI Radeon x800 with 256 MB RAM & Pixel Shader 2.0 |
| Sound Card: | DirectX 9 compatible |
| Hard Drive Space: | 6GB Free Space |
| Other: | MS DirectX® 9.0c |
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*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Aug 09, 2010 04:52:03
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