Let’s see.
The game have, in multiplayer: around 5 coop missions based in some of the already present single player missions, 2 warfare missions, and three pvp missions (from dm to sector control).
In single player:
-15 tutorial missions (pretty short each one, of course). They are pretty well explained step by step, they have improved it since Arma 2 so they can be used by new players without problems. With visual indicators to see where to go, etc.
-7 single player missions (scenarios), 10-20 minutes each one.
There is a little infantry firefight with a humvee as support, clearing a village by night with laser pointers in weapons, a sniper missions at dawn, an attack with tanks, a stealth/sabotage mission, a combat patrol with an armed Little bird and the Death from Above mission with the Apache/UAV combo.
-1 benchmark.
-4 “showcase” missions, one for each side, which are just a place where you can try each weapon and vehicle from each army.
-7 mission campaign.
-Of course, we still have the editor, the combat mode (secOps module), the armory, etc.
The campaign itself.
They have improved two points since the Arma 2 campaign: it does have more action, and have more varied missions. But also they have lowered the level in qualities like the atmosphere, the plot and the characters, hell i would say that it’s not like they have bad plot/characters per se in OA, it’s just they don’t have a proper plot/characters this time. You are a guy from the US army that participates in a military operation. End of the story.
The whole interaction with the civvies angle is anecdotic as best. There are (i think) two missions where if you were friends with them they give you a bonus (a bit of info, allied guerrilla), or a “minus” (without info, guerrilla against you) if they don’t like you, that’s it. Occasions where to affect that civ opinion are also… sparse.
Another “negative” point is the length, with a duration of 6-7 missions (the seventh is optional, depending of your acts in the sixth mission), it can be finished in a long evening/night by veteran players.
Without giving spoilers, there are three infantry missions (well, in the third you have a Bradley at your disposal, so it may be a vehicular mission really), two tank missions, and two Apache missions.
There is a possible salvation in this aspect of duration/replayability of the campaign, and it’s the coop mode. You can play with 4 friends, and unlike in the Arma 2 campaign, in each mission each player have different roles, like a infantry guy, a specOps Delta force attacking from another point, a tank giving support and a chopper making attack runs. It sounds interesting from a replayability standpoint, even if perhaps you can’t fight “back against back” with your friends. As the campaign have more action and less “dead time” than the Arma 2 campaign, it may be more adequate to play it in coop.
Some extra comment:
-Sounds for the new weapons and vehicles are very good. I was a bit worried with the tin sound for the SCAR i heard in youtube, but it’s clear that YT sound compression is not something to trust.
-The sound engine can play more sounds at the same time (setting in sound options), it should help to have less problems with the cutting/sttuter sounds.
-Backpack system works great. You can open it and take stuff from the inventory screen, or drop it in the ground and use it from there, or call a mate and open theirs without him having to drop his backpack in the ground.
-Also the new combat sights and the “zeroing” in the sniper rifles/vehicles works without problem. That said, i would liked to use the zeroing in more weapons that just in sniper rifles, for example it would be great to use in the scoped MGs.
-I am a bit dissapointed with the “new and improved” vegetation. Improved, lol. It looks worse than Arma 2, it looks like vegetation from a game from years ago, that’s why it will consume less resources.
-Textures seems also a bit more blurry, in the same setting (high textures). I think they perhaps changed the distance where they use the highres textures to a more shorter distance. Or maybe is an issue with my computer.
-Take care with the postprocessing setting in video options, now from medium upwards it adds SSAO effect, and as in other games it’s very taxing for the gpu.
-There is a pair of vehicles where they made a halfassed job, like the SCUD and the Striker Mortar, where the weapons doesn’t work. Come one Bohemia, one of the strong points of your game is how every weapon and vehicle is usable, you shouldn’t make fake stuff like this.
-There is a pair of humvees / Land Rovers with dual weapons, a first for BIS-made light vehicles. I am speaking of a car with a fixed mg in the front seat and a rotory fixed mg in the rear seat.
-The ‘automated’ voice system… well, it’s still the same, but they have improved it slightly, the pauses between each word seems to be a bit shorter.
-There is a new, quieter, variation for the voices, if you are in stealth mode.
-Choppers are a bit more agile, but perhaps it’s my imagination.
-IR strobes can’t be sticked to yourself, meh, it’s the main use for them in the ACE2 mod.
-I didn’t try the new modular system (dismount/take in backpack/mount) for the fixed weapons.
-AI is the same as always (well, the same with the 1.07 patch for Arma 2).
-Not even one big bug in the single player missions or the campaign… well, until the last objective of the last mission in the campaign, where the game got stuck and couldn’t finish it properly. I had to use the endmission cheat. Tsk.
-The new radar, the RWR system, the progressive/by step zoom optics, the flares in the air vehicles, all the improvements in the vehicles are god sent, as the vehicle part of the Arma games was being left a bit behind in comparison with the infantry part.
-Now you can’t use the NV google with the scoped weapons. To compensate, now you have flashlights, or new scopes with NV or FLIR vision.
-You can throw grenades with different strength.
-Perfomance in the first scenario, the Takistan countryside, is good, but in the second scenario (which is smaller in pure scale), Zargaband, the capital of Takistan, is very poor. I know i am going to play in the first one and forget the other until i have a new computer (note: i do have a dual core, the new improvements in the engine are more focused in improve the game in quad cores).
-It seems Bohemia has made some changes in how the interaction between certain projectiles and armor works. In theory this is good because it’s supposed to be a little more realistic, but right now it’s bugged or some data values from some projectile types (HEAT ammo from T55, for example) are incorrect.
-FLIR system is excellent, but that’s not a surprise, it’s one of the most publicized features by Bohemia. It’s affected by weather, season, time of day, the heat affects the metal from vehicles and people in a different way, etc.
