ArmA II Preview

VideoGamer.com: Sure. Quite a few people are still playing Operation Flashpoint, aren't they?

MS: Right!

VideoGamer.com: That game eventually game to the Xbox. Will ArmA 2 be appearing on consoles?

MS: Mmmm. It's not possible for us to confirm that. Sorry!

VideoGamer.com: Fair enough. Changing topic a bit.... The original Operation Flashpoint was one of the first games I played that really offered open-ended gameplay, but now you see that kind of structure quite often. What's next for sandbox gaming? Is there still a lot to do with the genre?

MS: My feeling is that it's very hard programming and designing dynamic gameplay, overall. There's a lot of work to be done improving all the elements. It could go on forever, basically! In terms of our game.... from tank operation to flight simulation, every single part can be improved with infinite resources or infinite time, until you get one-to-one with the real world. So there's no end!

IB: Of course, we focus on balanced gameplay. And in terms of the dynamic part, we look at things that help the player to fully exploit the potential of the game - all those warfare-related features. I think that's the next step for sandbox gaming. This way we're really giving the player the experience of fighting on the whole map at once...

MS: If you're talking about what's next for sandbox gaming, I'd say that it's definitely the way players can influence not only the story, but also the environment. Imagine a game that lets you construct whole cities, build railroads, bridges. We're still a long way from that, but in ArmA 2's Warfare mode you can build bases, so you're already kind of influencing the environment.

VideoGamer.com: So instead of it being an environment you play in, it's an environment you play with?

MS: The environment is not static. You may destroy half a village, and then it's gone. But you could build a new village. That's the future.

IB: We've also put a lot of effort into the civilians, how they are spawned and how they behave during Warfare mode. You can talk to them and improve their stance towards you. There are some simple mechanisms, of course, to keep them working within the game. To be honest, we had to keep our ambitions low. But you can talk to a guy in a village, find out if he likes you - and then you work out that the source of the guerillas in the game is the fact that two hours ago you destroyed some houses, and now those guys don't like you. It's just a thing that we like to do, and that we'd like to do in the future.

VideoGamer.com: One last question. You guys make a lot of military simulators that are used by real-world armies. How close is this game to those applications? Are they getting closer, in terms of the level of detail?

MS: In some aspects, yes, it's getting closer. The other view is that ArmA 2 has the benefits of the new engine, so it's actually ahead in terms of things like shaders and things like that. For gameplay, I'd say the gap is getting closer, because things like injury simulation, suppression and battlefield clearance were first used in training systems but now they're available to gamers. On the other hand, we don't need much story for the military systems - and the amount of graphical detail in ArmA 2 is quite extreme when compared to what is needed for training purposes. It's closer in some ways, and not so much in others.

VideoGamer.com: Maybe you should put the stuff about interacting with the civilians into the training systems. Some armies could probably do with a bit more of that...

MS: Oh, that's already there!

IB: But of course, they have a bit of a different approach. We always see the implications of a system, but soldiers need to train to in certain procedures...

MS: There's more linearity, it's more straightforward. In a game, we can use more dynamic systems. It could be difficult to be a training instructor if the scenario is too dynamic. You won't be able to react properly, because you yourself will be too surprised by what's going on!

VideoGamer.com: Thanks for your time guys.

ArmA2 is due out for PC Q1 2009, with console versions TBD