One of the great things about this game is that there is such a variety of servers out there. You are free to choose what type of game you wish to play. And, if you are able to take those blinkers off for a little while and try something different, you may see that other styles of game have their merits too. Although they may never be to your taste.
Most of the time there are more servers than players in this game. The majority of the populated ones are old skool tron style last man standing affairs, so I don't know what Phytotron is complaining about. What the devs have done is give people more chioce.
Now, should arma include a mission based single player game containing crazy maps and interactive zones? I don't know. But a story based around a series of square arenas fighting bots wouldn't be too interesting imo. Online is the place to play that.
Although I do remember many moons ago when I first started playing this game, I couldn't understand how these players online were so good, I stood no chance. It took several hours against armagetron and gltron to build my skills before I could start winning occasionaly online. This was before 50 rubber servers starting popping up all over the place, [blinkers] those places add nothing to the game[/blinkers].
Storyline?
/me Agrees 100%Monkey wrote:Most of which [servers] consider rubber to be a game physic rather than a network lag aid. That's not good.
I guess if we see Arma as having two types of game play; online multi-player and single-player, then developing the single player side of it would only enhance the game (if ever so slightly) without affecting the perfection of the multi-player side. And if a single-player campaign was successful, then that could easily become a multi-player campaign, adding even more flexibility to the game.
When someone installs arma for the first time and starts playing in local game, it's quite hard to survive a minute against ultra-precision bots, with 1 rubber and high cycle_delay, and it's harder to even wish to beat one them.
The "change game" menu let's you switch many parameters already, but it's not easy to use for beginners and it doesn't let you really change the game. Also typing commands in console is not that intuitive, and the chance to include a self-made .cfg file to avoid typing them everytime isn't so attractive.
Wouldn't it be nice to inlcude a built-in short list of gametypes?
Something like 'easy', 'average', 'hard' as in almost every game.
In my opinion this add would encourage beginners to play arma , and they will be more happy being able to play decently in online servers after a few local matches.
The "change game" menu let's you switch many parameters already, but it's not easy to use for beginners and it doesn't let you really change the game. Also typing commands in console is not that intuitive, and the chance to include a self-made .cfg file to avoid typing them everytime isn't so attractive.
Wouldn't it be nice to inlcude a built-in short list of gametypes?
Something like 'easy', 'average', 'hard' as in almost every game.
In my opinion this add would encourage beginners to play arma , and they will be more happy being able to play decently in online servers after a few local matches.
Well, time to chime in 
I'm a bit opposed to adding a back story. Right now, you can imagine the game is about several things, for example:
- you're a human trapped inside a computer forced to play games for your survival
- you're an AI forced to play games for your survival in a virtual evolution simulator
- you're a hacker of the future and what you see is a representation of what goes on inside the systems you hack, and whenever you dump an enemy cycle, you killed one of the intrusion detection systems
- you're a competitor in The Favorite Sport Of A Distant Future
- you're a virus scanner keeping your system safe
- the game is a simulation of a Grand Unifying Theory and what you see on the screen is what actually happens on a tiny scale 10^50 times for every atom in the universe (on the flat membranes of M-Theory, of course)
- you're programs fighting in a war of open vs closed source
- you're all snakes competing for food on the planet Xyrxz
Adding an official back story would destroy that ambiguity. You'll notice that all of the listed possibilities are cliche; that's OK if it's the player imagining them, but if we force feed it, people will notice it's crap. Unless, of course, it isn't, but seriously, can there be a non-crap backstory for things making turns at right angles?
The same goes for a story accompanying a "campain" single player mode, only even more so: Not only will it limit the player's imagination, it also limits what kinds of levels you can make. In the Future Sport Tournament model, all you can do is have the player fight stronger and stronger opponents in a variety of arenas, for example.
For a mission based single player mode, sure, why not? There's already a lot you can do if we add pre-programmed AIs that follow a given path and spawn at given times and win conditions like "kill all enemies", "gather X points", "get to the win zone" and "survive X seconds". Oh, and AIs with different physics settings than the player are mandatory, I think.
For a tutorial, I think a mission based thing that forces the player to develop techniques on his own would work better. A tutorial has reason to exist only to explain the controls, if you ask me; game mechanics are best explained by just showcasing them in regular levels. You can demonstrate how fortress conquests work with the following sequence of levels, all with just the introductory text "conquer the fortress":
- A lone enemy fortress zone, quick to conquer (so the player does not have to drive around in it, just through it is enough)
- A lone enemy fortress zone, slow to conquer, so the player has to drive around inside of if for a few seconds
- A fortress zone with a very poor defender circling inside it, so the player has to kill the defender first
- A fortress zone circled by an enemy AI chasing its own tail reasonably closely, so the player has to fight his way into the zone
Oh yeah, and I'm no fan of chico maps, shooting or styball. The mechanics just don't seem right to me, like some completely different game crammed into Arma.
I'm a bit opposed to adding a back story. Right now, you can imagine the game is about several things, for example:
- you're a human trapped inside a computer forced to play games for your survival
- you're an AI forced to play games for your survival in a virtual evolution simulator
- you're a hacker of the future and what you see is a representation of what goes on inside the systems you hack, and whenever you dump an enemy cycle, you killed one of the intrusion detection systems
- you're a competitor in The Favorite Sport Of A Distant Future
- you're a virus scanner keeping your system safe
- the game is a simulation of a Grand Unifying Theory and what you see on the screen is what actually happens on a tiny scale 10^50 times for every atom in the universe (on the flat membranes of M-Theory, of course)
- you're programs fighting in a war of open vs closed source
- you're all snakes competing for food on the planet Xyrxz
Adding an official back story would destroy that ambiguity. You'll notice that all of the listed possibilities are cliche; that's OK if it's the player imagining them, but if we force feed it, people will notice it's crap. Unless, of course, it isn't, but seriously, can there be a non-crap backstory for things making turns at right angles?
The same goes for a story accompanying a "campain" single player mode, only even more so: Not only will it limit the player's imagination, it also limits what kinds of levels you can make. In the Future Sport Tournament model, all you can do is have the player fight stronger and stronger opponents in a variety of arenas, for example.
For a mission based single player mode, sure, why not? There's already a lot you can do if we add pre-programmed AIs that follow a given path and spawn at given times and win conditions like "kill all enemies", "gather X points", "get to the win zone" and "survive X seconds". Oh, and AIs with different physics settings than the player are mandatory, I think.
For a tutorial, I think a mission based thing that forces the player to develop techniques on his own would work better. A tutorial has reason to exist only to explain the controls, if you ask me; game mechanics are best explained by just showcasing them in regular levels. You can demonstrate how fortress conquests work with the following sequence of levels, all with just the introductory text "conquer the fortress":
- A lone enemy fortress zone, quick to conquer (so the player does not have to drive around in it, just through it is enough)
- A lone enemy fortress zone, slow to conquer, so the player has to drive around inside of if for a few seconds
- A fortress zone with a very poor defender circling inside it, so the player has to kill the defender first
- A fortress zone circled by an enemy AI chasing its own tail reasonably closely, so the player has to fight his way into the zone
Oh yeah, and I'm no fan of chico maps, shooting or styball. The mechanics just don't seem right to me, like some completely different game crammed into Arma.
/me gives Z-Man a cookie...Z-Man wrote:I'm a bit opposed to adding a back story
Bah, you can have the whole packet...Z-Man wrote:Oh yeah, and I'm no fan of chico maps, shooting or styball. The mechanics just don't seem right to me, like some completely different game crammed into Arma.
Playing since December 2006