Hello,
I have been playing this game since the early beta release and I have to say this game is very good but with one very important condition. You need to play the game in a tactical clan where you have order and discipline to begin with. This is an army simulation, so its not just another FPS; shoot at anything you see type of game. I am currently in Australia and playing with one of the clan here, I found out that this game is 3 to 4 times better when you have 10 or 20 other players that have relevant "military experience" on coop, as someone that doesnt have any military background, I think the game serves as a very fun, interactive, and accurate tool to learn about many of the military stuffs. Except for the fact that it is a game, you can't control who plays it, you know, you dont want some 12 year old shooting at friendlies at the base, thats all.

If you want more realism, you should try installing mods because mod development is the thing that has kept ArmaII communities (and now Arma III ported) going strong. The first mod that you need and must try is ACRE, which stands for Advanced Combat Radio Environment. Its where you connect the game with teamspeak and you have communications similar to real life where you can talk either in the radio or direct communication via teamspeak in which obviously you can only talk to people that is around you in-game. When you want to talk to other players, say they are 300m away from you in-game, you can't just shout at them don't you? In this case, ACRE allows the use of the AN/PRC 343 radio which allows you to communicate with other players for up to 600m depending on the in-game terrain just in real life. This is actually a real life radio mainly used by soldiers for personal comms! (It's a military simulation, so we use real world radios! yeay ). And ACRE have another type of long distance communication radio called the AN/PRC 148 radio. In addition to the radios, they have this kinda protocol called RATEL which stands for Radio Telecommunication, where they have callsigns and specific radio jargons.

An example: "Viper One, this is Zero Alpha, you are clear to engage, out".

I can talk lengths about what I have learnt, and this is only one mod, there are bunch of mods out there that has made this game, one of the closest simulation of modern warfare out there. 10 out of 10. Here is me playing in a custom map called Patrol Ops with the OCB clan in a mission called Clear Sea Minefield, where you have dynamic mission generator spread all over Altis with customizable parameters. In the video you can see for yourself how a usual tactical mission goes, with radio comms, a structured rifle team with formations, and calculated movements.

My hopes is that we can make a clan in malaysia, but with our own military backgrounds, rank systems, weapons, and radio protocols with members that have military backgrounds to help 'train' other members in the clan.



Cheers everyone