ArmA 2 is now Free(-ish)

#1 Posted by eroticfishcake (7745 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

Couldn't find a thread about this in the forums and I'm not too surprised to be honest. Anyway, earlier this month Bohemia Interactive, developers of the military simulator series, Armed Assault has now announced that their second game in the series is now free. Anyone who's recently bought it off steam need not rage because it's not quite ArmA 2 but more so ArmA 2 Lite. To give you a quick run-down on what's different on the free version here's a chart;

A limited version but no micro-transactions at all.

If you care about ArmA chances are that you already know (and own a copy of it) but even so it's quite clever of Bohemia Interactive to release a free (albeit limited version) of ArmA 2 to draw in a bigger crowd. Personally, I've always been fascinated by military simulators but equally intimated by the steep learning curve of them so this is a good chance for me and others to give it a shot and see if it tickles their fancy.

It should be noted that the series is geared towards realism so if you're looking for something among the lines of Battlefield or Call of Duty, you're probably looking at the wrong place, otherwise it'll scratch your realism itch that you've been aching for. Currently, the servers for their website are being hammered (or just offline for now, I'm not entirely sure) so thanks to some kind individual, you can download the game from Megaupload (about 960 MB, zip).

Finally, here's the minimum system requirements so you know wheter or not you can run this graphic intensive game;

Processor: Dual Core CPU for Intel or AMD
Memory/RAM: 1 GB
Video Card: Nvidia Geforce 7800 / ATI Radeon 1800 or faster with Shader Model 3 and 256 MB VRAM
Hard Disk Space: 10 GB
Operating System: Windows XP or Windows Vista

#2 Posted by RandomInternetUser (6779 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

Awesome! I have been wanting to get this game for a while, loved the demo for ArMa 2 and Op. Arrowhead expansion.

#3 Posted by zudthespud (3204 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

Downloading it now, might aswell check it out. The box that says "HD Graphics" Is not ticked so I don't know what it will look like, but meh. FREE

#4 Posted by Chavtheworld (4132 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

@eroticfishcake: Oh my, thanks for bringing this to my attention - I've been wanting to buy ArmA CO for ages now but haven't had the money to spare, and better things have been coming out. Also, I was fairly sure ArmA III would get announced soon (which luckily it did at E3) which surely will be better optimised (I heard ArmA II runs like a dog) and will be a better buy.

Also, those system specs look really conservative considering what I've heard about ArmA II.

By the way, how are they not including high-res graphics? Did they literally just put in a load of low quality textures only to save on file size? Also I was thinking that most Arma servers seem to be CO servers only, so there would be noone to play free with - but then also hopefully a lot of people might pick this up and add more players for this version, so it could be okay.

This sounds really dope, and if I enjoy it I'll definitely buy ArmA 3. Good on Bohemia!

#5 Posted by xMP44x (2188 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

That's excellent. I always wanted to play ArmA II but even now, I doubt my laptop could handle it adequately.

#6 Posted by HitmanAgent47 (8577 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

No hd graphics?

#7 Posted by eroticfishcake (7745 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

@Chavtheworld@HitmanAgent47: : That's odd, I didn't get a notification mail for this reply. Anyway I haven't played it myself since I'm only downloading it at the moment but from what I've heard the game still looks pretty good. I doubt it'll be Crysis 2 levels even at HD settings but with ArmA it's more about scale which is important given the style of gameplay. I tried the ArmA 2 demo last year and yeah that's not the most optimised of games (granted my PC is shit as well) but as I said, that was last year so I'm sure they optimised it at the least.

Also, no HD graphics which I'm going to assume they've just disabled them or something. In all fairness, people who care about HD graphics on their PC are the type of people who probably already own the game.

Since it's multiplayer only I'm thinking of starting with other members of the sight and see how that goes. Of course, that just came off at the of my head right now. I may not even understand the controls let alone start a game.

#8 Posted by RandomInternetUser (6779 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

I just played it for a second to see what they mean by no HD graphics... and shit. It looks kind of like ass, at least the character models do. Very low-res looking. Had it on 1920x1080 and High settings. (Can go to very high, but didn't change it)

#9 Posted by SamStrife (1037 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

That's cool but without mods the games pretty crappy. It's all about ACE mod multiplayer.

#10 Posted by Chavtheworld (4132 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

@xobballox said:

I just played it for a second to see what they mean by no HD graphics... and shit. It looks kind of like ass, at least the character models do. Very low-res looking. Had it on 1920x1080 and High settings. (Can go to very high, but didn't change it)

Ah, fair enough, I don't care really as its free.
@eroticfishcake said:

@Chavtheworld@HitmanAgent47: : That's odd, I didn't get a notification mail for this reply. Anyway I haven't played it myself since I'm only downloading it at the moment but from what I've heard the game still looks pretty good. I doubt it'll be Crysis 2 levels even at HD settings but with ArmA it's more about scale which is important given the style of gameplay. I tried the ArmA 2 demo last year and yeah that's not the most optimised of games (granted my PC is shit as well) but as I said, that was last year so I'm sure they optimised it at the least. Also, no HD graphics which I'm going to assume they've just disabled them or something. In all fairness, people who care about HD graphics on their PC are the type of people who probably already own the game. Since it's multiplayer only I'm thinking of starting with other members of the sight and see how that goes. Of course, that just came off at the of my head right now. I may not even understand the controls let alone start a game.

Yarr it'd be nice to play with some GB duders - no idea how to get a server set up though so. Also, its a pretty deep game so who knows if anyone will get the controls :P

#11 Edited by JJWeatherman (13875 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

No HD? Seems like an odd exclusion. (Or I guess limitation)

#12 Posted by Chavtheworld (4132 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

Aaaaand apparently you get kicked from the severs for having a ping of 100-150ms. Goodbye ArmA III sale!

#13 Posted by Hero_Swe (943 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

@Chavtheworld said:

                    Aaaaand apparently you get kicked from the severs for having a ping of 100-150ms. Goodbye ArmA III sale!

That's serverside, not gameside. Find other servers.

#14 Posted by CL60 (16906 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

No HD graphics? Wut?

#15 Posted by Chavtheworld (4132 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

@Hero_Swe: Ah okay thanks, it was just coming up as a message from that thing called BattlEye that is installed as part of the game, so I thought it might be true for all servers.

#16 Edited by Kyle (2317 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

Interesting... I think ArmA II's particular brand of hardcore crazy might be a little too much for me, but now I guess I at least have no excuse to not try it.

And yes, no HD seems pretty lame. Oh well...

#17 Posted by Jack268 (3386 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

Neat, hopefully more people will start playing it more regularly then.

#18 Posted by Chavtheworld (4132 posts) - 1 year, 10 months ago

@Kyle said:

Interesting... I think ArmA II's particular brand of hardcore crazy might be a little too much for me, but now I guess I at least have no excuse to not try it.
And yes, no HD seems pretty lame. Oh well...

The game looks okay, as long as you make sure your resolution in the video option matches the 3D resolution - otherwise it goes all blurry. That way, it's still really crisp - basically they just used low res textures on everything to save on the file size.

ArmA II

ArmA II: Ultimate Military Simulator is, as the title would suggest, a Military Simulation game developed by Bohemia Interactive. Experience the intensity of lifelike combat situations in one of the most realistic soldier sims available.

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