I've always wondered about America's Army, but as it's not available anywhere on DVD and knew it was a big download, I just never got round to getting it. Until now.

After two sessions downloading it, as it's well over 4Gb, it was finally downloaded and ready to run. I had high hopes for this game, being the official game of the U.S. Army, but apart from some of the training and educational aids, I was actually quite disappointed.

My first mishap was that with AA2, it is said that you do your training offline, then proceed through online missions. With AA3, you have to train online and then continue online. You can do the training offline, but you will always fail regardless of how well you did in fact do - as the game has to be able to connect to the AA3 server to calculate your score.

I believe that it was a big mistake using the Unreal 3 engine on a game such as AA3. This is an eye-candy action FPS engine at best. It does not bode well with a 'realistic' real-world-based tactical infantry simulation. Also, as with most games that put too much emphasis on realism, it becomes less than realistic. In training for example, you have to go prone and then do a roll under a raised log. If you don't lay just right and face just the right way, you'll roll but won't go under. The questionable control scheme can actually make what would be really simple tasks in real-life, very tricky.

Graphically, the scenery is nice and overall the game looks quite good. Close-up however, it's not great - for what you might expect from an Unreal 3 engine game. The weapon models are good but nothing spectacular, and people look adequate but not what you'd expect. Some animation errors on faces, where the mouth blends in with the nose are laughable.

I completed my training and wanted to move on to the more advanced training, which I did in one area. However, to unlock more training you have to go online and gain points in order to do so. There are many active servers, but for a complete noobie like me, where you get thrown in at the deep end online in 'real' missions full of experienced players - you don't have a hope in hell's chance of getting anywhere. Even being an experienced FPS player doesn't really give you an advantage here, as as I said before - even simple tasks are made harder by questionable player movement, as well as animation and clipping issues.

I thought the aim of the game, pardon the pun, was to be realistic? Well if potential soldiers play this game and see an enemy take 3x three-round bursts of an M16 in the torso area and still manage to kill the player - how long do you think it will take to empty the recruitment office?

You only get five different mission areas, but as each has three mission types, is seen as having 15 missions available. The maps are good, but not that big and I would much rather have seen the CloakNT or Source engine used for the ability of large areas with detail, while still feeling much more immersive and forgiving on PC spec needed.

Overall, I loved the training and educational aids, but the online game is pretty repetitive and not for newcomers. Not really worth a nearly 5Gb download, with little replay value unless you don't easily get bored with few maps and always getting killed. Sure, you can play the game with realistic elements, but as it is a game those aren't the be-all and end-all to win battles. Experienced players will always know level flaws and ways to exploit game bugs. My biggest grievance most certainly being the choice of game engine used.

This game was one of the greatest, most realistic tactical shooters back in the day... when they tried adding vehicles and co-op missions it went to hell...all of it. IMO

Unfortunately I never got to see the older version of it. If there wasn't co-op play before, was there only training available?

no...all force on force... you always played as the Americans and the enemy was the rags... great tactics, suppression, objectives, and fireteam layouts.

Yeah, definately better back then, crap now.

America's Army died with the 2.6 patch, before that it was probably my favorite team based shooter ever.

I gave AA3 a shot and while it is good for a free game it's still nothing like it was when I really liked it.

As I haven't seen AA2.x in action, can you give me a few key features that made it better for you over AA3?

Faster pace and less "random cone" for the gun fire is the easiest way to sum it up. There were a lot of small changes that caused the former and I guess the latter is one of those but they completely changed the way the game played with that patch and then just made it subsequently worse with the next 2. I slowed down playing it a lot after 2.6 and by 2.8 I pretty much hated the game.

You are kidding, right? The game play was no different from CSS or DOD:S or COD/Mw2 in that all you did was spray and pray. Even the realism community gave up on it, primarily because they could not mod the game to fix the issues that prevented you from experiencing tactical immersion.

No I'm not kidding... don't need to show me a video of 2.8.5... I've already said anything after 1.8 sucked, IMO... I was in for 10 plus years and to me AA1.0 to 1.8 was the best most realistic first person shooter EVER.

IMO

I had forgotten about the stupid radar they added, that was another awful addition, I believe that was in 2.8.

You mean like the 'tactical situation display' at the bottom left of the screen? Yeah I thought that was weird to have that in there - given the so-called realism factor. I mean, I know stuff like that is available to today's Stryker Brigade Combat Teams but not to the regular U.S. Army infantryman.

I played the hell out of AA2.6 (when it was programmed by the military), and then joined the beta team for AA3. It was going along fine until the entire civilian dev team was fired and the game was pushed out half baked. At one point we only had 1 programmer. I didn't last long after that. It was too depressing.

When I hear of people being beta testers for games and programs, I always wonder, do you get paid for it? I realize that may depend on how big the company behind it is, whether it's paid or purely voluntary. Also, are there any requirements (apart from having a PC powerful enough to run the game/program)? Just curious.

I guess it's sort of like those that bash DOD:S and say that DOD 1.6 was more realistic. In the end, they are nothing more than twitch shooters, that have bunny hopping, n00b tubes, cross heirs, small and linear maps, zero tactical immersion, KDR, achievements, UAVs, radar, unlocks and no combined arms.



You probably get paid by the big publishers/developers to do real beta testing that is followed up by a focus group and questionnaires. But most mods and smaller game studios usually pick friends, employees, clans/units/guilds that have supported the game for a long time. Or some times game studios, like in the case of PS3's Mag, they gave out X amount keys for the beta.

except dod 1.6 doesnt have bunny hopping, n00b tubes, achievements, UAVs, radar and unlocks

brain fart... whats DoD? and how that get into a AA thread? lol

DOD is Day Of Defeat, a Half-Life WW2 mod. DOD:S is Day Of Defeat: Source, the Half-Life 2 version WW2 mod.

oh ya, played it for a while when it came out...didn't care for it much.

You don't get paid for signing up for beta testing a game, no. You have the honour of playing the game months before anyone else I guess. I've been on beta tests for a few games now and have never bought one that I have tested lol.

And, you don't need a powerful PC to be accepted, they want to test on a wide range of specs so they will have people with the borderline setup up to the beast machines.

My beta work has all been volunteer. I was chosen because I have extensive RL experience with the weapons in the game, and I'd beta'd for other games. It's really just for bragging rights.

Yeah, it depends. Sometimes you get chosen based on experience, in which case you might get paid. But probably 99% of the time, it's volunteer, and it can mean a lot of different things. Sometimes it's a first-come, first-serve basis where you sign up for a limited amount of beta slots. Or they might just draw names from a hat. You might get a beta code for pre-ordering a game or owning a previous game; I think MoH had a closed beta early on for users who pre-ordered.

OK people thanks for the info on beta testing, I didn't mean to go off-topic like that. But then again it was my topic so... It's just that I've thought about beta testing and always had a niggling thought about it perhaps being paid 'work' (for proper software companies anyway). I mean after all, you can get paid to take online surveys and stuff so I just guessed this was kind of down that route. And if that was the case - I'd want in!

QA testing is what you are thinking of, that's the testers the actually work for the developer or a company that specializies in doing QA testing being hired out by a developer.

Yeah perhaps it was, I guess beta testers and QA testers kind of do similar things, right?

Most beta testing isn't even beta testing in the traditional sense, but rather just a marketing tool to build hype over the product. Yeah, I should have said QA testing when I was saying that some game studios/software developers actually do pay.

Back to AA3 topic

My opinion is that indeed AA3 is not what it was hyped to be. It's still in a much less mature stage than AA2 is: some bugs remain, and there's few features there currently.

Honestly, I think AA3 has great potential. Eliminating the ability to do "bunny hopping" (jumping to make it harder for the enemy to aim at you), for example, is something I agree with 100%. The folks there really tried to make an FPS where thinking before you shoot is good, and that is commendable. I also like the way they organize a squad into fireteams, and the fact that shooting your own teammates gives you A LOT of negative points. Furthermore, if you kill someone, you won't get a message saying "XXX was killed by YYY". Sometimes this can make it hard to estimate how many enemies are left. All of these are novel ideas in the FPS world, and I like them.

If AA3 is expanded to include more features (more specializations, weapons, maps, training modules, etc), I think it can yet become a very good game. We'll have to wait to see.

Quick note on QA:

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/1/25/

I worked for Acclaim Entertainment as a line tester and a QA studio lead. That comic is not too far off, the pay was horrendous as well.

-Jenrick

Some times I got a check, others I got a free copy of the game, some just my name in the manual/credits...

I still get Excessive amounts of Merchandise From Microsoft for Being on The External Beta Team. (Xbox, Live, Zune, Turn10), this ranges from Xbox Hardware, Points Cards, DLC Cards, Games, Clothes, Etc

Depends on the Publisher/Developer.. EA hasnt given me crap, prolly because i give them a hard time on every project im on.

Internal = On Salary with the Developer = Working in a Company Facility = Get paid
External = NOT on Salary with Developer = Working in your home = Not Getting Paid, But you may get Merchandise or other form of Perks.

AA 2.6 started the downhill of AA.

I to play A.A. hours a day with my brother.... he wont even touch AA3 since he has to RE-DO all the training, yada, yada, yada…

AA3.0 is not so much the same as it 2.0 was.... it’s Still stripped down and unfinished, the training teirs have levels that aren’t unlocked with “coming soon” labels on them, all the weapons in the DLLs are not present in game, and to do all the Tier 1 training you have to get EXPERT ON EVERYTHING. Which I’ve pretty much done.

Controls are weird at times. Graphics are SubPar for Unreal3, I have them maxed and was forced to disable GFX Features of my card to get the menus to work (which is a known bug).

Some maps are fun, while others are frustrating as all hell.

Punk buster w/ AA3.0 is a pain in the arse, couple that with some of the glitches with Steam, yeah….

Supposedly there’s gonna be a huge 3.5 update coming out adding more maps, weapons, training and some other crap.

You can still download AA2.8.5 AFAIK, I still play it online every now and then.

Im still getting harsh messages over the feedback I give the developers on BFPlay4Free. Which is no where near complete.

2.3 was the peak of the franchise IMO. If someone built a real life version of the Weapons Cache map I could probably sprint blindfolded from the starting warehouse up to the top cache through the shipping and recieving entrance without bumping into anything.

Sprint, prepare flash, open door, flash stairs, up the stairs, frag down the hallway, right through the office, left, flash from the room overlooking the warehouse into the line of back offices, charge down there, up the stairs, frag the elevator shaft room, clear the two offices across from the cache and cap the objective.

Geez I loved that map.

AA3 is now gonna Deploy an ES2 Update, blah....


http://forum.americasarmy.com/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=25

I think I spent a good 4 years playing it and it was the first time I had ever joined a clan and played in matches.

I've always preferred the tactical game to that of run and gun and AA was the first time I had played a no respawn game. AA was always the best for rage quitting if memory serves me right

I too gave it away after 2.6. Border was my favourite map. I was never very good at close quarters stuff.