Interview with animation lead

"Meanwhile, we've also added an 'armed diving' variant, where you can shoot from an appropriate weapon. That being said, the whole underwater combat thing is completely new and undergoes its 'trial by fire' right now. As for movement on land, in addition to the existing movement modes (walk, run, sprint), there'll be additional one - what we're calling the 'tactical pace' - which is essentially a jog with weapon raised."

"Another feature worth mentioning is 'alternate poses', which is an experimental feature we're keen to validate with the Community Alpha and see if it earns its place. These are extensions of the three basic stances (stand, kneel and prone). With them, you can adjust to have a high/low or left/right variant to each stance. In terms of gameplay, we'd expect to see improvements in finding effective cover and being able to fire from it."

"You can expect tailored reload animations for each weapon, and animated gun parts, for example the recoiling barrel of the GM6 Lynx. A lot of attention has been given to setting up the weapon model more aesthetically from the 1st person perspective, too."

"We also aim to improve weapon behaviour, which means tweaking recoil mechanics, precision and weapon sway to more properly reflect the different states of the shooter, factoring in fatigue and injury, for example. Our goal is to not only improve the feel of firing guns, but also make firefights flow as close to reality as possible. "

"Also, we're focusing upon animating character's fingers – micro-motions, hands gripping things properly, etc. These are small details, but they add a lot to the impression."

"There are two, actually! Most of animations were recorded by our animator Pawel "Smookie" Smolewski, who also happens to be a military enthusiast."

That's awesome; apparently they hired the fellow who made the SMK animations pack for ArmA 2: see here. So we may very well be getting all of that great stuff, but better integrated: urban prone, blind firing, and so on.

Well, that news, combined with the 'individual weapon reload animations,' should silence a lot of the tedious pre-emptive complaining that I've heard.