Vancouver to be exact. I just spent a week in Seattle, with a 2 night diversion across the boarder, and picked up a copy of Operation Flashpoint, in its slick plastic package (why can't all games be packaged like this- its so adult!).

I played a lot of the demo, so I knew what to expect. I managed to play the training missions tonight, and the first two campaign missions, and am very, very satisfied (however, now I have to go to Maine for two weeks-ugh, no game time). Here are my initial thoughts:

The graphics are much, much smoother, and quite a bit crisper (an earlier concern of mine). The Islands the game takes place on do have a sort of weathered green look, but it fits in with the background of the game.

I love the forests! There are so many individual trees, which is such a great thing in comparison with WW2OL's "forest netting" for lack of a better term. I know it isn't fair to compare the two, but I do like my trees realistic. But even better is when a tank rolls though them, or fires into them, and as an infantry guy 150 meters away, you see them falling over in a huge cloud of dust! It puts you right in the action.

Criticism: the sound is terrible. You can barely hear the dialogue and the vehicle noises, but when your commander barks out orders it shakes the windows in your house. I hope they can patch that. Has anyone else playing the game experienced sound problems and come up with a solution.

Oh well. Off to Maine. Take care QT3!

Sounds good, keep us posted once you get back into it.

"Criticism:"

My problem with the game is that it's almost impossible to tell which soldiers are on what team. Maybe I'm missing something. In the 3rd or 4th mission, you're a sniper supporting a squad that's attempting to take a city, and I honestly don't know if I'm shooting friends or enemies. Maybe that's all part of the real sniper experience. But just because it's real doesn't mean I'm happy about it.

Erik, I think that it pops up a little dialog that tells you if it is a friendly soldier. But then again maybe it is just when you aren't zoomed in.

It seems pretty cool but there are some niggling problems like the sound and the chaos of combat. The campaign is confusing in terms of it is hard to tell if you did what you were supposed to. I get these bad scores and wonder what I could have done to do better. It isn't very clear.

I guess it is realistic but is it fun? The most fun I have had is blowing up a convoy on one of the single missions. That is the one with the sniper rifle as well.

Erik: yeah, I remember that a dialogue box opened up during the demo, but when I played the release version a box only popped up for enemies. I guess it works ok since if a box doesn't pop up he should be an ally, but I was a little nervous not shooting at people a long way off in what I thought was enemy territory. I'll do further research when I can.

"I guess it is realistic but is it fun? The most fun I have had is blowing up a convoy on one of the single missions."

Fun quotient is king for me too. It is the reason I can trade off the not-so-simulation-like handling of the vehicles in OF for enhanced playability (which I guess is a fun multiplier). So far I like the chaos involved, but I'll have to play for a while before I decide whether I'm consistently having fun (so far so good).

So, it's more "realistic" for Flashpoint to have you identify friendly and enemy troops... but not when you zoom in on them?

Odd.

-Andrew

Maybe they nerfed the sniper weapons to make the game more "balanced." (?)

Alternately, I can imagine the following:

Tester: But the game just isn't "fun."
Designer: I know, let's add more "realism."

- Alan

Yeah, I think the soldier HUD doesn't pop up when you're in sniper mode. Which stinks. I agree that blowing up the convoy with satchel charges has been the highlight of the game so far; that was really satisfying.