Tuesday, July 12, 2016

Arma 3 Apex - Preview

Arma 3 Apex was officially released on 11Jul16, but most of the content released was available through the so-called "Dev Branch".



With a new and slick interface, a new map and new armed virtual characters it shows that the developers do care about how the current and future users do and will interact with the game for years to come. The core values that made Arma a success, like the readily available mission edition, modding and the wide open areas of operation were not left behind.



New faction: Syndikat. A semi-pro guerrilla with its own agenda about the future of Tanoa. All equipped with a nice mix of NATO and Russian vintage (remember the game is set in the year 2035) weapons. It's going to be uphill for these hombres to keep up with NATO troops and their top-notch kit.

The Tanoa island's jungle is a work of art. The type of battles I am fighting there is totally different than the ones I fought in Altis or Stratis. The ranges are short, the concealment is terrific and the amount of cover is very often misjudged. Yep, bullets go through leafs and other soft plants.

A Tanoan "Gendarme" aiming his MP5 at the jungle. 

I don't know if this is new or not, but it is great to equip the truck with guns, ammo and kit.

A screenshot of the single-player campaign. The amount of data exchanged between deployed teams and central command is so big that would make Shannon go bananas. But joke aside, it is a beautiful cutscene nonetheless.

Yep, I'm ready to fight! Bring it on.
Bullying the enemy with my thermal sights. If you want a more balanced fight, you may want to check the thermal-detection defeating suits. They are located somewhere ... 

The eye candy gets sweeter at every single iteration. The light effects really surprised me.
That water looks so vivid and fresh.

Mission one of the single player campaign. The interface elements are very well arranged and informative.

NATO dismounts are about to enter the jungle.

The infantry battles are very intense and as I mentioned before, they feel very different than the ones fought elsewhere (i.e. Altis or Stratis).
If there is any criticism about this release that would be its shortness of single player missions (some of the missions are a bit shallow) and the weak sound effects for some guns.

But when you have so much in other departments, does it really matter?

Cheers,

5 comments:

xcvbnxcgnvdfgbn said...

Pics, or it did not happen :)

Pictures are not showing up for me in Chrome or IE (the picture frames are ok)

JC said...

Sorry to hear that. Still happening? I can see those in my computer and cell phone. Anybody else having issues seeing the pics?

Cheers,

Marco said...

It happens sometimes when I check the blog from the PC at work, damn server firewalls that try to block internet to make me do my job :D, but it's a local problem don't worry JC.

JC said...

Ah, OK then. Thanks, Marco.

xcvbnxcgnvdfgbn said...

That must be the case, yes. It worked fine from home for me as well.

It is of course no wonder that an obscure website such as Blogspot is blocked... ;-)