What if DAYZ becomes a stand-alone game and ARMA3 is still a non popular game

[[GR]Operative]

English is not my strong point, so really, I did not understand it
EDIT: Or do you mean that it is not logical BIS expending more resources on DAYZ, if it's a success?

[i76]

You are right about the maintenance bit. As recent betas show BIS fixes mostly what was broken in DayZ by DayZ instead of improving ArmA2. Like that VoN improvement. Nobody uses VoN in ArmA2 because it's crap compared to TS3 and especially ACRE and improving sound quality will not change that a bit because the issue runs much much deeper (lackluster 3D positioning, no custom channel separation allowing for dozens of channels incl. within the channels, no radiochannels). But VoN is used in DayZ because of a very closed nature of a mod forcing the same setup on everybody. Mumble support was voted in a long long time ago but BIS doesn't try to implement that still.

And then other stuff like magazine fullness indicator which was made for DayZ but is of almost no use in ArmA2 where instead the bullet counter on HUD should be removed, DayZ broke VoN with how players respawn, it was fixed for DayZ almost immediately, DayZ broke player authentification, again it was fixed for DayZ almost instantly. At the same time the majority of most voted issues on dev-heaven keeps catching dust.

Just to add, BIS took a week to release a beta fixing the 'gamma goggles' for DayZ (cheap mans NVG)... its a fucking mod, when this issues has been a neglected for nearly 4 years https://dev-heaven.net/issues/8748
But to add insult to injury BIS's fix for this negatively effected ArmA 2 by making it so dark that looking into pine trees at midday was like looking a a bunch of black trees... was eventually fixed but fuck me BIS.

I see a steady decline in the quality of BIS products.... They backed Iron Front which imo was a piece of shit which BIS refused to refund.
They released ACR which was good except for existing map cut-out (cheap BIS).
Then Carrier Command, could be sooooo much better, but BIS fucked it for a quick cash fix.

I think BI$ are starting to see the $$$... and if the trend continues they will be EA in 10 years.

BI$ can do whatever they want.... I'll just move onto the next true developer like Chris Roberts 'Star Citizen'

[OnlyRazor]

Just to add, BIS took a week to release a beta fixing the 'gamma goggles' for DayZ (cheap mans NVG)... its a fucking mod, when this issues has been a neglected for nearly 4 years https://dev-heaven.net/issues/8748
But to add insult to injury BIS's fix for this negatively effected ArmA 2 by making it so dark that looking into pine trees at midday was like looking a a bunch of black trees... was eventually fixed but fuck me BIS.
I see a steady decline in the quality of BIS products.... They backed Iron Front which imo was a piece of shit which BIS refused to refund.
They released ACR which was good except for existing map cut-out (cheap BIS).
Then Carrier Command, could be sooooo much better, but BIS fucked it for a quick cash fix.
I think BI$ are starting to see the $$$... and if the trend continues they will be EA in 10 years
BI$ can do whatever they want.... I'll just move onto the next true developer like Chris Roberts 'Star Citizen'

Don't take this the wrong way because I fully respect your opinion, but replacing the 'S' in a company's name with a dollar sign just makes everybody that does it look like self-righteous pricks. Money is kinda the whole point of capitalism, you know?

[[APS]Gnat]

Yeh
Small Game Maker / Developer trying to do their best without the size and shit of other big time (capitalist and self righteous) game company.
...... done good for me for 10 year.

[Chortles]

To answer the title question: ... then we'll just be right back to where ARMA (OFP)/BI has been for the past decade

The appeal and civilian market for milsim has always been limited, whereas DayZ (the mod) meant that a "designed for milsim" engine ended up getting way more of a chance from mainstream gamers when it was wrapped in a "open-world zombie survival" wrapper than it ever would have in a "tactical realism milsim" wrapper. In the mainstream there's plenty of continued interest in the DayZ concept but very little love for Real Virtuality, as evidenced by the greeting the news of the standalone being mixed with so, SO much antipathy for "the Arma 2 engine" and "please tell me that this won't use the "Arma 2 engine" or "please tell me that this uses the Arma 3 engine"... you may consider that last one a positive or a negative as you like, but maybe the real reason that DayZ got such priority from BI is because DayZ is now the way that most people even hear of the engine? I mean, Maruk did already talk early on in the mod's life about how it'd get attention.

I will note though that a bunch of these "fixes that only happened because of DayZ, or for things that aren't used in regular ARMA 2 play" seem like they were made back before the standalone" happened back when Rocket was still publicly calling for a standalone (and seemingly throwing Real Virtuality 3 under the bus in the process) which suggests to me that the future direction of "how will BI implement the DayZ concept" remained unclear, i.e. when people were publicly wondering "will it be an ARMA 3 DLC? just porting over the mod?" BI may have been internally debating the same thing.

But yeah, if ARMA 3 remains non-popular then it won't be because of "the bugs" this time or because of "insufficient" love from BI... it'll be because the appeal of the idea of "tactical realism milsim" was always limited, even if ARMA 3 makes itself more approachable for those mainstreamers who give it a chance.

P.S. The Army's own "VBS2 successor" contract (as opposed to other VBS2 or VBS2 successor contracts) I've heard from Kotaku is to the tune of almost $45 million over five years, or approximately $9 million/year.

[NodUnit]

Well not everything was changed to befit dayZ, the patch release that changed the ballistics of rifles and especially handguns to better reflect their IRL counterparts was 'welcomed' by the dayZ community with greeeeat loathing. And the things that did come from the dayz patch that supposedly focused on dayz COULD be used to benefit Arma2, the question is A. if anyone will use them, B. in what manner.

I'm not sure I'd say BIS are greedy really, not when I look at the changes that occur between each iteration of the engien, with A3 being the most severe change to date, and the thing is that they don't even NEED Arma 3 to be financially stable, they could drop it, focus on dayZ and VBS and be set. The revenue Arma 3 would bring in couldn't hope to compare to a dayZ stand alone or VBS2 series, yet they press on with a no doubt pricey budget for a game that probably won't return all of it.

If BI were EA, they'd drop Arma altogether and focus on milking DayZ with as many redundant DLC's as possible along with a no questions asked requirement of sprocket being installed and further require you to be online at all times to play the game.

[CameronMcDonald]

If BI were EA, they'd drop Arma altogether and focus on milking DayZ with as many redundant DLC's as possible along with a no questions asked requirement of sprocket being installed and further require you to be online at all times to play the game.

Exactly.

[Chortles]

Well not everything was changed to befit dayZ, the patch release that changed the ballistics of rifles and especially handguns to better reflect their IRL counterparts was 'welcomed' by the dayZ community with greeeeat loathing.

Having taken a glimpse the DayZ mod forums when that ballistics change happened, I can second that; DayZ players were speaking up against the change, and they too resented the change being part of an ARMA 2 patch instead of simply being something that happened in the mod.

I'm not sure I'd say BIS are greedy really, not when I look at the changes that occur between each iteration of the engien, with A3 being the most severe change to date, and the thing is that they don't even NEED Arma 3 to be financially stable, they could drop it, focus on dayZ and VBS and be set. The revenue Arma 3 would bring in couldn't hope to compare to a dayZ stand alone or VBS2 series, yet they press on with a no doubt pricey budget for a game that probably won't return all of it.

I'd point back to Vespa's comment somewhere that the standalone is getting its own engine iteration instead of using Real Virtuality 4 (believe me, the reception of ARMA 3 footage versus ARMA 2 was a lot more positive by these "casuals") because it would be "insane" to try for two separate games using an engine that was still not yet developed maturely, and in any case Rocket has elaborated as well that what's already been released is stable.

Admittedly the hype from these "DayZ casuals" at the since shot-down idea of "DayZ on ARMA 3" was at the idea of the DayZ concept being executed on an engine with such better-looking graphics and infantry movement/weapons handling, but to me that actually bodes well, that ARMA 3 as of GamesCom actually appeared to be on the right track... and the subsequent shoot-down by Rocket announcing that it would use its own engine iteration instead was also "ARMA 3 being on the right track".

[Janez]

If BI were EA, they'd drop Arma altogether and focus on milking DayZ with as many redundant DLC's as possible along with a no questions asked requirement of sprocket being installed and further require you to be online at all times to play the game.

They would not drop Arma. They would probably add some blue, bloom, make the sun over half of sky, make 90% of map out of bounds and use it to kill CoD (and your eyes).

[metalcraze]

Well there's some truth to "BI$" thing.

ArmA could be selling much better if many years old issues were fixed. But BIS has its priorities wrong. DayZ will die down and die out. Zombies are a fad just like WW2 games were. And then BIS will have to get back to their original ArmA sale numbers. Which could've been much bigger.

Like BIS had more than 3 years to fix driver's AI - and yet they did almost nothing. Had it been DayZ issue - this wouldn't be an issue anymore.
It took 2 years to fix warping? Come on BIS.
More than a decade to teach AI fight inside buildings? Still nothing. CS bots can do it and their pathfinding is very simple. Oh wait no - in DayZ standalone AI will supposedly be able to run indoors. That's like a giant leap forward or something.
They have an ACR hint telling you to take a knee when you fire - and yet BIS still can't make AI do that after more than a decade. How hard can it be?

Ha I remember how BIS was "we won't be working on Chernarus anymore" and look at what they are doing now