Suddenly Arma Reforger appears, awakens pleasant memories of Operation Flashpoint and is supposed to pave the way to Arma 4. A clever move or a fatal mistake?
One of the most complex and traditional military simulations in the world continues: a new Arma is here! Just like that, almost out of nowhere. But wait, this isn’t Arma 4 at all?
No, the new project is called Arma Reforger and sees itself more as a bridge to Arma 4 than as a true sequel: developer Bohemia emphasises that Reforger is more of a platform than a full-fledged game. A foundation on which fans and producers are to “build the future of Arma together”, they say.
Sounds complicated? We paid a digital visit to Bohemia and explain in this article what exactly Reforger is all about – and why this release is an extremely daring manoeuvre!
Table of Contents
What is Arma Reforger anyway?
Sequel, reboot, basic framework – to understand Arma Reforger and the plan behind it, we should first talk about the hard facts. Reforger is a new standalone product, i.e. not an addon or remaster, and is based on Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis (which was incorporated into the series by being retroactively renamed Arma Cold War Assault).
The setting is the fictional island nation of Everon in 1989, where the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the USA is escalating. The first in-game scenes already convey a good picture of the scenario:
Bohemia themselves describe Arma Reforger as a creative platform. So this is where the engine will be optimised, new features and assets developed over the next few months, laying the foundations for a full-fledged Arma 4.
The developers explain that players should “test the gameplay and infrastructure here and help shape future development”. If you’re only interested in the bare numbers, that’s Arma Reforger in a nutshell:
- Release and price: Arma Reforger is already out by the time you read this article! The PC version is available via Steam and the version for Xbox Series X and S will be released in the Game Preview Programme. Cost: around 30 euros. The download is about 12 GB.
- Early Access: Arma Reforger will remain in Early Access for about 12 months until the final version 1.0 is released. Until then, new features and improvements are to be added based on community feedback. The price, however, will not change.
- Scope: Arma Reforger is to offer ground combat with infantry and light vehicles as well as a logistics and inventory system on the approximately 164 square kilometre island world of Everon, which can be imagined as a large open world with forests, mountains, fields and villages.
- No single player: Unlike Operation Flashpoint, there is no campaign in Arma Reforger, the focus is clearly on multiplayer. For solo players, the tutorial and multiplayer matches against bots are the only options. No story is planned for version 1.0 either.
- New engine: The Enfusion engine, a completely new in-house development by Bohemia, will be used for all future games of the studio – first and foremost Arma 4, of course! Old mods are no longer compatible, but the makers promise easier operation and higher graphic quality.
- Game modes: The official game mode of Arma Reforger is Conflict, a persistent battle for dominance over the entire island. Rounds in Conflict have no time limit, players can join and leave at any time. In Game Master mode, admins can create their own scenarios and modes, similar to Battlefield Portal.
- Mod support: Even deeper than Game Master is Workbench mode, where modders and programmers can rebuild the game as they see fit: Own scripts, sounds, animations and much more are possible. Creative fans can then make their works available for download via an integrated tool for the community.
And now what about Arma 4?
So much for the facts about the release. But much more exciting is actually what Bohemia plans to do with Arma Reforger in the future, and what this future means for Arma 4! We spoke to the developers to find out exactly that for you.
At the heart of Bohemia’s strategy is the brand new Enfusion engine, which will also form the technical basis for Arma 4. Full compatibility is the keyword.
Arma Reforger is, so to speak, the starting signal for a development that will eventually lead to the fourth part of the series and then virtually replace Reforger. Or to put it more simply: Reforger is the bridge that leads to a new Arma.
Bohemia Interactive wants to get players on board early and give them exactly the same tools that the studio itself works with. How to imagine the journey is shown in the video “Road to Arma 4” by Bohemia itself:
The calculation: Ideas, feedback and mods from the community should shape an Arma 4 that fans will really want in the end. This mentality has a long tradition in the Arma series. Because Arma 3 lives on to this day primarily through the countless creations of its players!
Whether uniforms, weapons, scenarios, AI routines or control elements – there is nothing that Arma 3 fans have not already built themselves. Now they shall do it again. In Reforger, but for Arma 4. Quasi the mod scene of the Arma future, only today already.
Brave move that gives us hope
Arma Reforger looks like the glorified version of Operation Flashpoint that fans of yesteryear almost automatically have in mind when the classic is mentioned.
The special atmosphere returns immediately: Humvee formations make their way through hilly terrain, artillery shells swirl up dust, infantry fights fierce house battles with M16s and AK-47s – and all this in a level of detail never before seen in Arma (let alone any other milsim with a huge open world).
The new Enfusion Engine is quite something: clouds of smoke pile up realistically after explosions, soldiers cast believable shadows and vehicles crash through wooden fences. In general, jeeps and trucks behave much better than in Arma 3, where they often fly uncontrollably through the air in collisions. In Reforger they finally convey weight and momentum.
The improved day-night cycle and the changing weather promise to be exciting tactical elements: If it rains long enough, mud and puddles form (even with reflections) and in cloudless moonlight we can spot enemies at night with the naked eye. Headlights and tracer bullets, on the other hand, brighten up the darker or foggier nights – all of which should have a massive effect on the battles and add dynamics.
As a very slim package, Arma Reforger also does not scare off potential newcomers as much as its now mercilessly overloaded predecessors. There is only one (admittedly very large) map, only one main game mode, few vehicles and no aircraft, whose highly complicated controls first have to be learned. With this, Reforger could perhaps achieve the feat of remaining true to the hardcore roots of the series and still win over new fans who have so far given the game a wide berth due to the monstrous complexity of Arma.
But above all, Arma Reforger wants to pick up those who have always invested a lot of time and energy in the further development of Arma: the modders. For them, the time of experimentation and learning has now arrived. They should use Reforger as a springboard for Arma 4. The fact that Bohemia is bringing them on board so early in the development is a sign of confidence and trust.
The motto: Loyal fans know best what Arma 4 should look like! A clever move, because it avoids the potential frustration of simply presenting the community with a finished Arma 4 in a few years and saying “what’s on the table is what’s eaten”. Listeners to our podcast have long known that Arma’s strength and secret recipe for success is its community.
Open questions that worry us
However, this is also possibly where a major stumbling block for Arma Reforger (and by extension Arma 4) lies: By moving to the new engine, all previous mods and creations are passé at a stroke. Years of work have to be started from scratch – and the developers make no secret of the teething problems:
“For modders, almost everything changes in the new engine and they have to learn a new scripting language,” we were told at Bohemia. “But the performance is better and the whole development process is much more modern and streamlined.” Still, if Arma Reforger fails to get the creative core of the Arma community to move, Arma 4 has already lost.
A problem at the other end of the spectrum: without a single player mode, many will think twice about buying it. The fact that Operation Flashpoint serves as a role model makes matters even worse, because most will associate the name with one thing above all: the campaign, which was magnificently staged for its time! And even with the mod tools, it should be almost impossible to build a campaign, at least at launch, because the AI is “currently not as complex as in Arma 3”, the makers admit. And the intelligence of the NPCs is by no means the supreme discipline of Arma 3!
Those who see the trailer for Arma Reforger probably imagine big battles in which you can take part with tanks or planes like in Battlefield. Something for everyone? Far from it: At release there will be neither aircraft nor tracked vehicles – and much of this is not even planned! They are working on helicopters, but heavy battle tanks or even jets will not be seen in Reforger, Bohemia tells us. Instead, it will be jeeps, trucks and light armoured infantry fighting vehicles.
The game was deliberately designed on a smaller scale to refine the technology and not necessarily to produce much new content. And this is probably the biggest weakness of the new Arma: it is only half a game and half a development platform. New content is not the stated goal at all. And players who misunderstand this will turn away in disappointment soon after launch.
Editor’s verdict
After seeing Arma Reforger for the first time, two conflicting thoughts immediately popped into my head: On the one hand, a remake of Operation Flashpoint with awesome graphics is exactly what my shooter heart has been secretly wishing for years. On the other hand, it seems to me as if Bohemia is just giving its fans a basic framework and expecting them to somehow build an Arma 4 out of it. But the truth, as almost always, lies somewhere in between: Of course it makes sense to tap into such an extraordinarily inventive community as Arma’s and involve them in the development of a new part.
If the engine can even begin to deliver what the developers promise, a military sandbox of superlatives is being created here! But at the moment this is all pie in the sky. Arma 4 is still a long way off. And Arma Reforger could have a hard time inspiring the average shooter fan with its barebones Early Access approach for a whopping 30 euros. In Bohemia’s place, I would have set the price much lower to reduce the barrier to entry to a minimum. Enough money could then most likely still have been made through mass sales. But this way I see a future in the bubble of hobbyists, enthusiasts and modders. In other words, where Arma has been at home for years anyway.
