Open Source Warfare
While the previous Developer's Blog entry announced the release of our latest community project, Warfare, it only briefly touched on the main thought that drove much of its development. In most game communities a huge new Player versus Player multiplayer mode, would simply be ... well, played. But the ArmA community has always had the incredible mindset where the public release of missions or addons is considered the start of their development, rather than the conclusion.
At Bohemia Interactive we design games to be open ended in terms of their content, providing a basis for the community to personalise a lot of this. The countless adjustments and innovations generated by the community have contributed to what could be called the “public evolution” of a genre that's seemingly so complex that hardly any other developers dare to approach it. To take this unique situation to a new level, we want to throw Warfare's design discussion wide open and let it evolve even further. Not that many of you haven't run off with the mission files to already do this anyway, but this time we'll be far more directly involved with your suggestions and modifications. We would like to establish Warfare as a platform for mission designers and modmakers to exchange views and concepts on how ArmA's many gameplay styles can work together on one big battlefield, instead of splitting up the community into isolated camps.
To help you get started, we have composed an Editing Guide outlining much of Warfare's mission and script structure. Even if you're relatively inexperienced in the world of ArmA scripting, the Editing Guide will show you how to easily change many parts of the mission. We have also launched a new Warfare section on the official forums, where you can discuss its gameplay, your concepts, scripting solutions and more. BIS will be closely following the community's work and input, to ensure that the further development of Warfare will continue to live up to its succesful launch.