Honestly, military simulations are a popular genre, but no other time in history, have so many video-game players also seen actual combat abroad. A former employee of mine (and former military soldier) and I once were speaking about the video-game SOCOM, and I, very idiotically, mentioned something about game playing as a SEAL kicking down doors in the Middle East, while trying to avoid being killed by terrorists. My employee mentioned that the game was nothing like that experience and that the fear and tension that is constant probably took 10 years off his life as he burned through massive amounts of adrenaline. He then went on to laugh at the current crop of military-type games saying that they simply have yet to make a game with the actual realism.

It made me think of why I like games firmly rooted in the fantastic and virtually impossible.

So it was with a completely new set of eyes I reviewed ARMA II, the “supposedly” most realistic combat game available. And to that, I owe my former employee (a true American hero) the honesty to get this review as right as I ever have.

ARMA II is (duh) a military-combat game that places you smack dab in real military situations in the fictitious land of Chernarus. Chernarus is located in the greater areas of Eastern European countries and in reality is based on actual topography of the area. What’s cool about the game and Chernarus is that it is roughly 80-plus square miles of land complete with countrysides, towns, burnt-out war-torn areas, roaming animals, several warring factions roaming the area, farm land, long, open areas perfect for sniping and tight, claustrophobic areas where you fear being shot by a single bullet. So, in a nutshell, it wants to be the game that my former employee thought was never possible.

As the game is played both first- and third-person, the shooting and controls can be a bit iffy, especially when you begin assuming command of your own troops and issuing orders via pre-made commands on the number line. Most of the actual shooting is done in a move a few feet, scan the horizon, move a few feet and then take a single shot type way. Running and gunning will get you killed everytime in this title, so it pays to have patience and ice water in your veins.

But then the bugs start.

ARMA II is as buggy and frustrating game as you may play in modern gaming. What makes this so bad, is that it is actually a cool game when it works, and you want to get into it and experience all it has to offer, but these bugs, which reveal themselves in many forms, will pop up and absolutely drive you crazy. Enemy soldiers will stroll through your team of commandos and kill them all at their leisure as they have suddenly become invincible and your own troops are frozen in place. Events that occur when specific accomplishments have been made sometimes don’t activate, so you end up running around with your troops not knowing what the heck to do.

There are several downloadable patches that are available and I recommend you get them if you are serious about this game. From what I know there are even more patches on the way. At this point, nothing you can download will make this game play perfectly.

What’s worse, the game has pretty decent and viable graphics going for it. Landscape is very authentic looking and the scarred look of the land really has an authenticity to it. This makes it that much worse to play a buggy game when the look of the game is so spot-on. Enemy soldiers aren’t stupid, but they aren’t perfect killers either; they will engage in smart combat action. Flanking your position, moving in competent military fashion and so on.

This is stalemated by the horribly delivered lines of dialogue the game presents. Information your troops deliver to you is impossibly spotty and in no way would even the most unfamiliar with the English language ever say things in this way. Good sound effects and score, but this voice work is laughably bad and there isn’t too much that funny about the atrocities that some of the factions operating in Chernarus are doing.

As time goes on, in the game, various plot twists occur and how you and your team deal with these situations affects how the game plays out. Remember, you are one of several warring factions, allying yourself with one can cause ripple effects that don’t come to light until further in the game. And by then, you could be commanding several teams of troops operating in various parts on the map, moving the game to an almost real-time strategy game.

There is some additional life to found in the title in the form of an editor and involved multiplayer modes. I suspect there will be a choice online competition with a game like this just because of the sheer accuracy of the way the game is true to military equipment. In fact, even though the game struggles to get players to work with the controls there is a significant amount of military hardware to find, learn and use. Tanks, heavy weapons, and other highly detailed and surprisingly accurate weaponry is everywhere. Heck you can even commandeer a tractor and use that to traverse the landscape.