OFPEC Forum

Missions Depot => Arma2 - Single Player Beta Testing => Topic started by: Undeceived on 04 Nov 2012, 18:27:41

Title: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: Undeceived on 04 Nov 2012, 18:27:41: (http://img855.imageshack.us/img855/3884/blacklandscoverofpec.jpg)

Title: Black Lands
Version: 1.2 (beta)
Author: Undeceived
Game type: Single player resistance campaign
Required game version: Arma 2 + Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead (V. 1.62)

Features:
- Story-driven resistance campaign (19 missions + cutscenes) with an enthralling plot about a group of men struggling against their enemies
- Custom music (including some self-composed titles)
- Many cutscenes, intros and outros
- A mix of linear, straight-forward missions and wide and complex ones with many tasks
- Weapon pool (weapons and gear are forwarded and available in the next missions)
- Squad management system (get to know the background story of your men and chose your group for the next mission)

Description:
After the Russian army takes control over Chernarus, Tomas Cerny and his best friend Dimitri, among other war-survivors, form up a resistance movement. At first, the group is able to cause harm to the Russian intruders, but little by little, Tomas sees the strength of the movement crumbling and deteriorating. As eventually Dimitri is killed in an Russian ambush and Tomas, all at once, loses everything he loves and cares for, the resistance fighter finds himself all alone, devitalized and a broken man. In his darkest hour, Tomas is suddenly contacted by an agent of the U.S. intelligence, who is able to light up a small flame in the young Chernarussian again. Tomas learns that there are still people who want to rise up against the Russians. He is able to find new courage, meets new friends and goes on the most difficult journey of his life. He passes through adventures and defeats, experiences friendship as well as betrayal and faces survival and death.

Beta test (read this!):
- PLEASE help me with the correction of English grammar mistakes or strange expressions! ;) Thanks!

Download:
All needed addons and installation instructions (check the readme) are contained in the download.
[CAMP] Black Lands 1.2 (beta) (http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=23144) (154 MB)
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: SaOk on 04 Nov 2012, 18:58:19: Have been waiting for this. Going to test right away. :good:
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Wiki on 04 Nov 2012, 21:04:47: going to test it too.but later, I'd like to test the whole campaign, as you've made all of the missions
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Undeceived on 04 Nov 2012, 21:44:42: Yes, they are finished, but not yet translated. :D And some minor configuring stuff needs to be done.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Mad_Cheese on 04 Nov 2012, 22:10:06: ooohhhh snap. I'm getting a bag of chips for this. :clap:
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Pirin on 05 Nov 2012, 08:31:47: I am having NO luck getting away from the bar. :dunno: ???

Ahh, never mind. I went around back and asked a friendly soul for a light. After some "persuasion" he helped me out.

Really enjoying this so far!
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Inlesco on 06 Nov 2012, 22:47:07: I've been waiting for a long, story-'n'dialog-driven campaign like this. Gave it a go today and here's the long-awaited (I hope :P) feedback.

Intros

Great quality overall - well-chosen cam angles, good action scenes, fine music and a poetry-like storytelling with some unnecessary lines (I'm sure this will be improved as the campaign passes beta stage).

1st mission - Death came upon me (Afterwards)

An interesting concept. However, I didn't like the long run to the barn hideout through forests and all the dangers a typical Chernarus night 'offers' to us :D. The later scenes were rewarding, although a bit hyperbolized. But that's reasonable - it's an emotional crisis for the main character to see his friends murdered and being betrayed by a fellow. Also - the family, everything that matters... has been lost.

Despite some awkward design-decisions (long runs, scenes without the possibility to skip), it was enjoyable and new experience.

2nd mission - Awakening

Although this mission is quite linear, I liked it because it set the dots in a good way. Several scenes had too long dialogs and they didn't make much sense, possibly forcing player to skip or start to think that this is unworthy to watch throughoutly. I suggest to shorten the scenes and remake the dialogs a bit to sound more 'intelligent' and consistent.

3rd mission - Starting to inflame again

The first and IMO the most important remark - this mission must be divided in two. Why? It's too long. The boat drive isn't enjoyable at all and the car which was left at the light tower wasn't useful. I had to go on foot facing Russian patrols in the forest.

I experienced a weird bug - after the bartender was accidentally killed with a C4 (satchel charge), reloading the last save didn't work out - the bartender died and died time after time. Probably because of he was placed inside an object of the bar building. Correcting the placement pos might be the solution.

Overall, the atmosphere was lovely with some interesting ideas. Sorry to repeat myself, but... This mission must be divided in half :).

4th mission - Setting-up time

Who doesn't like the sandbox-type gameplay? This took some time and was enjoyable at the max. Nothing to add, nothing to cut.

Conclusion

This has tons of potential to become one of the best (if not the best!) campaigns ever made for A2(CO). As I mentioned before, the first 4 missions should become 5 to make the experience smoother. There's a number of mistakes in the texts and unnatural english language expressions overall, but that is usually corrected later. As a person who holds a deep interest in video game soundtracks and music, I recognised many of the soundtracks you used.

An introduction to the features this campaign implements (weaponry inheritance through missions, etc) would be great for complete beginners to start. Of course, you can make it optional.

Technically, everything is fine so far.

IMO - the strongest features of this campaign are long, content cutscenes and an interesting, unique storyline.

I'm looking forward to the rest of the content and find out what'll happen next. Surprise me, Undeceived! :)
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Undeceived on 07 Nov 2012, 18:30:05: Inlesco, thanks a lot for your great test.

I'll look into it and will probably cut that mission in two.

About the language issues and unnatural sentences: @ Americans or Englishmen: Please give me a hand with this if you have some minutes of time. ;) The campaign is available in German too, but English isn't my mother language... Thanks!
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Undeceived on 15 Nov 2012, 19:19:35: I'm thankful for Inlescos input about cutting the third mission in two, but I'm still unsure.

If someone else played the mission: Do you have the same impression that the mission is too long and would be better if divided in two?

What I also could do is to skip the boat journey from Chernogorsk to the light house. I think that it would have the same effect as cutting it in two parts.

What do you think (Inlesco as well)?
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: savedbygrace on 15 Nov 2012, 23:27:13: I'll give it a go later tonight and see whats what.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Undeceived on 16 Nov 2012, 12:13:27: Thx, mate!
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Inlesco on 16 Nov 2012, 13:25:35: I'm optimistic that you'll divide the 3rd mission in two parts. Those could be connected with a more accurate explanation of the storyline, characters, their past, how they became Chernarussian people, or even philosophical quotes etc. The possibilities are limitless. And finally you'll have a decent number of missions in total - 20. :)
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: savedbygrace on 20 Nov 2012, 04:04:13: Played with latest beta on regular.
Overview
Great title font and image cropping!
Intro(s)
I'll work on English grammar corrections over the Thanksgiving holiday. You picked some spectacular angles throughout. The setpos scenes were great as well. There was a decent balance of action packed and somber scenes in there.

Briefing
Not much to say here.

Mission
Death Came upon me
I have to agree with Inlesco on this one. The task of evasion across Chernarus has been done to death, so the starting mission just seemed to be a requisite warmup to wade the player into the story. Don't get me wrong, evasion is challenging in it's own right if the opposition feels real enough. This felt fine, but as stated before, it just feels familiar.

One thing to note: The pine trees provide a cheat for the player as in AI block. If the player stands within the branches, the AI can't seem to locate him. I encountered a camp site of about three men and used a tree to engage them. If it were not for the limited ammo, I may have cleared that area. A distance check or trigger activation to reveal the player may help.

Awakening
I have always enjoyed sneaking through urban areas with heavy enemy patrol routes and utilizing stealth to avoid being spotted. This one was decent but I didn't push it to the limits. Perhaps future tests will allow me to do that.

Starting to Inflame Again
In regards to mission length, it's not bad at all. It really depends on how long the player takes to flee the city and even then, savegames provide a means to break it up manually.
There are quite a few flaws in this mission however.
1. Not sure if you intended this but most, if not all vehicles are unlocked. This allows the player to devastate the opposition by running them down without consequence.
2. As part of the first one, grabbing a tank or APC and mowing down opposition goes without consequence as well
3. The player has the freedom to kill with the starting pistol without consequence unless he kills the target or the guard next to him.
4. Some of the enemy standing outside the pub do not respond to the alert when the player kills the target
5. If the player holsters his gun and then picks the rifle up off of the dead guard that accompanied the back alley officer, the pistol can not be un-holstered. If he picks up a rifle before he holsters, it can be swapped normally.

The boat ride was unnecessary and could fade out and back in with the boat being setposed near the light house to shorten the length some(if you wanted to). But if you need it to advance the story through conversation between the PC and the priest, it's not really all that bad.

Setting Up Time
The pistol was never carried forward to the crate. It's magazines were.
The bandage wounds option quickly disappeared while the player rolls to his back and becomes helpless
The steal the bike task was, well, senseless. So many cars sitting around and I have to take the one thing that can't hold extra gear and can't provide cover when I need it. aside from that, the whole fix the car thing was a good idea except there was no fixing the car. I ended up having moral conflicts with it(imagine that). I was going to steal the bike and just leave but you had to have me talk to the fellah. That's like getting to know someone and then stabbing them in the back. It's much easier to commit the crime when you don't know who is involved.
I opted to take the bike but eventually had to come back and do the inevitable.
The AI ability to spot the player feels much like the supermen of old. It's too tough to approach any of the first objectives without instantly alerting the AI (Fuel truck, medical barn, other patrols)It may be easier with an actual silenced weapon but I honestly doubt it because the moment you choose to take out a target, they all know whats going on.

After several reloads to approach either task area, I became frustrated with the difficulty and decided to not play anymore. This is not what you want, I'm sure. The balance definitely needs some adjustment, perhaps some trigger tweaks too because there is no audible warning to stay out of certain areas; they just shoot to kill once you cross that invisible trigger line.

I rode my bicycle up to Pustoshka and was disappointed that no cars could be broken into, the store was empty(no meds), no patrols, no people. Could be that you raised the standard for immersion and I was expecting more than what was there.

Overall
Currently, the cinema overwhelms the game play but is sure to smooth out once you have more game play to balance it all out. Great camera angles, some of the music was so loud it was static...y if that even makes sense. Grammar corrections and audio will boost the overall presentation but condensing some of the cinema may go far as well.

Maybe it's me, but the AI prevent me from completing the last mission.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Undeceived on 20 Nov 2012, 19:49:46: SBG, thanks a lot! Great work!

Thanks for your offer with the grammar corrections. :) :good:

Mission 1:

Hhmm... Now you guys got me here. :D I have no idea how to change the design of the mission. What I could do is to add some small objectives or something like that.
If you have any idea how to make it more interesting, your suggestions would be much appreciated. :)

Mission 3:

Well, to be honest, I really need the boat trip to develop the story. There are some important information (which make sense only later in the campaign), but I understand that it's quite long.

Mission 4:

My friend, you're getting old?! :P Just kidding - I'll look into it and see how I can balance it or at least make it clearer to the player where that trigger line is.

This will probably disappoint you but I think that I'll remove all cars from the first village, so that there's only the motor bike. :D

Oh, and... There's a way to steal the motor bike without having to talk to the salesman and having moral conflicts because of it (loved to read that, btw, haha :D Kill 100 Russians but as soon as it gets personal, one gets moral conflicts :D nvmind ;) ). -> Anyway: The man leaves after some minutes, but he enters the house first to take his stuff. Maybe I should make this a bit clearer for the player... Thanks for the hint!

The rest you reported seems to be bugs which I feel able to fix (most of them at least). Thanks a lot for reporting, Saved By Grace!!
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: savedbygrace on 20 Nov 2012, 23:47:03: Whats age got to do with anything? :dry:

The boat ride was fine when using the 4x speed.

The difficulty was with me first trying to play the mission weaponless(without that holstered pistol). And then approaching the areas in broad daylight. You could give the option to wait until night.

I can't explain it. I guess when I expect that missions are going to pour on the immersion, I try to make decisions based on what I would do in real life. I thought about taking that bike outright while he was working on his truck but when I got close to him, he just started talking. I even selected the option that I was just distracting him to steal his bike(tried to be honest). I was then disappointed when there was no option to fix the truck, make friends and have him give me the bike. Next time, I'll just become a stone cold killer.
:cool2:
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Undeceived on 21 Nov 2012, 08:08:56: Nothing. ;) I was just kidding.

Wait a minute - he doesn't (or shouldn't) automatically start talking when you approach him. Only when you select the option to talk to him. Or when you steal the bike while he is outside (will call the cops in that case).

And when you chose to say that you want to distract him, he goes inside to prepare his stuff - then you can steal the bike. Did this not work like this?

About him giving the bike to the player: That's rather unrealistic because he needs it for his work.
I don'want other cars to be available for stealing, because then I would have to implement consequences for each and everyone of it. But I have an idea how the player can get one (but he'll have to work for it).
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Mad_Cheese on 21 Nov 2012, 11:06:11: Hey Undeceived,

I tested with 1.62 official on veteran, no mods or beta

Campaign Intro:

I am usually not a fan of ultra long intros scenes – but hands down, this was the best intro I have ever seen.
I watched it twice and killed a box of Pringles. Scenes and angles were superb, the music brilliantly selected and syncopated with the images. I was set into a beautifully depressed mood as weird as that might sound. As SavedByGrace already stated, a good balance of combat and storysetting scenes, only the music was so loud it became distorted (This also happened in the next two cutscenes).

Mission 1: Death came upon me

Nothing to add to the other tester’s comments, my experience was similar. But I didn’t really mind it too much. However, and that counts for the other missions as well, I like how you use the briefings to establish both story and characters.
I was moved by the scene with Tomas finding his dead buddies and wife, but the wording became a little bit cheesy for the first time here. Anyways, I am sure that will be fixed.

Mission 2: Awakening

I liked the sneaking but I took a very safe route. Great idea with the secret bucket sign!

Mission 3: Starting to inflame again

The cutscene in the church was the first time I got slightly bored and therefore lost my concentration. But I see what you are trying to do and it was mentioned before. The briefing is extremely well laid out and the plot is just great.

Now to the mission: I also experienced the same bugs as SavedByGrace and Inlesco. The barman kept dying, I had to reload to a savegame pretty much at the start of the mission. Also, holstering the pistol was bugged at the first attempt, I could not do anything except moving anymore and had to restart the game. Then I also grabbed the dead guard’s AK, the option to holster my sidearm was still in the menu. I decided to drop the rifle as it can't be hidden.

I walked around the bar to scout for possible escape routes and decided to take out the guards at the back doors so i could slip through the bar counter after shooting the target. That’s when a patrol walked by – I had holstered the weapon again so he did neither engage me nore react to the dead body in any other way. A reaction of some sort would be good here.

As far as the boat ride goes: I also felt like it was too long and I had trouble focusing on reading and driving at the same time. I felt that the other guy should have been driving anyways, since he is waiting with the boat. Unitplay could work well here.. That way the player can focus on the textlines or get a cup of coffee if he's really not that into it. Voiceacting would solve this whole issue too off course. I personally do not think that dividing the mission is necessary but rounding up the campaign to 20 missions is a very fair point.

The rest of the mission went smoothly allthough again the guards did not properly react to my teammate taking out their buddies from a distance, technically all units in the area should have at least been alerted by the unsupressed shots.

This was only my bug report and to say the least, this mission was awesome and I enjoyed it a LOT.

Mission 4: Setting up time

The talking part was a bit long.
Reaching the village, I enjoyed messing around with the salesman in order to steal the bike. I was also arrested on my first attempt, which I found pretty cool. I do feel the officer could at least try to chase the player after the bike was stolen, he has a nice whip that could even have a police siren. Loosing him before continuing the mission could add some extra immersion, but it's not really necessary either.

The Russian camp was a nightmare for me, but that was my own fault really. It’s actually a very cool setup. Instead of going into detail of my planning failure, here’s some objective observations:

First off, I thought it was a bit weird that the path to the camp was not blocked with a checkpoint (where the gas station is). Some more barb wire, a guard and a gate would suffice. Further, I agree there has to be some kind of a warning from the camp guards as they would clearly know that something can’t be right.

The soldiers reacted very well once they knew about me, but the BMP3 did not behave realistically– it didn’t break out of it’s patrolling pattern as I was having my skirmish with the foot soldiers and also stayed in “safe” mode unless I fired at it directly. I stole the supplies and some satchels as well as the UAZ, off course that was a suitable target for the BMP and I had reload and do it in a more sneaky fashion.

As I drove up to the Fuel station in the UAZ, I was immediately engaged by the guards – as far as they were concerned I could have very well just been a Russian, so I think a stolen Russian car should provide a bit of undercover functionality with units that do not know about the player’s enemy status yet. Stealing the fuel truck did not tick off at my first attempt, at the second attempt it did.

When I came to Kamil’s house, I couldn’t help but notice that there was plenty of civilians outside, even though the curfew was already in effect. Talking to Kamil again felt stagnant although the content itself is great.

I really enjoyed the plot and setup of taking out the two spies. Very original! Only thing to mention here is that when I failed, it said the spy had detected my weapons – yet my pistol was holstered.

Overall, a very cool mission! I will play it again, the part I did not enjoy was merely a consequence of my bad approach.

Overall:

The potential of the campaign is huge. Drama, action, blood, sweat, tears and a lot of brains.

I would expect the upcoming missions to shift the weight from cutscenes to gameplay, nevertheless this was a truly unique and awesome experience. Original, immersive and well executed. That goes for mission setups as well as the storyline and all briefings.
Actual cutscenes are incredible, yet the dialogs are way too long. As mentioned by the others, these just have to be boiled down and I am sure that will happen so the information is well bundled and less repetitive (and consequently never cheesy).

I do believe that enemies reacting to bodies can be a HUGE plus. SaOk set a great example how to achieve this in ZUB. Also the use of 'taskhint' would be a way to inform the player of a completed objective without him having to open up the map. It might be a detail, but whenever a task is added the hint says "... was added to Notes", but they show up in the task menu. Using 'taskhint' would be beneficial in this case as well.

Are you planning to get this voice-acted?

It goes without saying, I can’t wait to play the rest.

Saubere Arbeit Undeceived!
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: savedbygrace on 22 Nov 2012, 17:27:55: Haha, I am going to be picky here but as a reply to your comment.
Quote
About him giving the bike to the player: That's rather unrealistic because he needs it for his work.
Door salesman that have ever arrived at my door have always needed a way of carrying the sample product to demonstrate for the potential customer. I can't imagine this guy hauling a vacuum cleaner on the rear bracket of that bike. :D Just kidding you pal, I have to give you tough time or you wouldn't feel the love.

It dawned on me that I didn't elaborate on my tactics in mission 3. I'll do so now because it seems that no one else has attempted the same approach, it may be of some help to your future edits.

The gun flaws truly ruin the mission since I can walk the streets and shoot on sight without anyone questioning my ruthless slaughter. Correcting this would certainly improve that portion for sure. But, I refused to win the mission that way, so after having my play test of running people down, blasting them in the face with cool resolve and casually taunting guards who warn me to back away from the door, I reloaded and attempted the mission while keeping the play as it should be.

The target is positioned perfectly. I wandered around, looking for an angle to take him out from a distance but could not find one that afforded a reasonable escape route. As soon as the target or his guard is killed, the guns begin to blaze without era. I finally grew the balls to take out the rear guard, front guard, responding guard and enter the cafe from behind the front counter. I shot the target and instantly the inner guard begins to blast away. Since I was covered by the counter, I made my escape with minimal collateral damage and made it a good distance before the alarm began to sound. I gained access to the roof of an industrial hopper plant and watched the patrols for a while. I could have had some serious fun with this escape but felt like I was pressured from time, so I became careless. After dying in the process, I reload and this time, I use a satchel that I took off of the dead rear guard. Walked around to the bmp without engaging any others, and placed the satchel where the blast would reach the target through the windows while keeping the bartender protected by solid walls (This took several attempts). I then walked as far as I could before detonating the charge. After that, the escape was pretty easy. Not sure how you could change this except remove the satchels from the spetz since they are not on a mission that requires them. To penalize the player for using something he finds in the mission could ruin the game play and creative tactics he employs.

Hope this is useful.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.0
Post by: Undeceived on 23 Nov 2012, 18:38:48: Finally it's weekend and I can find some time to answer. ::)
THANK YOU, guys!! Your input (approval AND criticism) really is great.

Mad_Chese:

Quote
Stealing the fuel truck did not tick off
Did you take the truck to the camp in the forest at the first try? The task should only tick off then.

Quote
I couldn’t help but notice that there was plenty of civilians outside, even though the curfew was already in effect
No, the curfew is only in effect at night. At day it is not. I'm not familiar how to write time information in English - would 6:30 PM be right? That's how I wrote it in the briefing but it might be capable of being misunderstood.

Quote
Only thing to mention here is that when I failed, it said the spy had detected my weapons – yet my pistol was holstered.
There are two possible locations for the killing of the agents: One in the village around Kamil's house (in case you come to his house unarmed) and the other one is at another place more to the north near an abandoned lumber mill (in case you come to Kamil's house with non hidden gun).
Would be important for me to know which of both mission endings you had and where exactly you were seen or how it happened that the mission failed.

Quote
Are you planning to get this voice-acted?
Well, I was planning it at the beginning (definitely). :D But with the 19 missions plus cutscenes the amount of dialogs grew that much that I'm not even sure anymore. :D Poor voice actors, in the case I decide to really do it. :D

savedbygrace:

Mission 3:

Yeah, I'll look into what you (and also M_C) mentioned about the reaction of the AI when player is armed / not armed / when the target is dead, etc.

And yes, I'll remove the satchels from the Spetsnaz. You're right, they don't need them on their body guard mission. :)

@ All:
Can one of you please set the sound settings like this (effects and music) and run the intro scene again to see if the music still is too loud / distorted?

(http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/7452/settingsm.jpg)

Thanks again, the reports helped a lot!

-> I have practically finished the missions 5-11 for the next release*. But I think it's better if I fix 1-4 first... It will take me some more time though.

* Please be patient with my linguistic skills in the rest of the campaign as well. :D My wife helped me a bit with the translation in the first two or three missions but then she gave it up because of the huge amount of text. The expression should be even more strange for you English-native guys - so every help with it would be much appreciated (to be honest I depend on you here... :dunno: ).

And one last thing: Yes, there is a shift from cutscenes to gameplay in the next missions. There still are cutscenes but not as many as in the first 3 or 4 missions.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 03 Dec 2012, 19:43:26: Hello everyone.

Thanks for your tests and your feedback! :good:

The next release is ready (version 1.1 - missions 1-11). The download is in the first post.

Version 1.1 - Notes:
- @ beta testers: If you don't want to test the missions 1-4 again, you can start playing at mission 5 right away (of course it would be much appreciated if you began from mission 1 again! :good: ). The player character will carry only a preset handgun, so you should not have the problem to run around without gear.
- There is a number of bug fixes and optimizations in missions 1-4 but I didn't change everything you guys mentioned in your beta tests. There are things where I'm still unsure how to solve them and they might be adressed in the next releases.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: savedbygrace on 04 Dec 2012, 00:17:00: I haven't forgotten your stringtables pal. I was halfway through and was diverted to other duties. But I will certainly get it done and give your mission another test from start as soon as time permits.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 04 Dec 2012, 18:28:19: Thanks, SBG. No stress with the stringtables. :)
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: SaOk on 04 Dec 2012, 22:54:32: Havent yet got far - I am in 3rd mission, but have been enjoying it much. Only bug I saw was an extra actor standing near the barn door when player left it running. Cinema is really thrilling and well-made. Almost like playing a movie again. Missions have been more straighforward, especially the first mission could have some more ambient life and other scenery/event e.g. at distant that player could see while running. But great already. I will try to have better feedback when playing the new version more far.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: bedges on 07 Dec 2012, 21:27:11: This has all the makings of OFP Resistance campaign for Arma2. I'm really looking forward to this.

However, I'm currently at the start of the third mission, and I'm sorry to say I ain't going to play no more. Why?

Well, I spent quite a bit of time in the second mission scoping out the area, then attacking one of the roadblocks and arming myself to the teeth, only to be given a single silenced pistol in the next mission. That won't do.

Similary, I started out with an M1911 only to have that vanish, replaced by a Makarov...

All that immersion created by awesome cutscenes and music, and then boof: no loadout carryover. Not good :confused:
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: SaOk on 07 Dec 2012, 23:15:24: I use this code for that weapon transfer if you end up needing it:

Before mission ends:
Code: [Select]
PlCo = [weapons leader player,magazines leader player,damage leader player]; saveVar "PlCo";
In next mission init.sqf (place to early lines.):
Code: [Select]
if (!isnil("PlCo")) then { removeallweapons player; _we = PlCo select 0; _ma = PlCo select 1; {player addweapon _x;} foreach _we; {player addmagazine _x;} foreach _ma; player setdamage (PlCo select 2); };
Havent included possible backbag.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 07 Dec 2012, 23:18:33: bedges, thanks for this honest feedback. I have to confess that you're right. I didn't think much about that aspect. In some of the missions the story is told in such a way that the player finds himself without the gear of the last mission, but particularly for the third mission - as you mentioned it - it should not be a problem to give the player the weapons from mission 2. I'll look into that and make it possible for the player to use his equipment there. But it will be quite hard for him if he wants to use unsilenced weapons. But at least he has the choice.
Anyway - good point!

If you give it another chance, I could tell you how it continues. ;) The equipment will pass from 3 to 4, but (again) not from 4 to 5. In mission 5 the men are going undercover again (at least at the start). But from mission 5 ahead until 10 or so the equipment is always carried over, as the incidents are immediately connected to each others.
I won't spoil much here but after that sequence of connected missions something in the story will happen which will turn around everything...

Talking generally: The carryover of the equipment is not yet polished in all missions - some bugs might still happen, but I'll fix that. And - thanks again for your thoughts - I'll give the player the stuff from mission 2 (as mission 3 happens only some hours later).

@ Sa0k:
Thanks, mate! If you have time - check some of my scripts. ;) I borrowed that exact (absolutely awesome) code from your campaign (of course you've got credits right in these scripts - in ReadMe too). :D Thanks again!
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: bedges on 08 Dec 2012, 10:33:16: Indeed there can be many story-driven reasons to strip weapons from the player, and I admit that the cutscene in the church at the end of the second mission may have had one of those reasons in it. However, all I got was a bunch of well-chosen camera angles with no speech and no subtitles, so if the reason was there, I missed it.

You hit the nail on the head about choice. In (awesome) missions such as yours which are story-driven you can take a lot of liberty with the player's situation: think up a good enough reason in the plot and you can get away with just about anything. That said, these are real-time sandbox games which encourage the player to strategise. The mission may involve quietly neutralising a character, so a silenced pistol makes sense, but what if the player wants to create a fall-back point in a dark alleyway where s/he stashes a bunch of weapons picked up in a previous mission?

Arma2 allows for that, so your story needs to have a pretty good justification for taking that feature away.

I was kidding about not playing further; of course I will. Looks awesome so far. :good:
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Inlesco on 10 Dec 2012, 20:14:32: Another report incoming! This time I didn't have enough time to play from the beginning. I decided to start from Martin's List. Loads of feedback and suggestions below. :)

Martin's List

The mission is quite linear, but since the storyline is the key of your campaign, this is reasonable and fine. I waited for the bus, seeing people joining me at the bus stop. Then proceeded to the church. Now, this part was chaotic - somehow conversation texts ran on each other and the friend left without any explanation what's next. Well, I placed the objects in the church, stole a vehicle and reached the ambush position. Nothing to see, proceeding to ammo stack. Everything went fine - I fully prepared for the primary objective. The convoy's movement was weird due to A2 AI incapability of driving. I blew up the convoy and retreated to Prud, later moving to the east.

Suggestions:

a) use unitCapture and unitPlay for the bus and convoy's UAZ to avoid unpredictable movement. Of course, that could affect the performance.
b) make the bus arrival at the Novy Sobor smoother - it's kind of messed up now.
c) create some random (or not) conversations while moving in the bus or waiting for it.

Martin's List 2

Interesting mission with several unexpected events. IMO - it's fine as it is now. There's a fair balance between difficulty and enjoyment here. After destroying the generators and fleeing away, I felt like playing another cat&mouse game.

Inner Abscess

A typical storyline-driven campaign scenario with linear elements. Nonetheless, I liked the uncertainty. Eventfulness always increases the enjoyability. This is resistance-type campaign after all. :)

Currently, I think this mission is solid and fits nicely.

Alexej Pribotow

This one is a bit messed up. Somehow I found myself inside Chernogorsk, although according to briefing I was outside of it. I suppose this is a simple bug - easily fixed. Hunting down Pribotow was weird at times - his car stopped and the driver and Pribotow disappeared. I approached the nearby house carefully and they suddenly were moved back - running away again. Later, I reached the gate full of hostiles - killed everybody, found Pribotow unarmed (that's weird for such an enemy). Then disappeared into the forest and hide.

Suggestions:

a) Pribotow's capture - you may change the scene to something more believable. For example - player has to carefully approach the house because the traitor is armed. When the distance is < 5, a cutscene starts, player shouting to put down his weapon, he has no chance to escape, etc.

Petrovka Strike

A moderate mission, containing both weak and strong features. Here's what I outlined as improvements. :)

Suggestions:

1) add a music track at the start, so Chapter 3 will impress more.
2) The pilot at Gvozhdino could be able to communicate with player's team and report that enemy T90 has left in Tomas' direction after the ammo truck was hit or if the player is taking too much time and the pilot will cancel the flight soon. I'd like to see a time limit to reach the pilot.
3) after the in-game cutscene, add a check if the player hasn't left the pre-set sniper's position or is too close to the village and can get spotted. It'd make things more realistic.
4) set appropriate viewDistance in the init.sqf, so the player couldn't change visibility to have a more clear aim on the target.
5) Pilot's chopper should fenced in. Who knows when some outsider will decide to steal or damage it. :D
6) A sudden decrease of view distance looked weird.
7) Elipses 'Investigate' get green (completed (I assume)) without player really checking out that particular area.
8. Place some objetcts inside the farm building, so Tomek could hide behind or between something. (for realism.)
9) Nemec could hide in the shed and player should knock in when close to it, saying some code-word. (I suppose it's dangerous for a mayor to stand outside in a forest.)
10) Add optional objectives like 'take control of Russian artillery / mortars' or 'steal a patrol vehicle' to make camp elimination objective easier. IMO - flexibility is the best way.
11) To make this mission more interesting, you should create a simple dialogue between the player and pilot to somehow convince him to fly in hostile area.

Resurrection:

All started nicely - pumping up the emotions and seeing the story develop, etc. Still, several flaws were obvious and IMO need to be solved for the version.

Suggestions:

1) Use disableUserInput 'true/false' in scene after Tomas' friend was hit from behind because when player gets down you can still use Num pad and see for yourself what's behind - nobody.
2) make sure that player doesn't have a change to kill all hostiles. I did and the scripted death always caught me running away. :D

Back to Safety

A trigger at the house found by moving in direction of the moon didn't activate. But you can fix it anytime. However, an in-game cutscene would be better than strange conversation when player can run and do stupid things.

Overall

So far so good. The cutscenes were nice, especially the Inception-like after Resurrection mission. I assume most of the players are not the fans of in-game cutscenes, but sometimes they're unavoidable.

All in all - great work. Looking to forward to this campaign. Hopefully, this feedback will help to improve the quality bit by bit. Can't wait to continue Tomas' adventure in Chernarus. :)
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 11 Dec 2012, 21:04:24: Perfect, Inlesco! Thanks a lot for your feedback! :) Great suggestions too. :)
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Mad_Cheese on 12 Dec 2012, 23:36:47: Hey Undeceived

Tested on regular with Arma 1.62 + latest beta.

I started with the first mission again because I was interested what you had changed.

Mission 1+2:

Nothing to add.

Mission 3: Starting to inflame again:

The barman stays alive this time, i reloaded a lot to see if it happened at some point. All good. I can however still run around with the handgun and kill everyone outside the bar without resistance, only if I cross an invisible line (inside the bar) or kill the officer all hell breaks loose. Later at the barn, I had the impression that the AI reacted much better this time. Not sure if you changed teir behavior or they just had a good day.

Mission 4: Setting up time:

I remembered all weapons and magazines i stole in mission 3 to see if they were transported to mission 4. The good news is - they were all there. The bad news is: I had no handgun. I'm not sure if it has anything to do with it, but when mission 3 finished I was in a stolen UAZ. The UAZ was gone at the start of mission 4, which is hard to avoid I guess.
Just an observation, it is possible to have both conversations in the beginning simultaniously.
Unfortunately, having no handgun screwed up the mission big time for me. I couldn't sneak up to the russian base and then infiltrate it at a good position. No matter how I approached, I was quickly pinned down and while time passed, more and more reinforcements arrive at the base. After roughly 70 reloaded savegames I decided to use endmission, pinned down in a barn surrounded by 4 armored vehicles. I am sure this would not have happened without the missing handgun, maybe you can add an extra one to the weapon crate.

Mission 5: Martin's list

Very nice and funny detail with the rocker car in the beginning. The AI's pathfinding also made it look like the driver was drunk :D
I had problems to get off the bus, after dropping us off it would back up and crush Kamil, thus failing the mission. Luckily you had an autosave just before the drop off, so allthough it took a few attempts it wasn't to problematic. But as Inlesco suggested, this can be fixed with unitplay. The bus also ran into a house after the drop off, which would be fixed as well). Another thing, Kamil took me into a backyard where nothing happened on my first two attempts. On the third try, he took me to the car, a bit further down the road. Must be the AI pathfinding. A mapmarker would fix this.
The setup, robbing a weapon stash and ambushing a convoy, is terrific. BUT i think the player needs a little bit more time. I took out the guards at the weaponstash quickly but lost some time after being tied down by incoming enemies. With a bit more time, I could have prepared a better ambush. I'm just talking about 1-2 minutes here, it would still put the player under pressure.

Mission 6: Martin's List 2:

I'm not sure if the cutscene was the outro of mission 5 or the intro of mission 6. However, it is awesome. I love how you use the most mundane features of Chernarus, it might sound silly but it really brings the country and characters to life. I'm talking about simple stuff like a bus stop or in this case a little lake with a pier - it's great.

The mission is a great classic stealth scenario, a lot of fun and very detailed. I spotted no bugs.

Mission 7: Inner Abscess

This one also worked completrely bug free for me. The twist in the storyline is unexpected and adds to the movie type feel this campaign has.

Mission 8: Alexej pribotov

I experienced similar bugs as Inlesco did. Unexpectedly, the mission started inside of the car, at the parking lot, and the lines in the cutscene overlapped ( a mix of storytelling and dialog), repeated and made no sense. There was also random fade in's and fade outs - I can't really explain, but it felt like there was two camscripts running at the same time. Also the fades and some text continued while the actual gameplay had already started. While following the car, some text displays were triggered, their content indicated that that the mission should have indeed started outside of the city. Some of the chat conversations is displayed twice, also the task to follow Pribotov is displayed twice (see .rar file with screenshots).
However, the rest of the mission plays smoothly and finishes. Great idea with the gps marker by the way. Only thing to be mentioned is that while the mission finished, I was being engaged by a hind - if the mission had not ended chances are high it would have killed me.

Mission 9: Petrovka Strike

The mission starts with a scripterror:
Code: [Select]
Tomas setGroupID "Tomas"; TomasF setgroupID "Tomas"; Error: Nicht definierte Variable in Ausdruck: tomasF File Campaigns\und_blacklands1_1beta\missions\09petrovkastrike.Chernarus\init.sqf, line 60
Another convoy ambush - I absolutely love these and I have to say, I have never been immersed into the resistance role like this before. The assasination and it's setting was also superb. After the assasination, there is a bit too much running for my taste... It's 2km to the castle and just before arriving I have to change course into Grishno which is pretty far again. I fail to change weapons after I took out a patrol in the woods and find myself in a close combat environment with a heavy sniper rifle and a pistol. It takes me ages to survive an attempt to steal a weapon of a dead spetznas in town. The enemy AI behaves very well.

Moving on.. I can imagine this was done purposely, but two of the angry guys in the forest have no weapons on them. Taking out the russian camp proved to be very hard, but not impossible as it turned out. One guy in the forest does have an rpg, but it takes effort to prevent him from wasting it on foot soldiers. I hid my guys in a forest, snuck into the base and used the AA gun to take out the vehicles.

After the attack, I properly armed my units and managed to get away just before reinforcements arrived. This was good because the BTR would have slaughtered my men on the way to the truck if I hadn't done so.

This is a very long mission. It has enough content to make two, maybe even three whole missions. It is not a problem, but I feel that facing so much armor needs to be balanced out a little bit by giving the player appropriate weaponry before attacking the camp. The joining units in the forest could have a car with another rpg for the player to use.

Mission 10: Resurrection

This mission mainly serves to develop the story and it does a tremendously good job. I found the setting of the arrest very dramatic. The following cutscene has a great twist. The first half of it, where Dimitri reveals he is the head of the Red Star - well it is already great and detailed but the second half with the KSK rescuing Tomas had me sitting infront of the screen with a dropped jaw. AWESOME!!! Really... wtf!

Conclusion:

The campaign is on a great path. Yes, there is some issues that need to be adressed, but the quality is huge. Storyline, characters, cutscenes and last but not least mission design and gameplay. All top notch if the bugs are fixed. I played the campaign in german this time, and all lines made perfect sense, never cheesy, but very fitting all the time. Great effort btw to write this huge amount of text in two languages.

Here's the file with screenshots of some errors that came up
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/29770617/Blacklands%20Screenshots.rar (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/29770617/Blacklands%20Screenshots.rar)

Like I was hoping, the weight is shifted from cutscenes to gameplay while the campaign goes on. I am thrilled to play the remaining missions of this campaign.
:clap:
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 13 Dec 2012, 12:30:09: F*** , guys, I forgot to remove a debug line in M8... That's The cause for that mess... SORRY, I'll reupload later today as soon as I get home...

Done - I reuploaded the campaign with mission 8 fixed. It should work normally now without strange cutscene behaviour.

Btw, sorry for the short replies - I'm pretty busy in RL atm... I'll answer soon.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: savedbygrace on 29 Dec 2012, 02:27:14: Finally made it through the string tables and corrected what I spotted. There was so much to read that I may have missed some things but for the most part it's looking good. There were some parts that I didn't want to change for fear of removing the meaning, so I just left them alone. At least this way, it narrows future efforts down a bit. These string tables were from the download version I played so it won't contain anything new that you've put in them(if you have at all). I'll be circling the wagons soon to run through the beta missions again, so it shouldn't be too much longer before I am able to provide more feedback.

I'll remove the zip file when you've grabbed a copy.

Later pal
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 29 Dec 2012, 22:37:14: Thanks a lot for your work, SBG, really! It's really appreciated!

I got the zip - you can remove it.

At the moment it's quite hard to get to editing - RL is taking all time and strength ressources. But I'll get to it! :) There are some nice and interesting missions yet to come (which of course will need a good amount of beta testing... ;) :D ).
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: savedbygrace on 07 Jan 2013, 06:04:05: I attempted to download version 1.1 and the file is no longer found. If you're in the process of updating again, I'll wait for your next version, otherwise, I'll grab it when you re-upload it.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 07 Jan 2013, 18:24:50: I guess that the download expired due to lack of downloads. :) I reuploaded it again here: http://www.gamefront.com/files/22826933/UND_blacklands1_1beta.zip (also updated the first post)

Unfortunately I didn't work much on the campaign after the last update - RL is kicking my butt atm...

Thanks for your help, mate!
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: savedbygrace on 07 Jan 2013, 23:42:11: Yeah, real life is having a grand time kicking all of us about. I'll get to it as soon as I can. thanks for re-uploading it.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 03 Feb 2013, 21:06:49: Hey, finally I am through with the older missions and can test this campaign.

Introduction I and II

As the others said, it's great cinema here, perfect angles and the sound fits the depressing theme of the intros, the whole action scenes are asthetic, and the somber scenes are worth of a movie.

Death camo upon me

This is more a cinema mission than a real mission, but bug-free, and very engaging as well. You could almost catch a depression while playing this.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 04 Feb 2013, 19:34:48: Thanks a lot, mathias!

I hope that your emotional condition is alright. :D ;)

Looking forward to your further impressions.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 08 Feb 2013, 11:34:48: Well, using your mission to be distracted from a relationship breakup was the wrong idea. :whistle:
But I am good again and so here are my impressions of

Awakening

This is a rather easy mission, but the nightly ambiance is great. As you have written in the first post, it is more of a cinematic mission, but the storytelling and camera as well as music is excellent. No bugs spotted.

Starting to inflame again

The bug with the missing action menu entry for the church door I reported via PM must be related with one of my myriads of addons and mods - disabling most of them did cure it.

Else, the mission is top notch - following the hooker in the backyard to kill the officer without being spotted was intense, and at the bar I really walked around for several minutes with no hope of doing this before catching my breath and remembering ArmA2's poor CQB AI. A close shave anyway, but I killed my victim, followed by a mad dash for the boat and a calm ride with a nice conversation.

The crawl to the men to be liberated was nerve-wrecking too, with enemy patrols all around, but a well made cutscene provided enough motivation to free them. After a short battle at the prison, they were free to go and we reached our hideout without intervention.

Great mission, no bugs and full of immersion.

Setting-Up time

I started to play this mission tonight and I am totally blown away by the hilarious conversation before you can steal the motorbike. Just great. Right now, I am stuck at the materials depot, which is very well guarded, but I think I have to try to sneak in from every direction before giving up (right now I was trying from the north, thinking that the side opposite the woods would be less guarded. But to no avail). Ok, tried several times to infiltrate that russian position, but they have guards on all sides on the building, an impossible situation. As for now I give up and try your next mission if I find motivation again.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 20 Feb 2013, 08:00:13: Thanks, Mathias. I think that I have to tune down that part a little bit.

Approaching the depot from the east worked for me but of course it's not easy to run and gun at that part of the mission.

The next update will also bring the whole campaign eith all 19 missions. But it will still take a while (some weeks maybe).
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 14 Mar 2013, 23:06:57: On with Martin's List

I have to say beforehand that I am totally unhappy with this mission, here's why:

All is well until I approach the small enemy ammo depot in my little van on an unpaved road. Driving that van on the road is already slow, but I am intercepted by an enemy UAZ full of soldiers. After dealing with them and the guards at the depot, an enemy squad instantly appears and has to be dealt with as well.

After these "small matters" I have a hard time equipping my squadmates (they shout "Negative!" when I order them to pick up stuff from the crates). So I get them weapons from the downed enemy squad. Meanwhile, the convoy is well past the ambush point, idly waiting in the middle of the road to the east.

A Tunguska, a T72, and some trucks together with infantry. All this without a squad loaded with AT weapons because the crates at the base could not be accessed by my men. My only salvation is going Rambo with Loki's Lost key. Afterwards, I discover that going by car is another suicide because there is an instant T72-response to the incident.

Going on foot does not help either, and with a (spawning?) APC 200 meters behind me, I cannot finish the mission - since it is dependent on the survival on my mates.

Suggestion:
* Add teamswitch
* Delay the enemy response
* Arriving at the weapons depot and equipping is time pressure enough - do away with the enemy response at this location.

The cinema is top-notch, but the mission needs a bit more fine-tuning.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: savedbygrace on 14 Mar 2013, 23:16:24: Might be a good idea to add team switch to allow the player to control each AI with precision when needed such as gearing up or getting set, etc.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 15 Mar 2013, 17:39:47: Hello mathias. Thanks for testing and your feedback. I'll deal with those things you mentioned.

That UAZ on the dirt road is a bug. It should only come after you attacked the depot. :D
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 20 Mar 2013, 20:30:48: Oh, that's not a bug but my tactic.

From the ammo depot, there is a hedgerow stretching conveniently to the dirt road. I stopped my van, let the precious team mates wait for me, and rushed the hedgerow upwards to take out the guards. Soon after I was back in the car and driving a minute, that UAZ arrived, much to my dismay because the clock was ticking.

On with Martin's List II

This mission also excels in the arena of scripting and story telling - plus it really keeps the player on his toes. Stealing the boat was a more emotional experience that I expected first, and the dialogue before trying to destroy the generators was interesting as well. I literally managed to run away with bullets kicking the dust around me, but I think that boat was a tad too close when I tried to drive away. I had to retry multiple times, which is something I do not like if I have absolutely no options to fight back. Anyway, I managed to reach the hideout and the outro was very well made as well. Top-notch mission which makes me want to play more of your campaign.
Remark: Kamil died during exfil and I used the CAMPAIGN cheat at this point.

Inner Abscess

I believe I have found the first bug of this campaign. I am now in the woods, after a 10 minute patrol around to find some bad guys, but now my lead has stopped patrolling and is just standing around looking dumb, no progress in the mission yet.

Alexej Pribotow

This mission was bugged as well, because my squad had no weapons when they exited the bus, so I had to use the Loki Lost Key cheat to equip myself and play the mission. Enemy reaction upon capture of the traitor is too swift, as in earlier missions. The storytelling and cinema is top-notch as usual. Might be the cause that using the cheat "CAMPAIGN" is doing all the bugs.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 23 Mar 2013, 19:51:28: Hi mathias,

yes, normally the final script checks which weapons you and the others have at the end of the mission, but when you use CAMPAIGN due to showstoppers, this weapon check script has not launched.

7 Inner Abscess:

Where did the mission stop working exactly? Didn't the man from the village lead you to the truck with the civilian corpses??
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 23 Mar 2013, 21:44:49: Quote
Where did the mission stop working exactly? Didn't the man from the village lead you to the truck with the civilian corpses??

Yes, I saw the truck with the corpses, then the man told his wife to go home and afterwards my party patrolled the area around the massacre, without ever coming across a single enemy. I cannot say when I exactly became tired of it, but on top of that I let 10 minutes pass on 4x speed, and then the "Seek and destroy" routine timed out and they just stood around.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: Undeceived on 24 Mar 2013, 08:39:19: Ok, something absolutely weird is going on there... :(
The mission should work as follows:

- The woman comes to the car (The blue one, at Mission statt)
- The player goes to the village
- The man tells about corpses
- The group joins him and he starts leading them to the place
- After 10 meters he stops and sends his wife back home
- Then he leads the group to the truck
- A Dialog takes place at the truck with the corpses
- The man leaves the group
- The group's car (the blue one) is setpossed to the truck and the group members get back their weapons (only if You finished the last Mission properly resp. had weapons at mission start). Other thqn that the womans' husband disappears (he got back Home)
- The Player gets the task to search the area ( the area is marked on the map)
- When the Player gets to that area, the next cutscene appears

That's how it should work. The Player should definitely get the leadership back after arriving at the truck with the corpses... That wasn't the case, was it?
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.1
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 24 Mar 2013, 11:59:01: You are right, the player never got his leadership back, though at this point, my squad still had its weapons.

Petrovka Strike

...is an impossible mission. There's about 20 seconds time before the convoy arrives - not enough to lay any charges, and about the same amount of time after the BTR is dead until a T72 arrives, making short work of my mission critical squadmates. At this point I am a bit sick and tired of that instant enemy reaction. Needs to be changed to have any enjoyment in the mission.

Resurrection and Back to Safety

These missions are more cinematic but anything else, but boy are they dramatic, the cinema and storytelling is just perfect. The "watching a movie" feeling that befell me in For the Life of a Friend is here again. Congratulations!

Campaign verdict

Some balancing problems that are frustrating, but easy to iron out. The rest is just awesome and a cut above any other ArmA2 campaign. I wish BIS would take note of that campaign and construct their ArmA3 one as engaging as yours.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: Undeceived on 03 Jul 2014, 21:38:36: Ok, guys, while OFPEC was down, I published the next version of my campaign (version 1.2). Check the link in the first post.

PLEASE note that due to the downtime of this forum I could not check the names of the beta testers which really (!) helped me a lot! Thus I could not include them in the campaign credits. But you definitely will be included in the next version!

I'm working on a Arma 3 project right now but when it's finished, I definitely will come back to this campaign. I fell in love with it and nothing else I began working on, feels the same. ;) Well, enough emotions for now - just wanted to say that Black Lands is not dead. Only paused.

Thanks again for your help (@ all!).
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: savedbygrace on 04 Aug 2014, 02:08:54: I was hoping I'd get a chance to play test this one again. I'm in the process of reviewing one currently and will get to this project asap. Thanks for sticking with us.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 01 Sep 2014, 23:28:02: Hey, Undeceived, I am as far as Awakening with this version of this campaign. Playing it on 1.62 and I am not spotting any bugs yet. Great piece of art so far, as before!

In Starting to Inflame Again everything is great, until I am trying to escape from the shed with the newly-liberated prisoners. All the enemies converge on it, it's much harder than last time and simply impossible to solve --> endmission cheat.

Setting-up time is as impossibly though like the version I played last year. Stay tuned for feedback for other missions, but I am at a loss with this one again. :dunno:

Martin's list appears to be bugged on this version.
What happens is that I disembark the bus at Novy Sobor, Kamil also gets out, I go to the church and place the dogtags. However, despite the briefing talking of "WE doing task X etc etc", nobody joins my squad.

So I head to the small ammo depot on my own, but during the process of killing the guards and equipping myself, Kamil always dies of unknown causes and the mission cannot be completed.

Martin's List II in contrast, works without problems. I like the boat insertion, plus reaching the hideout was very tense because of a well-placed patrol. Great stuff and no bugs.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: Undeceived on 07 Oct 2014, 19:56:49: I'm (at the moment) not working on BL, but, mathias, I'm reading your test and it's definitely highly appreciated! Thanks a lot!
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 07 Oct 2014, 23:16:11: Hey undeceived,

is there a chance that you are working on it again some time in the future, or is it simply "too old and distant" to be unearthed and tackled with? I would not blame you, since I have been there myself. But if you won't touch it anymore, it is a waste of time write down beta testing notes here in your thread.
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: Undeceived on 10 Oct 2014, 20:53:54: Ooh, you can be sure of one thing! I'll DEFINITELY come back to BL soon! :) This is my favorite baby. :)
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 10 Oct 2014, 22:46:55: Fine, then time spent with BL is time well spent. :good:
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: Undeceived on 10 Oct 2014, 23:38:47: I might add that sooner or later I'll try to port it to Arma 3. Do you play it, mathias?
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 12 Oct 2014, 22:49:55: Yep, I play it, and honestly, I think Arma3 has got more potential. Just the usual years of spit and polish required. :D
Title: Re: [CAMP] Black Lands 1.2
Post by: mathias_eichinger on 14 Oct 2014, 20:52:47: Inner Abscess

Did work this time but I am caught in the open on a clearing, being engaged and smoked by multiple enemies. I lost patience for now and used the endmission cheat to see how the rest of the campaign would play out.

Alexej Pribotov

In this mission, I am lacking any weapons which I would need to enter the compound to find Alexej. Does this mean I have broken the campaign by using the cheat in the last mission?