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Author Topic: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt (Review Complete)  (Read 13623 times)

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Offline Zipper5

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[CAMP] Operation Cobalt (Review Complete)
« on: 30 Dec 2009, 20:48:49 »
Author: Zipper5
Version: 1.01
Required AddOns: None
Campaign Description: Set during the events of Harvest Red, the player takes on the role of Peter Novak, a Private in the CDF. Akula Lopotev has seized command of the Chernarussian Communist Party in a violent coup and renamed it to the Movement of the Chernarus Red Star. He has declared war on the current Democratic government of Chernarus, and began a campaign of 'ethnic-cleansing' to rule out his competition. At first the CDF could contain it, but the ChDKZ slowly grew until they were overwhelmed. The President sent out a call for help, to which the United States sent the 27th MEU to Chernarus aboard the USS Khe Sanh.
Features:
- 8 missions long.
- Dramatic and interesting story-driven campaign.
- Small and scripted coupled with large and dynamic missions.
- Infantry-centric.
- Play as the Chernarussian Peter Novak, the Russian Vasilly Derevenko, and the American Mark Reynolds.
- Grunt, leading and special forces missions.
- Custom field dressing healing mechanic.
- Custom music and sounds.
Known Bugs:
None.
Changelog:
v0.1:
- Initial release
- First two missions included (in .pbo format): Cobalt & Devil's Castle

v0.2:
- Now in campaign format
- Devil's Castle: removed floating hanging victims
- Fixed typos
- Added one new mission: Turning Point

v0.3:
- Completely redesigned
- Now includes first 5 missions and all cutscenes to that point

v1.0:
- First finalized release
- Added the last 4 missions and the rest of the cutscenes
- Retaliation: Changed the music playing at the start of the mission
- Retaliation: Improved the attack on the castle
- Operation Cobalt: Fixed the issue with the contact not talking to you if you visit him a second time
- Operation Cobalt: Fixed the soldier in the outro continuously shooting you
- Various other small bits of fine-tuning to the first 5 missions and their cutscenes
- Fixed the many typos

v1.01:
- The Sobor Line: Improved the "last loon" issue
- Operation Cobalt: Fixed when documents are found, other tasks are canceled rather than succeeded
- It's Down to This: Fixed there being too little space in the BMP
- It's Down to This: Fixed script error when Lopotev is killed
- It's Down to This: Improved time limit scripting and conditions
- It's Down to This: Fixed the Mi-24 hovering in mid air
- It's Down to This: Fixed issue with Russians disembarking the Mi-24 at the end of the mission

Link to download
« Last Edit: 06 Nov 2010, 05:55:34 by savedbygrace »

Offline SaOk

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #1 on: 02 Jan 2010, 22:36:25 »
This project looks ultra promising.  :good:

I couldnt find a single bug. I even tried to act silly in the forest at start. In Cobalt there could be captions for the voices in intro. The cutscene itself looked very great but will it be as good if played with 4:3 ration screen? I am playing with 19:10 and it looked little like that 4:3 could have AA-soldier cut partly too off the screen. But I am not any sure with that. Just a thought.

The Devil's Castle feeled very polished. There was something going on all the time to keep it interesting. Still it was very easy - with friendly AI 1.0 and Enemy 0.7, the enemy didnt have time to shoot a single shot at me or my team. Anyway it feeled quite realistic since enemy didnt have nigth goggles and I avoided the many light sources.

Offline Zipper5

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #2 on: 03 Jan 2010, 14:03:26 »
Thanks for your kind words, SaOk. ;)

Also, I'm happy to announce the next update to the campaign is now available. Check the first post for more details.

Changelog:
0.2:
- Now in campaign format
- Devil's Castle: removed floating hanging victims
- Fixed typos
- Added one new mission: Turning Point

Offline Wolfrug

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #3 on: 03 Jan 2010, 14:12:07 »
I'll try this one when I get the chance.  :cool2:

Wolfrug out.
"When 900 years YOU reach, look as good you will not!"

Offline Gotcha

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #4 on: 08 Jan 2010, 18:18:47 »
First missions done, and I'm very impressed indeed. The intro for the campaign is very well done, no flaws there. I only have some concerns about the difficulty:

In the first mission (the one where you have to save the Lieutenant), the enemy forces are a bit oddly placed in my point of view. Why is there only a squad of soldiers guarding the Lieutenant, an important prisoner, while there are more enemies patrolling in the forests? Especially when you have to confront the most enemies with just a couple of men. I think you should put more enemies into the castle grounds, with an armed UAZ perhaps also, and reduce the amount of enemies in the woods slightly.

The second mission was great! I loved the cutscenes and the conversations - they were very well made! However, the sprint through the forest was a bit frustrating because of two things:

Firstly, there are again too many of them in the woods. I counted at least 20 Chedaki, all of whom we, two guys, have to kill - without casualties! Secondly, Olegich kept rushing into the enemy fire and dying, so I had to keep in front of him and kill all the enemies myself. This required lots of quick-saving and -loading, and playing through the same situations many times. Not the funniest way of playing a mission. Suggestions then? Well, I think you should, again, reduce the amount of Chedaki in the forest. Maybe you could also put Olegich on "Danger" mode during the fight, so that he'd stop mindless rushing?

Don't get me wrong, though! The campaign is top-class all the way and I'm eagerly looking forward to more missions. The greatest reason why I wrote this is to let you know that people actually play this campaign and you should continue with it!  :good:
War isn't about who's right, it's about who's left.

Offline Zipper5

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #5 on: 10 Jan 2010, 08:43:10 »
Thanks for the test report, Gotcha. It's an odd thing being a mission maker. I found that the fighting in the missions was relatively balanced and easy enough for missions that are at the start of the campaign. However, it should be expected that someone else did not find it so. I'll look into balancing it better in future versions, which you can expect to see "soon". Thanks again.

Offline Wolfrug

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #6 on: 12 Jan 2010, 21:56:01 »
Hey there! Here's a short "review" of the two missions in the campaign:

The first cutscene-mission where you get to go inside and blow yourself up, incidentally, was a very nice little piece of interactive storytelling: well done! I also liked the whole experience, very cinematic. You need voices, but what mission doesn't? :)

Devil's Castle was all right, but as Gotcha said, it's...a little unbalanced. You like your forest fights I see, and no problem there: I also think the AI does its best in forests and makes things the most interesting, BUT: the damned "this person can't die" thing! Also, why so many Chedaki?

How about you add a lot of Chedaki moving in through the forest towards the castle, as they surely heard the shots and are heading there to investigate. That way the clever player can attempt to sneak past these groups without engaging them, and then just fighting his way through the remainder. What I did to finish this mission ultimately is the same I do whenever I can: I went around. Didn't fire a single shot, which might have been what you intended of course, but still.

Also, at the very end I watched a Chedaki through my gunsight, standing at the edge of the forest with his back towards me, through the whole chopper extraction :P Basically, they don't react in any way to the big, loud helicopter arriving on the scene, which is a little unfortunate. How about you make it a Hind instead, add some kind of information-sharing script (so that the player can "spot" targets for it) and then let it rip lose on any Chedaki wandering too close to the forest's edge? It could also engage the reported armor targets (or maybe a secondary helicopter could do this): this would add a bit of boom-wham-explosion prettiness to the mission as well.

Finally, I suggest adding the first aid module to the lieutenant (you can add it just to him in the beginning - he will still have it when he joins your group). I also suggest you do this to Olegich in mission 2.

As to mission 2: Good cutscenes, speaking, plot, etc...all fine and well. But the god-damned running-after-idiot-AI thing! No! Just no! I got stuck at one particular spot trying to keep Olegich alive restart after restart: all he does is get himself killed. And no wonder: we're two guys against a whole forest of Chedaki! Why doesn't Olegich realize the situation is out of hand and try to turn back, run away, DO something? Even if he'd just lie down and tell you to handle the bad guys, anything...but no. So this, I'm afraid, is not gameplay-wise a very nice mission. If you don't feel like changing anything else, at least add the first aid module to Olegich: that will hopefully give him a longer lifespan. Also, make the first "scout" unit you encounter a sniper instead of the one up on the hill, that way the player will be about 100% more effective when the shooting starts thanks to the Dragunov.

I'm wondering: have you changed the cfgprecision in your config for enemies (like many people tend to do)? Or are you using something like ACE to make and playtest the missions? Since these are not simple situations or easy, "start of the campaign" fights you put the player up against here, IMHO. The storyline, the characters, and the basic setup of the missions is great, but for now the frustration > enjoyment, at least in the second mission.

Keep up the good work though, I hope to see some more of this campaign!

Wolfrug out.

"When 900 years YOU reach, look as good you will not!"

Offline Zipper5

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #7 on: 13 Jan 2010, 15:04:34 »
Thanks for testing it Woflrug. The main issue I'm facing at the moment is stopping it from being boring, but also stopping it from being over the top. There is some long walking through forests in both missions, and I don't want it to be actionless, but I don't want it to be impossibly hard. In my initial tests for both missions, I thought I had the number of AI down pretty well. I didn't have any issues completing the missions.

However, I'm also a fairly advanced ArmA II player, and I also made the missions themselves, so I know what to expect. It seems I'll have to dial it back a bit in the next update. In regards to testing it with mods, I do not use any mods when mission making unless it's going to be a requirement for the mission. I made and tested these missions in vanilla ArmA II v1.05.

And for a little update: I've finished my A-Level mock examinations finally, and now I can continue working on the campaign at a quicker pace. Expect to see a new update in the future containing the next two missions.

Offline Wolfrug

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #8 on: 14 Jan 2010, 10:34:07 »
Re: Amount of enemies

This is actually a bit of a pet-peeve for me. If the mission maker explains why the force composition is so "unjust", or at least gives some kind of justification for it beyond "it'd be boring if there'd be as many of them as there are of you since the AI is stupid", then that's fine. If not, it breaks my sense of immersion. Sometimes this doesn't matter, when the action is right and everything is working flawlessly - but sometimes, especially when I get stuck in a particular place where I am clearly outnumbered and outgunned, I ask myself what the hell command was thinking. OFP:R easily got around this by making the protagonist outnumbered and outgunned by default. In OFP:CWC, I really don't think there were a lot of situations where you were seriously the underdog - there was always air support, tank support, another squad etc. to help you. The escort mission is perhaps the one example, but that too has its reasons (scattered enemy forces, no resources for larger escort...).

Anyway, my point here is that this is what was off with me in this mission: force composition. I'm not supposed to represent a Gastovski-type super-soldier here, and neither is anyone around me. In the first mission, the enemy presence was ultimately symbolic, since I was the group leader - I beat the mission by going around the enemies, sneaking past their patrols, and otherwise being smart. No problems there. The second mission does not allow for this leeway, and this is the problem.

Harvest Red in the Manhattan mission has this pretty much under control. I finished this mission with nothing but the APC and my own 4 guys, but if I had wanted to I could've used the UAV, the artillery bombardment, and air transport. Whenever there was a situation, such as attacking the main Chedaki base, the mission makers offered some backup. The actual non-supported fighting situations - the individual camps, escorting the woman to the LZ - were very much within the grasp of what 4 soldiers + an APC could handle. Bugs notwithstanding, I really enjoyed that mission, even though it was far from super-challenging.

What you need to do as a mission maker, since this is NOT a rail-shooter, is to provide for alternative strategic possibilities to overcome a problem. Got to get from point A to B through a forest infested with Chedaki? Offer alternatives - the simple one of "walking around" being the most obvious. If this is not the thing, then other stuff needs to be explored - ambushing, sneaking, calling in assistance from outside, etc etc. Remember the mission in OFP:CWC where you were sent to scout the forest with your CO and a bunch of other soldiers, and got ambushed by Spetznaz and stuff? Although you were mostly on your own for most of the mission, there WAS an APC sent there which patrolled the outer edges of the forest - all you needed to do was to get to it, and you'd be home free. Stuff like that, basically, that tips the balance if used correctly.

I'm sure you're aware of all of this, and the only reason I'm babbling about it yet again is because I like your work, and I think this campaign could be a good one with some more effort. I am also aware that there's effort, and then there's "too much effort" - don't use everything, don't spend more time than you're comfortable with, focus on finishing the story arc. But do take some of the criticism to heart. Giving Olegich the first aid module, or making the player the leader of that particular segment is enough. If you're worried about the forest-runs being boring, you don't -have- to add enemy soldiers. Add conversation, add airplanes or helicopters flying overhead, add a small group of enemies you have to do something extra to (search them for clues etc) - there's plenty of ways to add excitement and stuff to do without having to resort to just plain ol' baddies-by-the-dozen-in-the-way.

Anyway, good luck with your further missions, looking forward to playing them!  :good:

Wolfrug out.
"When 900 years YOU reach, look as good you will not!"

Offline Undeceived

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #9 on: 16 Jan 2010, 02:37:21 »
ZIPPER!!! What a great campaign!! What a story!

I just sat there - with my mouth open by seing this great cutscenes and was totally fierced when I was playing. It is absolutely fantastic, man!
Especially in the intro I noticed how much can be done with Arma 2.

Ok, there were some details and little suggestions I want to share with you, here we go:

- When you take the ruin in the first mission there comes a radio chat with HQ and the player becomes an order. That chat and the order passed a little bit too fast, I was trying to read it all but I couldn't. Later, when I got command of the group I figured it out what was the extraction team, who would stay in the castle, etc. I know that you plan to put in full voice acting (do you?) but nevertheless you could use the chatlog too. This would be cool to read the orders again in case one didn't understand them.

- The player is Private Novak, but in the chat appears my own name. But this isn't important at all. :)

- When enemy armor comes to the castle, maybe you can put in some explosions or MG noises from the castle. And I also had the impression that the team died a little bit too fast (the one in the castle).

- I sneeked around the forest guards to the LZ avoiding the enemy without killing everyone (didn't want to run the risk). Then, when I embarked the chopper I saw an enemy standing at the edge of the forest, not very far away. He was not reacting to the chopper. Maybe make them look to see why the choppers is flying in?

- Good thing with the sniper rifle in the second mission! It helped a lot against those hords of Chedaki. [Edit: I read the previous posts in this thread now (about the amount of enemies and stupid Oligev guy getting himself killed all the time). Well, he did indeed die some times, but all in all I found that this part of the mission was very good and tenseful! The amount of Chedaki was ok and my comrade also was - I did have to play baby sitter only some times.]

- When Oligev dies in the second misison, the mission ends in 10 seconds. This is not good. :) I did let the 10 secs pass to see what would happen and it really ended, but it ended this way that I could not load my last safegame! Please do not end the mission this way. :good:
This was told to me too while I was making Evil's Last Will. :-[ When the officer escaped from the player, I made an endless cutscene with the camera moving higher and higher very slowly and then I put a text in there that the mission was failed and that the player should load the last safegame. Maybe you could do it this way too. But do not end the mission please. :)
Btw, it speaks for the absolute top quality of your campaign that I began the second mission again from the start! :D Normally when a mission crashes or if there is a showstopper I become so frustrated that I stop playing it. This was not the case here!

- On the second run of the mission, Ltn. Marny did not stop to be executed (bad boy, didn't want to get shot!). He walked forward through a fence into a ruin of a house or something like that and I'm not sure if they killed him. Anyway the mission did not continue from there. The last thing, Ogeliv said was that he was sorry about my friend, etc. After that nothing. Did you put a condition (Marny = dead) for to the mission to continue? If yes, maybe you don't need it. They shot at Marney (but it could be that he didn't die), so the mission could continue.

- Just out of curiosity: When the NAPA guys knocks on the door of his friend, the guy says: "Ok! Ok! I'm coming!" Is that an insider from OFP Resistance?? :-D I don't remember for sure. ??? Hm... :)


Once again: This is a absolutely top notch campaign with 2 missions so far. Cinematics are just devastating and the story and the gameplay are wonderful!! Please give me morrrrreee! Now that you have finished your exams! :D
« Last Edit: 16 Jan 2010, 02:58:45 by Undeceived »
Current project: Black Lands (Arma 3)

Offline Zipper5

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #10 on: 16 Jan 2010, 07:17:01 »
Thanks for the test, Undeceived.

Quote
- The player is Private Novak, but in the chat appears my own name. But this isn't important at all.
I haven't added identities yet for the characters, so that's why it says it's you.

Quote
- I sneeked around the forest guards to the LZ avoiding the enemy without killing everyone (didn't want to run the risk). Then, when I embarked the chopper I saw an enemy standing at the edge of the forest, not very far away. He was not reacting to the chopper. Maybe make them look to see why the choppers is flying in?
I'm redesigning certain aspects of both Devil's Castle and Turning Point to get rid of some oddities, like the guy not paying attention to the extraction chopper and what have you, plus I'm trying to balance it better.

Quote
- When Oligev dies in the second misison, the mission ends in 10 seconds. This is not good.  I did let the 10 secs pass to see what would happen and it really ended, but it ended this way that I could not load my last safegame! Please do not end the mission this way. 
This was told to me too while I was making Evil's Last Will.  When the officer escaped from the player, I made an endless cutscene with the camera moving higher and higher very slowly and then I put a text in there that the mission was failed and that the player should load the last safegame. Maybe you could do it this way too. But do not end the mission please.
It's strange that you say that about the mission ending in 10 seconds. I put that in so that people can load their saved games. It essentially stops the mission and makes you unable to continue, and I give them 10 seconds to load it before the mission ends itself. I might add "Please load your last saved game" to it, to tell them that's what it's for. From my tests there hasn't been anything stopping the player from loading their saved games. :dunno:

Once they're completed, I'm going to continue working on the missions that follow. I think that the next update for the campaign will be when all the missions are in a releasable state, so that I can give you something more to play with. Again, thanks for the test, and for the kind words.

Offline dmakatra

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #11 on: 18 Jan 2010, 17:40:33 »
Just did a quick try, and found a couple of issues. No (active) mods running.

Mission 1:
- When reaching the extraction point, you need to change how the extraction event is triggered. Right now, I think it is triggered by the presence of the entire squad (or perhaps the Lieutenant). This is madness, as it forces you, your squad and the lieutenant out of cover just to more or less randomly walk about (at least if you're playing without GPS as I am) until you hit the trigger. Either make the trigger radius bigger, so it also includes the surrounding cover, or make the extraction triggered by radio.

- When moving to the extraction point, I ran into shitloads of patrols which, naturally, made me change my bearings. After that I didn't encounter a single enemy just right until the extraction point. Not entirely sure, but I think the density of the patrols are extremely high (like one every 200 metres?) though very concentrated on a specific route. Spread them out, spread them thin.

- It'd be nice if you could save the information how many and who of your team mates died in the landing-of the-chopper-scene, as it is a nice way of rewarding the player if he kept them alive. Just a thought.

Mission 2:
- This mission started out alright, but I've come across a big no-no in mission design. The NAPA guy is too vulnerable. It's ridiculous, I find my self charging headlong into battle just so I can save some idiot AI whom I do not control myself from dying in some bonehead 80s action hero assault. I play without saves and this became frustrating enough for me to quit playing. It'd be an entirely different thing if you've made me in charge of the poor imbecile, because then it's my responsibility, but now I can only counter his idiocy with my own lunatic charges of ultra-death (TM). Make him invulnerable, make him hide, make me group leader, work his incapacity/death into the story or whatever. Just don't make the story dependent on characters that have (by default and not by player incompetence) a high mortality chance. The very least you can do is activate the first aid module.

Overall:
It's alright, has some points. The scenarios and dialogue is very action movie-oriented (archetypical villains, presidential betrayal, rescue operations of awesomeness, chivalrous last stands, etc.) as they're not very realistic. I do not know if this is what you're aiming at, but if you are, you've hit the spot. Some dialogue seems a bit stiff and overdue. An example is the dialogue which takes place in the car at the roadblock, it can be shortened and made more efficient to get the point across without losing tempo or suspense. I don't know where you're from, so if you're not a native English speaker it's very good, but if you are, you might want to go over it a few times and see if you can make it flow more natural. Reading it out loud, or trying to get the point across by talking to yourself are a few good ways to make sure your dialogue is accurate.

Other than that, I enjoyed myself. Might sound a bit overly-critical, but I'm just pointing out the bad things as they are the only ones that needs changing. Good job, looking forward to completing the campaign once the game-breaker in mission 2 is fixed. :)
« Last Edit: 18 Jan 2010, 18:02:10 by dmakatra »

Offline Undeceived

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #12 on: 18 Jan 2010, 20:52:29 »
I'm just pointing out the bad things as they are the only ones that needs changing.
If I may disagree a little bit with you: Not all that you mentioned were bad things in my opinion. For example I didn't notice anything in the conversation in the car that felt like overdue or unnecessary. It might be a thing of "own gusto" I think.

You are right with the part with the NAPA guy being so vulnerable though!  :)
Current project: Black Lands (Arma 3)

Offline mathias_eichinger

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #13 on: 01 Feb 2010, 18:37:01 »
Hey Zipper!

I second what the others here at OFPEC say: The visible presentation of your campaign is incredibly good.
I've only played the first mission - Devil's Castle - so far. And I understand the reason for making the journey through the woods enjoyable, but I am more in line with the others in saying that the amount of enemy camps is a bit unbelievable. As others have said, I suggest removing the tents and putting the soldiers more on the move, with the intent of interdiction around the castle since they have heard the shots.

Looking forward to the rest of your campaign!

On with mission #2: Turning point

As the others, I am absolutely stunned by your story telling abilities, both what you do with cutscenes and how you weave it into the mission. I have no problem with the dialogue in the car as well.
And the other testers are right with their opinion on Olegich's vulnerability. I made the mission before I was totally frustrated, but frustration started to set in... I think you can safely use setcaptive true on him, because the player is concerned enough with playing hide and seek with the enemy between trees (not to sound negative here, I really like forest fights since OFP CWC).
Also, I tried to have him heal me since he is a medic, but to no avail. That blue "Star of Life" pops up for a second, but vanishes and Olegich just continues to move on and would not heal me.

Other than these issues, simply a great mission. I was deeply disappointed once I realised that your campaign ends right now at this stage, since I was longing to play the next mission.

Excellent job!  :good:
« Last Edit: 05 Feb 2010, 20:17:40 by mathias_eichinger »

Offline Zipper5

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Re: [CAMP] Operation Cobalt
« Reply #14 on: 12 Apr 2010, 17:28:42 »
Well, at long last, I've finally got another update to release for this. Well, it's more like re-releasing the campaign as it is completely different from the original version. Please check it out, link's in the first post.

I hope you enjoy. :D