By Jim Rossignol on June 23rd, 2011 at 2:54 pm.
UPDATE: Get Arma II for free here. That means you can play in multiplayer, but not Operation Arrowhead.
According to the releases that have just popped up from BIS, Arma II is available for free, while OpFlash has been renamed for future release. Sadly, they do seem to be jumping the gun somewhat, as the download links are not actually live on the site in question. When the links do appear, you’ll be able to get a version Arma II, minus the single player campaign, minus fancy graphics, but with all the awesome multiplayer and editor stuff, for nowt. Hell, we might just have to run some “Arma II 4 Nowt” RPS evenings so that some of you who haven’t yet tasted the pungent, leathery-yet-addictive taste of hard simulation can find out what it’s all about.
The other news which my headline so clumsily reveals is that the original Operation Flashpoint is now back in the BIS stable, although now called Arma: Cold War Assault. BIS say: “All existing users of Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis and the Game of the Year Edition are entitled to download and install Arma: Cold War Assault at no charge. The game will also be released through various online stores in the near future.” So free if you already own it. Which is not free. Or is it if it has a new name? I am confused.
All this comes as BIS celebrate ten long, sometimes buggy years since the launch of the landmark soldier sim. Good job, them.
23/06/2011 at 14:59 Anthile says:
The main question remains whether or not one can use the free ArmA 2 with the Operation Arrowhead expandalone to form a Combined Ops lite, seeing as they did something similar with the two DLCs.
23/06/2011 at 16:05 Alexander Norris says:
It would be really nice if RPS could use their journalistic super-access powers to find this out, please.
23/06/2011 at 16:31 McDan says:
That would indeed be super awesome, as I only have the OA expandalone.
23/06/2011 at 14:59 Nighthood says:
Always did want to try the original Flashpoint campaign.
Will it be redone for better graphics?
EDIT: Never mind then. Might just have to buy it some day.
23/06/2011 at 16:37 Turin Turambar says:
There is a mod for Arma 1 for that, the original campaign with better graphcis. It’s being ported now to Arma 2, with even better graphics :P. Search for CWR2 (Cold War Rearmed 2) mod.
23/06/2011 at 14:59 leomr says:
Browsing the Bohemia forums yesterday, I was given the impression (with the oddly scant amount of information they provided) that the Arma: Cold War Crisis release requires a copy of the original Operation Flashpoint, given that Bohemia themselves still don’t retain the rights to distribute that game. This story seems to suggest otherwise, though, so can someone provide added clarification?
23/06/2011 at 15:02 Jim Rossignol says:
Sorry, yes, you do need the originals by the looks of it. Amended story.
23/06/2011 at 17:11 oceanclub says:
If you already have the original Operation Flashpoint, why, er, would you want to download it again from their site? Sorry, I may be missing something….
P.
23/06/2011 at 18:55 BathroomCitizen says:
To keep the game in digital form, I suppose. CDs and DVDs get scratched :(
So my grandchildren will be able to feel the terror I felt while ducking rifle fire when I was 15. And in OFP.
23/06/2011 at 15:01 Moni says:
I haven’t played ArmA yet because it’s always seemed like “not my sort of thing”, but I would like to play it with the RPS community for an evening, because of stuff like this: http://youtu.be/kZc0mwTbgwI
23/06/2011 at 15:17 Stuart Walton says:
Epic use of AttachTo right there.
24/06/2011 at 12:20 Malibu Stacey says:
That looks wonderfully silly. I must try this out.
23/06/2011 at 15:01 Hunam says:
I’m gonna get me some OFP hardstyle.
23/06/2011 at 15:07 Man Raised by Puffins says:
Tanks for free? Tanks for nothing, surely?
Edit: And moving swiftly on from such facetious pun-upmanship; this is pretty great news, thanks Bohemia people.
23/06/2011 at 15:08 Deman says:
Link is up!!
http://69.175.13.106/A2Free/ARMA2Free_setup.zip
23/06/2011 at 15:10 mlaskus says:
Oh great, my OF discs are unusable any more. I will definitely use this occasion to revisit this incredible game.
23/06/2011 at 15:11 Dyst says:
Can we only play with other people who are playing ArmA 2 Free, or can I play with my gazillions of friends that own vanilla ArmA 2 and/or Operation Arrowhead?
23/06/2011 at 15:17 Jim Rossignol says:
Vanilla Arma 2 yes, Op Arrowhead no.
23/06/2011 at 15:12 Daniel Rivas says:
Sometimes buggy?
I still love Arma, though.
23/06/2011 at 15:15 royaltyinexile says:
…and while we’re on the subject of those “ten long, [REDACTED] years”, you may find a short retrospective from the top dog himself to be of interest!
23/06/2011 at 15:16 Nick says:
Original Op Fap has something no game they have released since has. Decent single player.
23/06/2011 at 17:02 ZIGS says:
Cold War Crisis and the Resistance expansion were pure single-player bliss
23/06/2011 at 15:18 EBass says:
I am still very confused.
23/06/2011 at 15:19 drowsy says:
I’ve been trying to get into these games for years, but always end up shying away after hitting the clunky engine and interface face first. It doesn’t help that the AI soldiers always seem to run into walls or do something equally stupid as their first action.
One day, one day I’ll give these games a good shot. Maybe it’s today.
23/06/2011 at 15:20 Dana says:
Awesome, downloading !
23/06/2011 at 15:31 Ikkusei says:
First Panzer Corps, now this. This is becoming quite the day for fans of angry houses, to borrow a phrase from a certain seminal PC magazine.
23/06/2011 at 15:37 Owain_Glyndwr says:
I thought that the original game had already been modded in. Just look for Cold War Rearmed on the mod forums, and it’s there. Or is this like an updated version?
23/06/2011 at 15:43 blankname says:
The article doesn’t explain very well but it seems that the only new things about Arma: Cold War Assault is the ability to download from BIS and a new patch which fixes some bugs and adds some new modding functions.
http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Arma:_Cold_War_Assault
23/06/2011 at 16:02 royaltyinexile says:
This might have a little more useful information, hopefully.
23/06/2011 at 17:27 Jason Moyer says:
A little disappointed it’s not the ArmA or ArmA II engine, since I already have OFP/Hammer/Resistance, but it has a few bugfixes. Other than that it’s just a name change for OFP, since you need the original to play it anyway. It kind of sucks it doesn’t have Red Hammer, nor any intruction on whether or not you can use Red Hammer with it.
23/06/2011 at 15:53 Nullkigan says:
So, do I need to crank the unofficial RPS server over to A2Free for a while?
23/06/2011 at 16:06 Alexander Norris says:
No. God, no.
23/06/2011 at 19:20 Nullkigan says:
Unofficial RPS server now up. Not much in the way of missions yet, swing by the forums or steam chat with a list and I’ll them.
23/06/2011 at 16:35 The_Great_Skratsby says:
Huh. So I guess that OFP Gold key will come in handy after all these years.
23/06/2011 at 16:57 harakka says:
Any organized newbie multiplayer action being planned for this? I’m asking because I was late on the scene with a bargain-price plain ArmA II, and everyone was on Operation Arrowhead by that time…
23/06/2011 at 16:57 plopingo says:
Mirror : http://www.multiupload.com/878RT4ZYVU
23/06/2011 at 17:07 oceanclub says:
I bought ARMA 2 on release, but apart from the first mission, haven’t played it much. I found that on the second mission, performance was horrendous and I lost interest. Did the subsequent patches improve performance much? I also have parts of an upgrade on the way (Intel i5 2500K, 8GB memory, SSD) so hopefully that will help too.
P.
23/06/2011 at 18:12 DXN says:
Hells yes. As a big Project Reality fan, I’m totally up for playing this with the RPS crowd; I’ve just been too poor to buy it ’till now. (Ironic that it happens as I finally get my fancypants new job!)
23/06/2011 at 19:07 El_MUERkO says:
This is confusing. You’ve kind of blurred two stories into one but I think you’re saying:
1) ARMA2 is going free to play with some restrictions
2) BIS are releasing the original OFP campaign playable in the ARMA 2 engine for anyone who owns the OFP.
Am I right?
Am I slow?
Fuck that I’m going to the pub for dinner!
23/06/2011 at 19:09 Jim Rossignol says:
That’s right. Except the bit that is wrong. OFP is just being renamed, not remade.
23/06/2011 at 22:21 Theory says:
Torrent: http://gameupdates.org/details.php?id=4763
24/06/2011 at 00:21 malkav11 says:
So will this get OpFlash…I mean, Arma: Cold War Assault sold on GoG again? Because that would be nice.
24/06/2011 at 11:29 Player1 says:
Check this out, Arma: Cold War Assault is out: http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=121123
By the way: We need an RPS server for it!!
24/06/2011 at 16:01 Araxiel says:
But I paid 4 euros on steam for Arma 2 two months ago…I want my money back or else I will start playing it