And something I'd like to note: you say "MUCH" bigger, but this map is only around 50 km2 bigger than Chernarus.

To be fair it's ENORMOUS!!!
Battles at sea on a scale like this without Earths curvature would seem a little odd to me...
I often look out to sea only able to see the top half of a ship due to it being on the other side of the horizon.

ARMA II map compared with ARMA III...
http://imageshack.us/a/img836/1759/a2a3comparison22.jpg

Since ArmA3 enhanced the sea, That's something it should have
May not be that hard, I'm modder for both FS9 and FSX, FS9 dosen't got this while FSX do. To build a scenery like an airport for FS9 you can make one flat plane as a 3km long runway, for FSX, you need to make it within about 100mX100m squares individual poly, that means a runway with 30+ polys. BUT, you still keep it flat in Gmax and with these sections you made, FSX will AUTOMATICLLY covert it to stick on it's curved ground.(if you use only one poly for a 3km runway,it works in FS9, but in FSX, it will stuck into the earth).

So just upgrade the engine and there would need no changes for the model of the map.

http://f4.s.qip.ru/WMlLyKrO.png
http://f3.s.qip.ru/WMlLyKrP.png

Almost flat.

@CXN2615
Sounds interesting :-)

As long as the gravity of ALL objects is drawn towards the centre point of the radius (or imaginary sphere)
Instead of like now where all objects have their own individual, perfectly vertical gravity from their location on the flat plain.

I must add... I am in no way criticising ARMA 3 with this suggestion.
I love ARMA 3 and to me it is a hobby and I've some how managed to Clock up almost 460 hours in it :-s
I'm just saying that it would be a nice and accurate feature. :-)

Interesting results by the way 50/50

Absolutely unecessary feature at this point and I would imagine it would be alot of work for the Dev's. For A future ArmA game....maybe.

@SgtHannes

Unnecessary to you...
But VERY important to me :-)

Everyone thinks differently.

Downvote, simply because you fail to describe the feature you want in the title.

@pops

lol would have been a bloody long title!!!
I thought just for a change I'd describe the feature in the 'DESCRIPTION' section instead :-s

Thanks anyway :-)

no no no, I have to agree with pops on this one, your title must be relevant to your content, so you should call it "simulate curvature of earth" or something, it's not very long and if you don't do it, the mods will

@FeralCircus

I would have nothing against this being implemented. All I'm saying is that I think its a little too late at this developements state. It would have even been too late in the alpha version. I'm not a Dev, but I'm confident that it would be alot of work to actually curve the map (is that what your saying?). The Dev's have ALOT of other things to do as the release nears.

Im just trying to see this realistically.

I'll leave the title as a bit of a cliff hanger lol

Creating a 3D sphere (primitive) with a simulated omnidirectional gravitational pull is one of the most simple and fun things to play around with in a 3D modelling program :-)
I've simulated entire solar systems that animate via their own momentum, gravity and centrifugal force.
It's quite simple and loads of fun :-)

I understand that some are for realism & some are against.
It's just when I see a ship many many kilometres out at sea and it is perfectly perched on top of the horizon :-s
These environments are just too big to be flat.

Downvoted. AFAIK is infantry simulator, not horizon simulator. :) I'm afraid implementing this will be just a waste of time and resources IMHO.

Battles at sea on a scale like this without Earths curvature would seem a little odd to me...

Battles at sea between two inflatable patrol boats? There is no playable cruisers/destroyers/carriers in ArmA, so really huge naval battles is just impossible.

ARMA can contain any vehicle or object that the human mind can imagine...

And even if it was just an 'infantry simulator' (as you put it) firing projectiles while standing on a rotating sphere should at the very least simulate the object that you're standing on (Planet Earth)
ie... Earths curvature, coriolis effect and wind.

For coriolis you don't need to make landcurve in so small square of land. It's are very unnoticable curve.

Semiconductor, if this is an infantry simulator then we shouldn't have aircrafts, land vehicles or any vehicle at all. this is more of a war simulator, earth curvature its not really relevant to the realism, but i think modders will be more than grateful with this, and maybe being able to replicate planets in ArmA 3, it would be even better if modders can adjust planet size, and even better if that will also affect ballistic and gravity, after that i would suggest making the space dimension but i know that would be just too much

I really love how every time I check the votes are 50:50.

Downvoted. Almost no players play with viewdistance more than 5km - and the horizon distance while standing on a flat patch of land is 5+km. Isn't worth the effort.

@AD2001: 13+:14- now :)

@DarkWanderer

The same physics and perspective rules apply at ANY altitude except the higher you are (for example flying in one of the many aircraft that ARMA has to offer) the further away the horizon will be.

Dark, this is not just about horizon, but about making giant, titanic maps of almost (if not exactly) the earth size, if this make it into the game (wich would be hard) someone could port the whole FSX map (wich AFAIK its the whole planet) and add it into the game

@FeralCircus: Exactly. That's why no-one will ever see the feature you're proposing. Everyone already has a 2-3km horizon called viewdistance.

@Dr.Death: how about simulation of intestinal microflore of a soldier? Both things are plain impossible. Be realistic in what you want...

i dont say this thing is easy to do or REALLY useful, but it has to be accounted for being useful in big scale battles, and if they add realistic flight simulation of planes, for this last reason too.

The mathematics involved in completing such a feat would consume a gigantic amount of processes, of which there would be minimal gain (if any) in terms of gameplay.

Keeping things on a flat plane reduces a lot of unnecessary calculations. That being said, if the maps of Altis and Stratis were to be combined into a gigantic 600 km^2 region, then the need for such a feature might be needed. However, the current draw distance (that the game engine allows) is too short to allow the player to view the curvature of the Earth, even if their altitude was high enough to see such a thing in real life.

CPU consume? no, just making the water world curve. hard? yes, its still not neccessary if both islands are in 1 map, but we have to think more on a modders view perspective

when i drive across the united kingdome, i dont feel my car going downhill because of the earth being a giant bouncy ball :D

sorry mate, downvoted.

tyler

Tyler, didn't knew you could drive in UK at the age of 14

@tyl3r99
Oh god you just made me give up on humanity :-s

I can see that 50% get this and 50% don't.
It is very simple, basic & NATURAL physics ,why anyone wouldn't want it is beyond me.

People say that it wouldn't be noticeable then why do I see it all the time when I'm playing ARMA?

I give up on this and I'm going to try my best to resist explaining any more (no doubt I'll fail)
THANX to the people who understand :-)

I can see that 50% get this and 50% don't.

Yeah, 50% of people are not getting it, but it's the other 50% from what you think ;)

Such effects are no doubt realistic, but they are well beyond the scale of ArmA simulation. Even air combat simulations like Lock On and Falcon 4 don't use such simulation - and they have roughly 100 times the typical action scale distance of ArmA.

It's the same as asking to implement relativity in ArmA - while no doubt realitic, the effect is actually indistinguishable from floating point rounding errors at such velocity scale.

Keeping things on a flat plane reduces a lot of unnecessary calculations. That being said, if the maps of Altis and Stratis were to be combined into a gigantic 600 km^2 region

600 km^2 is just 20 by 30 km. The length of one degree on equator is 111 km. Basically, it means the whole island is just a speck on the Earth's curve - one-third of a degree. The effect of curvature is practically negligible.
(if you want to nitpick - if you're looking at another point on the ground d=30km from you, it will be same d/R = 30km/6400km = third of a degree higher if using flat modelling than if using spherical model. 30km are unachievable in ArmA engine).

i dont say this thing is easy to do or REALLY useful, but it has to be accounted for being useful in big scale battles, and if they add realistic flight simulation of planes, for this last reason too.

I can safely say in both ArmA 3 and ArmA 4 will be never such large scale battles as to span more than 200km (approx. two degrees of latitude). Hence, it's just a tremendous waste of resources on a feature 99.5% of people would never notice.

still, in a modders view, i think it would be useful, and no, it wouldn't be a resource waste, many games simulate the earth as a planet instead of a plane and it doesn't kill resources

I've just stumbled upon 'TAKE ON MARS' and it appears that BIS have already created what I'm requesting here :-s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfqsl0xQ34E&feature=share&list=UU-CrfD0kW2R_cP1bf1eGg0Q

Come on BIS...
TAKE ON EARTH? :-)

Downvoted because

1. 99% of people wouldn't even notice (or care if they did notice)
2. Doesn't have any real benefit to gameplay since you need a supercomputer to set your draw distance high enough to make a difference, and many multiplayer servers have a low distance cap anyways to improve the terrible multiplayer FPS
3. Developers need to spend their time on actual useful stuff like rewriting the netcode to fix desync and multiplayer fps drops... but of course they won't even awknowledge there's a problem.

@GeneralScott

Nearly 50% of people care and I'm one of them :-)
Like I said in my last post they've already created it technically with 'TAKE ON MARS'

And if it was implemented, it wouldn't change anything for you and the others who don't want physical and geometric realism.
ARMA would simply look exactly the same to you as it does now, so it makes absolutely no difference to you :-)

But it would benefit us who play much larger scale missions with a very high draw distance.

Everyone would be happy :-)

No, it will change one thing... BIS would spend a lot of time which is better spent on much more pressing issues.

If such changes are implemented in some other title like TKOH or TOM and simply merged to A3 - fine. But now, there are features like bullet-in-chamber accounting (just one example) which are much more beneficial to realism.

And... Before telling about some mytical "us", show me a screenshot of your game having 50km viewdistance and decent FPS. Otherwise, you're just talking dreams...

@DarkWanderer
I wasn't aware that ARMA 3 could generate view distances up to 50km :-s (unless it's a typing error then I apologise :-)
And why would I request something that my PC couldn't handle? lol

Anyway...
Depending on which direction and location the shooter is aiming and standing on earth, The Coriolis effect can significantly affect rounds at distances as little as 1000 yards (914.4m)
Simply changing direction from East to West to a target of equal distance & altitude would require different scope zeroing due to the curvature & rotation of earth.

@FeralCircus:
It's you who are saying, citation:

"But it would benefit us who play much larger scale missions with a very high draw distance."

This exact phrase is not true by any account, because viewdistance can't be made more than 10km from the ingame menus now. There's no "us" you're talking about.

And why would I request something that my PC couldn't handle? lol

See above - you are requesting exactly it. At 10km viedistance the effects are absolutely negligible, even more so at 200m-1km (typical engagement ranges). And rest assured, I'm certain you have your viewdistance capped at 2-2.5km. What are you requesting then?

Anyway...
Depending on which direction and location the shooter is aiming and standing on earth, The Coriolis effect can significantly affect rounds at distances as little as 1000 yards (914.4m)
Simply changing direction from East to West to a target of equal distance & altitude would require different scope zeroing due to the curvature & rotation of earth.

Wind effects are much more apparent in magnitude for shooting. Example:
Coriolis effect: 3 inches (8cm) at 1km http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2944/how-does-the-earths-rotation-affect-the-path-of-a-bullet
Wind effect: 56ft (17 meters) at half a mile (800m): http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article158181.ece

Hence, wind effects are required to be implemented before going into Coriolis "force" effects, air density effects, rain/dust effects etc.

@DarkWanderer
When you said... "It's you who are saying, citation."

Are you saying that everything that I'm saying is just copied and pasted from the internet without any knowledge of the subject that I have raised?
If so then I give up on your pure vehimence to blindly dissagree with a realistic feature for a simulator of balistics :-s
We are never going to agree are we? lol

Everything I know on this subject was taught to me directly from my grandad who was a Royal Marine sniper in the malayan war, and he was very good at his job :-)

It's hard to tell through your text, but I feel that this has evolved into an argument rather than a friendly discussion (I hope that I'm wrong :-)
If I gave you my PC spec (as requested) you would disagree, just like everything else I type.

By the way you keep bringing this 'us' thing up.
All I mean by that is, some people like simple and instant playability because maybe they have limited time, or it is simply what they enjoy doing, and others might like to simulate reality as closely as possible. There is plenty room for both in ARMA 3

Stay happy :-)
Seeya

First, what I'm saying is that here's a request for a feature which is not backed by any justifiable reasons. I've provided counter-arguments on each and every one - please care to re-check.

Second, there are things which do not work in humanitarian way - "everyone's opinion must be respected", blah, blah, blah. In the technical world, statement is either right or wrong. Your statements are wrong - as I've shown. And what did you expect, to put some statements and for everyone agree to them because it's "friendly way"? This is a textbook fallacy known as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groupthink No good things ever come out of it.

Third, there's little point in being "friendly" if you don't respect the person you're talking to by listening to what he's saying. Please take your time to read through my posts and understand that I'm not in the "argument" for the sake of argument, or dominating someone, or boosting my ego, or whatever. I'm in it just for the truth(tm). This thing is nasty, and it can't be bent by juggling words ;)

And to go through it again:
1.It adds realistic bullet behaviour - false, without wind effects it's not adding any value
2.It adds realistic horizon visibility - false, noone will ever see it due to viewdistance limit
3.It will waste no resources - false, a lot of developer time will be spent on that
4.It will allow modders to create planets - false. It's impossible to create a planet size map with the detalization necessary for infantry sim. Full X-Plane maps take how much? 50Gb? And they are basically just textures with barely any objects on grand scale.

Get real, guys.

Seeing as We're not fighting for world domination here and only talking about a GAME, personally I would rather keep it fun & friendly :-)

I'm simply suggesting that...
Rather than a flat plane with a perfectly, vertical and ever relocating gravitational pull assigned to every individual unit (as it is now)
Maps should be built onto a sphere with one single, central point of gravity.
The rest of the sphere can be left empty just like arma 2 with the seemingly infinite sea when you fly away from the map.

Unfortunately I cannot work at the moment due to a brain related illness, but After a 15 year career in 3D graphic design & structural engineering I know for a fact that this is a very simple task.
And like I said they've done it already 'with Take On Mars'

Just saying, people, i checked this was a feature in VBS2, so it could be coded in ArmA 1 engine and its not that hard to make it, with the dynamic view distance then this feature WOULD be something you could catch when playing, so i dont see why the downvotes

I personally think its a waste of time. It would add no real/noticable effect at all, nomatter what counter argument you may have.

animated fire selector its also useless and its not noticeable even in first person view, but its there for realism, same argument here

first off, definitely change your title so its not wasting our, developers, and mods time.

it IS an interesting idea...i think on arma's scale it would be more appropriate to simulate it like most everything else:

ships viewed from >3 miles have their object rendered lower than horizon line, client side only, still based on a flat plane.

BUT, pointing out previous math, this position-lowered rendering wouldn't be significant until much further (i'm in no mood for math, somebody wanna figure out how far away a 60' tall destroyer would have to be to appear 1/2 below the horizon when viewed from a 6' person?

personally, i would love to see spherical maps, But in Arma 4: when they can spend the time to build that _properly_ from the ground up (no pun) and when computers are far enough along to calculate and render everything that comes with such detail and scale (think of large singleplayer AI currently, now give them each their own real gravity and countries to play in, all happening whether or not you see them, not much is capable of running all that while maintaining quality game play (its just hanging on now!))

all ^that^ said, this could probably be scripted in an addon :D

again, this was used in VBS using ArmA 1 engine, so its possible already

@Dr Death

Thanks mate you helped me find this :-)...
http://youtu.be/8aWlCRsxwVA?t=2m0s

Also out of curiosity, I'm downloading this as I type...
http://youtu.be/92SsF9Sxdv8

u'r welcome, i did thought it was fine it this feature was not gonna be in arma 3 but looking with envy to the VBS videos i found that thing about earth curvature

This engine is AMAZING!!!
Check this one out demonstrating real time land deformation...

Outerra: real-time craters http://youtu.be/lRpkj4HXF40

i already have it, sadly, no money to pay it

I couldn't resist and bought it earlier today :-)
Would make the perfect engine for a milsim.

@FeralCircus: WOW!!!!!! ARMA 4 HAS TO HAVE THAT ENGINE.
The current terrain model in ARMA 3 is the worst I have seen of any game. Try running up a slope and look at the ground. It moves with you! People clipping through ground. Landscape changes with grass settings. Absolutley awfull!.

With that engine this game would truly be EPIC!!!!

@exxDUDExx

Uh...yeah...RV is still better for Arma.

@AD2001 whats RV

while true that the RV terrain in ArmA 3 is glitched, i disagree with AD, but i have to say that BIS cant really start making a new engine out right now, making an engine nowdays is a fucking nightmare in several ways, there is a reason why even EA is trying to recycle the frostbite over and over again.

if BIS DOES make a new engine, they would have to think about even the battlefield as a planet (yes, just like in Anteworld) and add realistic and accurate terrain of the whole earth planet. Not only that, but they would also have to think about making the engine as versatile as possible, using C++, making "Air" an element for the characters, and being able to literally do ANYTHING with that engine (porting ArmA 3, making a full new game, making a flight simulator with it, even making an arcade platformer with it).

If all those requierements are filled up, then they have to worry about time, work, and money.

TL;DR:

RV its starting to show its age, it has been holding up for 12 years now, but we need something better, HOWEVER, we cant have something better now, so we use what we have.

exxDUDExx the ArmA engine that is being used ever since OFP

A whole new engine? That would take A LOT of time.

Doesn't matter any more folks :-)

The people who create the 'Outerra engine' are already working with other companies to use the engine in various simulation products including the military simulation (maybe it's B.I) adding,... "Which is actually the largest part." so it is definitely in the works :-)
They say they're currently working on character animations, ballistics and other stuff.

I've bought it to help them with their development and It's already
incredible... Actually it's mind blowing :-s

...By the way it already has the three sliders that control the fog :-)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5L3ZUQUGvxQ&feature=share&list=PLPCPqZBbEQTtgj8ZzqkOZymSYXBQVJDit

Title and description updated as ordered :-)

i suggest that you change the title to "Planet curvature for ArmA maps"

its short, informative, and it gives the same amount of info than this title

Done :-)

Since it's clearly infeasible at this point in development, why not just fake it for watercraft (where it is most noticable)?

Make them appear to sink in to the surface a little to simulate being below the horizon, a bit like the way infantry sink in to a surface to simulate grass at long range.

this is very important long term for arma

It's started...
:-)
http://youtu.be/rD-G6udovA8

Outerra has nothing to do with arma 3

lol you're such bossy boots :-)

The subject matter has everything to do with this ticket.
It's a discussion with references showing that everything I've asked for is possible.

it has nothing to do with arma 3 because its another engine, if not, i would have mentioned kerbal space program.

Yes it's another engine doing everything that is being discussed here with absolute ease proving that it's possible.
Just like I brought up Mario earlier in the conversation as a funny reference to the subject.
Christ I used to play 'Elite' and 'Frontier' (Elite 2) on my Commodore Amiga in the early 90's which achieved this simple task.

We can't fix ARMA 3 by only talking about ARMA 3 :-s
We have to use external references otherwise we end up going round in circles which makes me feel the need to push dildos deep into my eye sockets :-z

i think you dont know how game engines work on computers. When you make a game engine you, depending on the code, do share something in common with other different game engines, but you make yours focused on the game you are making.

Elite/KSP/Outerra engines were made to be deisgned what they now are, and they cant do more, same goes with ArmA engine. Yes, some engine can do what others and more, but the point is that RV4 is an old engine and it cant do much more with the code as it is.

It's all about converting real life physics to mathematics, simple as that...

QUOTE Dr_Death: "Elite/KSP/Outerra engines were made to be designed what they now are, and they cant do more"

Outerra engine simulates an entire planet with gravity, an atmosphere, real time terrain deformation, aerodynamics, hydrodynamics, space travel, vehicle physics, mass, suspension, character animation, ballistics, all the way down to animated blades of grass.
it is soon to include the Moon and Mars! (these are just the things I've stumbled upon while experimenting with Outerra, there's probably more :-s

The earth model in Outerra is so accurate that I recreated the road through my village (1.5 miles) in the editor and I could tell exactly where I was by the elevations.

I can't imagine what more you'd want it to do really.

By the way I've been in the 3D modeling/animation/structural design industry many years so I do know a little bit.

yes, i know, marry outerra if you like it so much, i'd do the same, i know its an near-perfect engine and the only things i dislike is that its barely updated and the night sky looks AWFUL.

But you must know that as much as all engines are still coded, you cant do magic. you cant pick up golden source from HL1 and make DCS, cry of fear, for example, pushed it to its limits, and i feel ArmA 3 its the limit of RV4. As much as everything is related to maths in computers, its better to create a new engine than to modify this one.

@Circus: Why don't you ask Outerra to add an open-world-tactical-shooter to their engine, then you double your chances to get what you want (which will add up to zero for the near future I'm afraid) ;-P

Please take this as a joke, there is just a division among posters. People who put in here their dreams, however farfetched, and people who'd rather set realistic goals for the developers with clear improvements for the game in relation to its existing features. I'm afraid I belong to the latter. :-)

but this is not some impossible shit, i know this has been spamed all the time, but its an VBS2 feature.

@joostSidy: Outerra are already working on it...

Also a sphere primitive (one of the most basic shapes in 3D modelling) is hardly far-fetched lol
Neither is it a dream, it is simple basic logic to build the environment based on real life so as to avoid the infinite Tron style horizon that we experience in the game at present.

I saw some nice Outerra screenshots with vehicles (even Mechs!) indeed. That's one to keep an eye on.

Surprised this is so downvoted, it's not as outrageous or difficult as people think.
It would also be a great feature for saving performance, etc and would make the landscape feel much more real. +1

On maps CTI is a function - "Satellite camera." Works under certain conditions, the development of the game. View a map in real time. Purpose - tracking the location of enemy troops. All is well in sight, not flat like a Google map.

This is the kind of thing I'm talking about...
Look what the original makers of VBS are doing with the Outerra engine :-)
http://titan.im/www/

There is a mod for ArmA 3 that adds different planets and the posibility of actually moving in between arma maps.

No, i am not joking, i think i forgot the name of the mod, but it was pretty much mind-blowing

It's called the "Cosmos Mod" or something along those lines

Yo, feral, Where does it says the TITAN are the original makers of VBS? it doesn't say anywhere the name of the makers.

@the Demongod... Yeah I've seen the Cosmos Mod quality stuff :-)

@ Dr Death... TITANim is created by an australian guy called David Lagettie who (correct me if I'm wrong) is the founder of the 1st VBS which evolved from the game OFP.
I'll read up on it again because my memory isn't what it used to be and this has been kicking around in my mind for a few years so I may have got it completely wrong lol :-s
But I'm sure BIS was originally Bohemia Interactive Australia (BIA)

This is unnecessary also the devs will have to do some tweaking which the devs work on other features. Also the they will need to upgrade the engine. Better feature would come to the next ArmA instead. This is why I am down voting.

But xavier, this is not a breakthrough in the engine, VBS proved it was possible. Besides, why do we even ask for things if people always reply "this should/iwant/could/would come in the next ArmA"?

If we want a feature and it HAS to be done in the next sequel then i personally want to see it done, i cant stand anymore people (and even BIS) answering that X will come in the sequel just because they dont want to add it.