FROM: High Command

TO: Arma 3 Users

INFO: Tanoa Sector Tests, Community Guides, 1.58 Re-Released

PRECEDENCE: Flash

SITUATION

Seeing how we're very busy to deliver Arma 3 Apex, there isn't a lot to report on this week. You'll be happy to know that this effort includes our Marketing Communications people working on various avenues to shed more light on the expansion. Over the next two months, we'll finally be showing more about the assets, features and the Tanoa crown jewel. At the moment we don't yet have a concrete timeline for staging the components to Dev-Branch (besides what was already released on the #RoadToApex of course!). Our usual approach is to stage Sandbox assets (vehicles, weapons, characters, props, Tanoa) in several phases first and Playable Content (co-op campaign) last. Features sneak in continuously throughout, as they have for the past while. Once we decide on the specifics, we'll be letting you know via our usual channels.

INTELLIGENCE

In cooperation with Andrew "Dslyecxi" Gluck, we've published another entry in the Community Guide video series. The "Reconnaissance" episode deals with methods for conducting recon and why you would benefit from doing it in the first place. Andrew describes it as "looking for the enemy in a low-profile manner", which can be useful regardless of your play style or favorite mode. It will allow you to get an understanding of the tactical situation before you execute a plan of action. Tools of the trade include: binoculars, magnified scopes, remote cameras, UAVs, UGVs, recon helicopters and operators on the ground. A key take-away: always preserve the element of surprise!

If you haven't seen the rest of the Community Guides, view them all in this playlist. You can also access them from within the game, in the LEARN sub-menu. Because the game has evolved a lot since its initial release, we've added a few disclaimers to make it clear using which version each guide was recorded. Some of the Intel presented may be outdated, but the overal knowledge contained within the series is definitely still worth your time.

OPERATIONS

The splendid environment team, led by Martin Pezlar, still has a lot of work ahead of itself, cutting their way through the 'green hell' of Tanoa. As a sign of good progress, they have recently requested thorough sector testing from our hard-working Quality Assurance testers. The terrain is divided into 8 big sectors, which consist of a total of 32 sub-areas. Many of those are now undergoing rigorous and detailed testing by the ladies and gentlemen in the QA teams, for which we thank them! They are focusing on a broad range of issues so that we can fix them ahead of release. To give you an impression of what they're scanning for: misplaced objects, weeds growing where they shouldn't, missing textures, inconsistent visual appearance, satellite map blending errors, collision problems, AI navigation glitches, road and path network disconnections, terrain mesh irregularities, 2D map topography mistakes, and more. As further sectors are made ready by Martin's team, they too are submitted for testing. At the same time, Tanoa is being set up for its Visual Upgrade lighting configuration. Situated in a different part of the world, there are noticeable differences compared to Altis and Stratis. Slowly but surely, and with excellent cooperation with our artists and other departments, the archipelago is made ready for your eager exploration.

LOGISTICS

Hotfixes for update 1.58 and the Arma 3 Tools were published to the respective main branches last Thursday. For the game this should have solved the performance issues connected to the system malloc, plus some crashes and a problem related to difficulty settings on Dedicated Servers. Further difficulty issues are under investigation, so that we know exactly whether some behavior may have changed unintentionally for example. We are also still searching for the cause of various server crashes reported by admins.