BISim recently acquired and integrated the updated Chernarus terrain from Bohemia Interactive’s popular zombie apocalypse survival video game DayZ. Bisimulations.com spoke with Julian Saenger, BISim’s Lead Animation Engineer and Design Department alumni, who led the development effort to bring Chernarus to VBS3 and update the terrain for military training use in VBS3.

BISim: Describe the Chernarus terrain.

Julian Saenger: Chernarus was first created as a terrain in Arma2. It is a fictional interpretation of a post-Soviet coastal country, and is based on real-world terrain data from an area in the Czech Republic. It features a 35 km shoreline (generated from the shoreline of the river Elbe), 3 airports including a military one, a mix of forest types, an extensive road network (both paved and unpaved), and settlements every one to two kilometers ranging from farms to urban areas. It’s a very detailed terrain.

BISim: Why did BISim acquire the terrain?

JS: The Swedish Armed Forces sought a temperate map to train on in VBS3. Chernarus is an “off the shelf” terrain and represents a highly detailed temperate environment. Porting the terrain from our sister games saves money and a whole lot of time - making Chernarus from scratch would take about 40 man-years.