Army's MMO Game Sim Details Discussed

Thanks to HomeLan Fed for their interview with Robert Gehorsam of There Inc. regarding their U.S. Army-funded 'virtual world' project, as previously mentioned on Slashdot. This extension of an the existing There Inc. MMO title will apparently "enable a commander of an [Army] unit to say, 'Hey, my unit needs to train for its upcoming peacekeeping duties in Kumar.' He works with a trainer to develop a specific environment and scenario (or better yet, modify an existing one out of a repository), figures out who is going to play the bad guys, the civilians and the 'others' -- like the Red Cross, the UN, etc. -- and then prep his unit for the exercise." However, when asked about the types of features MMOG fans might recognize, Gehorsman suggests: "Guns? I'll admit, however, that the magic system is not particularly robust."

Comments

Realism

[papadiablo]

From the article "while we have a skill system in There's architecture, I'm not sure we're going to use it to automatically improve your aim, allow you to understand languages you can't really understand, and so forth."

Sounds pretty neat to me. I don't recall if their America's Army improved your shooting skill or not, but that game was fun and challenging. It doesn't sound like they are sure if they'll release it to the masses though.

"HomeLAN - Is there a chance that this game will be released in modified form as a commercial project?
Robert Gehorsam - That's a very interesting question, and I bet a commercial MMP exploring conflict in today's world would be pretty amazing. And useful, perhaps, to the Army itself, as civilians played roles -- like terrorists or other shadowy movements -- that it's hard to get people to play for real training. But ask me again in about a year."

That would be a shame if we didn't get to play it.

Re:Realism

[theghost]

Sounds pretty neat to me. I don't recall if their America's Army improved your shooting skill or not, but that game was fun and challenging.

Even though AA has "levels" in the form of Honor points, the only time they help you out is in weapon selection. Higher Honor players tend to get first pick of weapons in a scenario. They do not adjust your accuracy or give you any other benefit.

It doesn't sound like they are sure if they'll release it to the masses though.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if they used the work they do for the Army as the foundation for another game, but i doubt we'll get to play alongside the actual Army guys who are doing their training.

Now that i think about it though, it would probably be a good idea for the Army to hire some 31337 AA or Counterstrike players to play the bad guys, and maybe some deep roleplayers from some MMORPGs to fill in other parts.

Now that brings up some ethical quandries! I won't work for defense contractors IRL for ethical reasons, but would i work for the Army as an NPC/trainer in their MMORPG if the job was offered? On the one hand, i'd get paid to play a game - sweet gig. On the other hand, it's still working for the Army.

I guess it would depend on what kind of training i'd be doing. If i could help them learn to resolve more disputes non-violently, then that's a net positive, but if i'm just helping them learn to intimidate and kill more effectively, then that would be not cool.

Not magic. Luck

[securitas]

Gehorsman suggests: "Guns? I'll admit, however, that the magic system is not particularly robust."

While magic may not play a part in this I would expect that random elements of good and bad luck will.

Even with people behind the opponents of the team in training, every war has soldiers who have stories about experiencing lucky and unlucky coincidences.

Re:Not magic. Luck

[orthogonal]

While magic may not play a part in this I would expect that random elements of good and bad luck will.

Au contrare! It's onlyExactly Where They're At Weapons of Mass Destruction"

Other magic items will include: The Magic Flight-Suit of Re-election Ads: with this authentic U.S Navy flight suit, fortunate sons who managed to avoid real wars in Vietnam get to declare wars they instigated to avenge Daddy to be over! The magic lies in glossing over the ensuing casualties during the "peace", which will actually be larger than the casualties during the "war", and in providing macho footage suitable for use in re-election ads!

The Magic Avenging Aide: this highly placed administration aide can be used to cast a spell of revealing on Valerie Pflame, letting every enemy of America know she's and undercover CIA operative, in order to punish her husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, for not toeing the administration line and claiming that Iraq had nuclear bomb ingredient "yellowcake" when it did not. The magic is, even thought it's a Federal crime to reveal the identity of an undercover CIA agent, no one will ever be prosecuted!

The Magic Influencing Vice President: this magic item, also known as a "Dick Cheney", can be used to intimidate CIA analysts and other members of the intelligence community into changing their findings to indicate the existence of WMDs they don't actually believe exist. The magic is, this will even work on credulous Labour leaders in Great Britain -- even those who public claim they've found a "Third way"!

Please note that full use of "The Magic Influencing Vice President" artifact requires concurrent use of The Magic Halliburton No-Bid Payoff Spell: this spell allows companies that gave ungodly amounts to your campaign to get even more back in the form of no-bid exclusive contracts to "support" our troops. Actual soldiers in the field will receive benefit form these contracts on a roll of 16 or more on a 20-side die., but Halliburton will always prosper.

And finally, the most potent magic item of all: The Magic Word Patriotism: Use the word to shut up anyone who questions your policies, by accusing them of "giving aid to our enemies". Teh magic is that anything else that you do -- not finding Osama, non-existent WMDs, bad intelligence, skulduggery and payoffs --, can be swept under the rug, by the invoking of the magic word Patriotism. Any dissenter's reputation can be impugned by claiming that they don't have Patriotism. Any law can be passed, by invoking Patriotism.

It's the Bush Administration: suspend your disbelief, because the magic's all around you!

Lord Kril

[daeley]

Can we just get to the Last Starfighter phase of all this military video gaming and get it over with? I want off-planet already! ;)

Peacekeeping in Kumar?

[orthogonal]

"enable a commander of an [Army] unit to say, 'Hey, my unit needs to train for its upcoming peacekeeping duties in Kumar.'

Oddly enough, "Kumar" is the name given to a thinly fictionalized Saudi Arabia in the favorite escape from dreary Bush-redux reality of U.S. liberals, TV's The West Wing.

So is Robert Gehorsam (to paraphrase Baroness Thatcher's accusation to Neil Kinnock) a "crypto-liberal", or does Saudi Arabia have some "regime change" heading its way?

Re:Peacekeeping in Kumar?

[theghost]

Robert Gehorsam works for There, not for the Army directly. I doubt that he is privy to the plans of the US Army. He's probably just a West Wing watcher, but it is an interesting thought.

Magic system not robust

[Syncdata]

That's entirely too funny, and it illustrates exactly why I'm supportive of the team producing Americas Army.
They are candid and upfront when asked questions, unusual for a group affiliated with a government. Is it a recruiting tool? Of course it is. Can you be a wizard? No, magic isn't in the current build.
It's simply refreshing to think a house can be a affiliated with the government, yet build and maintain a project superbly, while offering no spin and good humor as PR.

Re:Magic system not robust

[Anonymous Coward]

uh, that quote is by There not America's Army

With these Army games coming out

[Horizon_99]

isn't anybody else reminded of Ender's Game?

Freaking Cool

[Deliveranc3]

Though a comercial release sounds pretty cool I think that the idea of keeping it kind of secular is much better. Cool possible features:

Ok imagine the scenario, you get in and check your e-mail. It's from *@army.us.gov, it asks if you would be available at 9:14 for insertion. You say sure, so 9:12 rolls around and you head in and wait in the waiting room, they have a couple extra guys waiting in case someone messes up then based on ping and mission performance they let you in.

Before you'd been training against other geeks but tonight you are going up against a U.S. platoon. You get five minutes to set up. First you walk over and grab a walky talky, there are four sets of walky talkys and you decide to form three units. Two guys can't communicate with anyone, apparently they are mercenaries and don't speak your language, when they type it's just gibberish. You go and discuss strategie with your unit for a few min's and elect a leader. He will stay in comm central and co-ordinate your actions with the other leaders over the fourth set of walky talkys. He tells you that you are guarding the west and south sides of an outpost and that there will likely be a U.S. attack in the next ten minutes or so. You head out to examine the terrain and set up some booby traps. You scout around and draw a small map for yourself, then cue up the trap building, major defenses like earthworks are only partially constructed, apparently this fort has crappy discipline. You cue up a bunch of build commands on the booby traps, and tell your soldier to clean and prep,his equipment a timer pops up showing you will be done in 5 minutes. You play a small mini game provided for this wait. Occasionally other members of your unit will pop on comms to mention booby traps they have set up or other important features of the landscape. As four minutes approach the mini game turns off and your computer beeps loudly in case you left the room. Your commander comes on to check up on you, there are no noobs and everyone seems to be communicating so he has people describe their likely location and any plans they would like help co-ordinating people on. He mentions that one of the mercinaries has set up with a silenced rifle outside your base behind a rock. When the action starts you must fire a flare to inform him to start flanking the platoon. You roger and move to your position. Peering through the gloom you check to see if the American's are near the base yet, it's been almost 40 minutes and even though you know they are comming you are starting to get bored, you look over and your teamate is lying with blood pooling around his head. You yell to your comm that you are under attack, you quickyly search through your partners clothing and take his pistol, the rifle will only slow you down. It's time to move to your defensive position. You do so pulling out the flare gun.

Five minutes later you are dead, the American's used some kind of laser guided bomb. You don't know about it and they won't tell you, apparently it's confidential. But you got one, tonight some private is reviewing what he saw and what you saw and putting two and two together. Some Seargent looked over your actions and gave you a tactical, strategic and weapons rating. That and the report from your commander will determine your rating for future actions.

Mod Down I ramble.