America’s Army 3: It Lives!
Back just before I went to college, a few of my buddies tried to get America’s Army set up on the PC. This was even before any of us had broadband, so the download was long and since we never got it to work, the wait wasn’t worth it at all. However, while I was in college, a few of my schoolmates and I put together a decently successful team on TWL for a short amount of time. AA (not Alcoholic’s Anonymous) was probably what helped us all stay out of debt since the game was and still is free. Over the last few years, AA has been pushed aside by each of the GU-S.O.G. and GI-JOE members in favor of console gaming. Last night while shredding some zombies in Left 4 Dead, my buddy and I talked about the lovely gem that was dropped in our email inboxes yesterday from the America’s Army team. We’re both excited to play it some day, and here’s a little bit of information for you to check out.
If you’ve never played America’s Army, it is touted as the most realistic tactical first person shooter. The ballistics system is as true to life as possible and the military uses the game for training simulation. In its efforts to strive for realism in the game, AA is pretty much a one-shot one-kill kind of game. If you get shot, you’ll either die instantly, or bleed out while your movement slows. The graphics in the current version are a bit dated, and even the when the new version comes out, it will be built on Unreal Engine 3 (Unreal Tournament 3, Gears of War and Gears of War 2), which is a couple years old. However, having a game built on a dated engine isn’t all bad – that also allows more users to potentially give the game a shot.
The minimum requirements are:
Windows XP SP2 or Vista
3.0GHz single core (minimum) or 2.4GHz dual core (recommended)
1GB RAM (min) or 2GB RAM (rec)
Direct X 9.0c compliant, Shader 3.0 enabled video card with 256MB RAM (NVIDIA 6600 or better/ATI X1300 or better) (min) or Direct X 9.0c compliant, Shader 3.0 enabled video card with 512MB RAM (NVIDIA 7950 or better/ATI X1950 or better) (rec)
When I was talking with my mate yesterday, he said he’d need to upgrade his 6800GT (the last card since college), but as it is, he should even be able to play on that.
America’s Army is a unique game in that, in addition to giving you “perks” for different character abilities by winning (i.e. Call of Duty 4), you have to do training to be able to play certain maps or fulfill certain roles. There is a field medic training that is supposedly pretty genuine as far as the information goes. You also have to do jump training to play on a few of the map and if you want to be a sniper, you have to go through sniper training. Each of these are pretty cool little additions, don’t take a lot of time, but are a nice dynamic to an otherwise multiplayer only game.
If you’re looking for a very realistic first person shooter for the PC, keep your set dialed in to the official America’s Army 3 page for more information on the game and release date when it becomes available.
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