From Steam demo description:
> This release is free, and it is two things at once.
> A playable demo
> A self-contained slice of Cold War Assault you can download and play right now - the classic open-world sandbox, vehicles, AI and mission system that defined a genre, running on a clean, modern codebase.
> An official asset pack
> The demo doubles as a sanctioned asset pack for the Arma community. The bundled game data is provided as raw material you are free to study, modify and build new Arma content from. If you have ever wanted to learn how a Bohemia game is put together, or wanted clean reference assets to start a mod, this is for you.
It's _so_ janky but in my mind way more immersive for reasons I just can't fully explain, though they are something to do with the fact that good comms is the key to fun and success. It's also got a pretty major learning curve...
It was later turned into the Arma series and re-released with this name to fit the series branding.
I've played them all - this was the best of the lot IMHO.
This repository holds the engine and game source code (codename Poseidon) behind Arma: Cold War Assault — the game first released in 2001 as Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis. That release launched Bohemia Interactive and began the technology lineage that later grew into Real Virtuality, Arma, and Enfusion. The code has been modernized to C++20, built with CMake and Clang, with cross-platform support for Windows x64 and Linux x64. Bohemia Interactive is releasing it to the community that has kept this game alive for more than two decades — to study it, build on it, fix it, and create from it. Three things are worth keeping separate:
Source code (this repository)
The engine and game executables, licensed under GPL-3.0-or-later with additional terms under Section 7. You may use, study, modify, and redistribute it, provided it stays GPL and you follow those terms.
The name and brand
"ARMA", "Operation Flashpoint", and the logos are not granted. The trademarks stay with their owners ("ARMA" is Bohemia Interactive's). A fork must be renamed and must not present itself as "Arma" or as an official Bohemia Interactive product.
Game data (separate)
Models, textures, sounds, missions, and voices. These are not in this repository and are not GPL; they ship separately under the APL-SA license. A free Demo is available on Steam.
In short: the code is free software, the name is not, and the game data comes separately. This license covers the source code only and grants no rights to the trademarks.
cmake --preset win-x64-clang-rwdi
cmake --build build/win-x64-clang-rwdi
On GNU/Linux, use the matching linux-x64-clang-rwdi preset.
cmake/ - presets, toolchains, vcpkg triplets, and overlay portsdocker/ - container support for service and runtime environmentspackages/ - ignored local game data staging arearesources/ - application icon resourcesthirdparty/ - vendored third-party headers and sourcesThe source in this repository is licensed under the GNU General Public License
v3.0 or later, with additional terms under Section 7 of the GPL. See LICENSE for the
full text.
This license does not grant you any right to use "ARMA" or any other Bohemia Interactive trademark.
The thirdparty/ directory is excluded from the project's GPL
license: it contains vendored third-party code (glad, the RenderDoc API header)
under their own respective licenses — see thirdparty/README.md.
Dependencies pulled in via vcpkg (vcpkg.json) likewise remain under
their own licenses.
"ARMA" is a registered trademark of BOHEMIA INTERACTIVE a.s. "OPERATION FLASHPOINT" is a registered trademark of Electronic Arts Inc.
See LICENSE for information concerning trademarks. This credits file is
informational and does not constitute any grant and/or waiver of rights.
Game data and assets (models, textures, sounds, missions, etc.) are not part of this repository and are not covered by the GPL. They are released separately by Bohemia Interactive under the Arma Public License Share Alike (APL-SA):
The compiled binaries need game data to run. You can obtain the free Demo game data on Steam:
The full game data ships with the retail game. Whatever you do with assets is
governed by the APL-SA linked above; whatever you do with this source is governed by
the GPL with additional terms per Section 7 in LICENSE.
This is a locked repository: pull requests are not accepted here, and this
repository will not be continuously updated.
Issues are only for bugs in official Bohemia Interactive builds distributed on
Steam. For ideas, development builds, ports, and community work, fork the code or
join the community continuation. See CONTRIBUTING.md for more information.
One thing is 120bit RSA (readily broken with a graphing calculator at the time of release), another thing is the provenance of the RSA implementation code in the original binary.
I wish other game studios would release their software so many years after release.
Also, Operation Flashpoint was the reason I learnt to code and ended up having a career a software engineer, so I owe BI for that. My first real foray into programming was writing scripts, specifically to trigger unguided bomb releases from planes onto moving ground targets using some shoddy trigonometry as a 14 year old kid.
I have a lot of fond memories of that game. I still remember being awed by some of the mods created by this guy: https://kegetys.fi His name has lived rent free in my head for 2 decades now. Legend.
Multiplayer is nice for others I guess, but not really for me.
you're pinned down as a 10 person group in a jungle clearing, everyone hunkering down behind some fallen down trees cos that's your only cover ... you're surrounded by enemy in all directions, the whole team is running low on ammo, tracer rounds flying over everyone's heads, your medic is wounded and trying to patch himself up ... you're trying to call in air support using only grids and compass bearing desperately hoping that you've got the grids right and the human pilots don't fuck it up and wipe out the whole team ... you've gotta try to organize some sort of extract helo in all of this mess, but chances are they'll get shot down if they try to extract you here ... suddenly mortar rounds start going off all around you because the ai have communicated your location back to the mortar installation you were trying to recon ...
as team lead, what do you do? what's your decision? how are we getting out of this mess? you don't get to think, there's no time to think, thinking is death. what do you do?
so fucking cool.
The learning curve just acts as a filter that results in more like-minded people sticking with it.
But where ARMA3 really shines is single-player sandbox mods like DUWS-X.
I was rather disappointed when I heard that they had been acquired by BAE Systems, but on further inspection it seems like that was only the BI Simulations arm (responsible for VBS), now rebranded as OneArc. My guess is that a release like this wouldn't have happened were they not still independent.
Like all the years the physics were just busted and tanks would flip over and explode because the engine couldn't handle the terrain geometry. Really sucks the fun out of your all-night commitment when that ends your mission for the night "because realism".
Getting a vehicle squad assigment was pretty much an 80% chance this was going to happen to you at some point.
Very eye opening experience though. It's disturbingly easy to mess up your navigation and radio comms and start having friendly squads shooting each other when obscured by trees... The wrong squad leader (and/or inattentive teammates) will get you killed as fast as anything.
If you want to learn rigid comms discipline, that is the right place to learn it.
it's the same with dayz.