ScopE's first impressions:

[ScopE]

Good to hear a positive, Stomp.
I'll have another bash next week.

[Voics]

...once we got out of the 'lobby' and onto the battlefield, all the AI's raced off (i THINK they were AIs), and I couldn't distinguish who were the human players so I couldn't stick to them and play together.

If they took off like a shot they were probably human. Keep in mind it's not real organised at the moment, many kids seem to be from Germany, slowing us down with their 400+ pings and probably not able to communicate all that well.

Also most servers so far have had friendly tags enabled, so if player names will come up in green when you aim at them. If AI it will just display their soldier class, eg 'machine gunner'.

[ScopE]

Originally Posted by Voics

If they took off like a shot they were probably human. Keep in mind it's not real organised at the moment, ...

Yeah I agree Voics; I had thought of that.
It's interesting to read the in-game chat and you can tell how many young Europeans are trying it out for the first time.

The gameplay might not feel so alien without the random 'technical' issues distracting from just simply getting up the learning curve.
(In a lot of ways it reminds me strongly of the state of things immediately post-release of Tribes2 several years ago. Ultimately SUCH a good game, but people were so annoyed with it initially until it got sufficiently patched.)

In any case, I now have my downloaded retail version (burned to 2 DVDs with neatly done printed DVD labels I photoshopped from some official ArmA site). And to be honest for AUD$71 outlay, I'm ok with it...

Now that I've had to somewhat adjust my expectation (like we had a choice!), I'll wait and dabble and patch until the much-heralded OFP gameplay hopefully emerges in the coming weeks/months.

[TruBlu]

I have to say Im luving it Once you figure out the controls and workout how to send out orders to your squad it becomes alot better. One thing the game needs is more people playing, there is heaps of servers running.
I have noticed a few bugs with some sounds and stuff, but compared to a few other new games they are being addressed pretty quickly with patches which is good to see. I didnt buy this game just for what it is now, but for what it will eventually become ( I am looking for a game with longevity) from the Modding community. And if you buy it now and have to patch it 4 times until the the rest of the world gets their retail version so be it, in the end both will be the same.

And if one of your squad runs off lol it is usually because some one has joined and taken that AI. Zutta and I were on Seize the Base Coop and we had a squad each going low and slow and all of a sudden one of my guys got up and ran off and got himself shot, told Zutta one of my men just bugged out, until we worked out it was another player that joined. lol

And Im with Scope ,$70 is ok by me aswell

[ScopE]

Originally Posted by Dads

... all of a sudden one of my guys got up and ran off and got himself shot, told Zutta one of my men just bugged out, until we worked out it was another player that joined. lol ...

Bloody humans

[Stompya]

Yer, at least the AI follows orders, been some absolute idiots spoil what was panning out to be a very good game.