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America's Army 3 announced

Published on 21st January 2009 by Joe Martin

The US Army has today announced the launch of America's Army 3 as a free downloadable game for PC.

The US Army has today announced that there will be a third game released in the America's Army series of military shooters and that the game will be released later this year.

The game, which is inventively dubbed America's Army 3, will be available as a PC exclusive title and will be free to download and play, just like the other games in the series.

Really more of a military simulation than a game, the new game will continue to focus on teaching players about real-life military strategies and what role the US Army fulfils in the real world. Players will have to take part in training missions and communicate with each other as a team if they want to stand any chance of success.

The game itself is currently being put together using the Unreal Engine 3, the same engine behind games like BioShock and Mirror's Edge. It will apparently be looking to include all the best features of the previous games, but will update player arsenals to be more in-tune with modern day.

America's Army 3 is also set to up the propaganda too, using 'pride moments' to mark special achievements for players. These pride moments will typically take the form of slide-shows and movies showing the best the US Army has to offer and how well your achievements mesh with that.

Constant support is promised for the interactive recruitment tool, as well as regular free updates to the content. It's just a shame that not all games can operate like that, eh? Let us know your thoughts in the forums.

13 Comments

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identikit 21st January 2009, 12:44

There was an AA2?!

p3n 21st January 2009, 12:48

haha love the picture

Blademrk 21st January 2009, 13:14

The only thing the picture is missing is an Arrow for the soldiers inpromptu bow (I'm sure someone can photoshop one in) and a funny caption.

n3mo 21st January 2009, 13:43

Big, nasty propaganda tool.

Comet 21st January 2009, 13:46

Americas Army was a great propaganda tool. Some may criticize the concept of using a game as propaganda but fact is it served its purpose quite well. The return they got from investing in building this game was much bigger than any other Army publicity campaing. I'm from Europe and fact is this game had a good result here in Europe. It ended up being a good tool to gain some support from non US citizens too. There was little to no bad comments on the way the project was conducted here in Europe. Actually it was quite the opposite. The Americas Army game ended up being a tool of unifying the US and its allies (even some non allies). It was good publicity on the army values and its inner principles. But this achievement could never have been acomplished if they didn't deliver what is even today one of the best tactical shooter experiences. Its online ranking features did up the stand on what we look for in an online FPS. I'm anxious to see what they have in mind for this instalment.

Redbeaver 21st January 2009, 14:13

good graphic, good action, and free.

i might have to swallow the propaganda part and enjoy the game!

glaeken 21st January 2009, 14:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by identikit
There was an AA2?!

Yep. For quite a while (about 4-5 years). Current version is 2.8.4.

D3s3rt_F0x 21st January 2009, 14:17

Whether you like its use as a propoganda tool dont matter when I play AAO I really enjoyed it, has a very steep learning curve but if you hang in for a week or 2 you get the hang of it and its good fun.

TurtlePerson2 21st January 2009, 14:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by identikit
There was an AA2?!

The first one was America's Army: Operations. The sequel was America's Army: Special Forces.

PureSilver 21st January 2009, 19:03

I'm not too bothered by the propaganda message here; if you're playing military-themed FPS you're already setting yourself into an Army of some description, and it's not covert or anything - they're upfront about it. This is no different to product placement in movies or books and much less underhand...

clumsy_culhane 21st January 2009, 22:24

I really enjoyed Special Forces... then i found cod4. But ill download and see what its like.

[PUNK] crompers 22nd January 2009, 11:40

certainly worth a look i reckon, i very much doubt i'll start having urges to join the american army

RallyRoach 22nd January 2009, 17:00

I loved playing AA:SF when I discovered it. I was a mediocre FPS player up until then. Playing AA forces you to think about tactics (how to enter a room, cover, keeping your teammates location in mind), and since friendly fire is so damaging, you have to be really sure and accurate about shooting. And no fricken' ray-guns! I spent months (years? lol) on end playing that, finally gave it up when COD4 came out (graphics + hard-core mode). But I still miss it, I'll be watching to see when its avail.

Oh, and I'm Canadian :)