After all this time, I've *finally* joined this decade and tried Arma 2. I bought Combined Ops on Steam this week for $30, and of course 2 days later they strike the price down to $15.
Man, since the complaints about Arma 2 started on this forum I was always hoping they were somehow exaggerated and wrong. Unfortunately, you guys were right.
The Shacktac mod certainly helps, but something is still really screwy with Arma 2's movement system. There is a jog separate from sprint, but you still can't aim or shoot while jogging!? Being only able to walk with sights up is really shitty in a game where multi-mile distances between objectives are common place. You have to stay in hip/crosshair mode to retain any defense while moving, and even that is too slow.
It also sucks that jogging is on by default. As soon as you double-tap shift the movement seems twice as logical and natural, but having to double-shift every time you spawn or enter the game is really annoying.
We were really spoiled with INF's movement. I hate to say it, but even arcade shooters like R6 Vegas and Borderlands feel more natural and realistic in their movement than Arma 2. I'm still trying to get into the game, but it's clear that it's not exactly what INFers are looking for.
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EDIT: Ok I feel like I solved my remaining issues with Arma 2 via the following methods:
1) I set my keys so I can switch to walking default by double-tapping ALT at the beggining of each round. It's a small change but for me it's a lot easier since I'm not using my pinky (and my crouch key) to do it.
2) I
raised my fov from Arma 2's default ~68. This makes a huge difference, granting the situational awareness necessary to navigate CQB effectively, and making your movement appear faster.
3) I realized that expert mode removes the crosshairs (though you can also turn if off in your server settings).
After doing those 3 things, Arma doesn't feel any clunkier than any other tactical shooter to me. If any of you haven't done this (especially the FOV) then definitely try it! All that's left to do is for someone to scout arma's maps for locations that'd make good CQB missions, and then make some.