Comrades in Arms Discussion Board

One of the most famous weapons in FPS games, the American M4 did not make an appearance in vanilla ArmA3, the first time in more than 10 years in the series. Alwarren then took the opportunity to create an unofficial add-on based on this weapon.

The M4 assault rifle is a family of firearms that was derived from earlier shortened versions of the M16 rifle, which was in turn derived from the original AR-15 rifle that Eugene Stoner designed and ArmaLite manufactured. The M4 is a shorter and lighter variant of the M16. It is a gas-operated, magazine-fed, selective fire, shoulder-fired weapon with a telescoping stock and 14.5 in (370 mm) barrel to ease close quarters combat. Like the rest of the M16 family, it fires the .223 caliber, or 5.56 mm NATO round.



The model of the rifle is highly detailed. The default weapon comes with a carrying handle which contains highly detailed iron sights that are pretty straightforward to use. The version with the attached M203 grenade launcher also contains realistic and useful ironsights allowing you to put some effective high explosive fire at any distance below 400 meters. When you fire the rifle it spits out empty shell cases. The textures are high resolution as well and the weapon comes in three variants: black, woodland and desert.

The animations still need work. When reloading a magazine the animation itself is good but both initial and final part need to be cut out. Reloading the grenade launcher suffers from the same problems of the vanilla game, with the weapon system remaining static without having any of its parts moving.

I find the sounds to be superior to the ones produced by BIS. Be it firing the weapon or reloading, the sound seems more authentic and not engineered. I do think it is a matter of taste though, some people might prefer the vanilla sounds.



The rifle uses the 5.56x45mm rounds which produce low damage when compared to higher calibers but you get increased accuracy. Personally (unless the enemy is more than 100 meters away) I use full automatic in bursts and when the combat switches to less than 25 meters I sometimes spit out half the magazine to make sure the enemy is dead.

The sway and recoil are based on the SDAR rifle. While the first is ok for me I think the recoil should be just slightly higher. Below 100 meters I have no trouble landing shots on the enemy and above that distance just make you use the proper stance and hold breath. You can zero the weapon to 100\200\300\400 meters.

The 40mm grenades are nothing new damage wise when compared to what we already have with MX\Mk20\Katiba. However this was the first time I found the grenade launcher sights useful. The trick is to zero to 100 meters then align the sights properly, for example 200 meters. If you zero them to 200 meters and point to 100 meters the result will be a 200 meters shot, which allows you multiply the distances when required. The sights can be zeroed to 100\200\300 meters allowing to double or triple the shot distance easily meaning you can put accurate and effective fire on enemies that are far away. Useful when they are coming down a hill and tight together.

Camouflage wise, the black version is best suited for night operations while the desert and woodland variants allow you to remain better concealed in certain types of terrain during the day. Using Altis\Stratis as an example, both of these camouflage patterns apply due to some extreme variations in terrain color. Overall the woodland pattern is more suited when used with the ghillie suit in more green and lush environments while the desert pattern is more suited for the coast and dry vegetation areas. Of course you should also take into account the camouflage pattern of the uniform you are using.



I think this add-on is great but of course there’s always areas that can be improved, namely the animations for reloading (both the rifle and the grenade launcher) and the recoil needs (in my opinion) some slight adjustments. From 0 to 10 I give it an 8. Keep up the good work Alwarren.

Nice read HK!
I agree about the reloading animation, I just love the "twist to check the chamber" but it's a bit twitchy. Can it even be improved?

(08-03-2014, 07:27 PM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]Nice read HK!
I agree about the reloading animation, I just love the "twist to check the chamber" but it's a bit twitchy. Can it even be improved?

Spoke with Alwarren right after posting this. The grenade launcher animation cannot be improved because of engine issues but the magazine one can.

(08-03-2014, 07:27 PM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]Nice read HK!
I agree about the reloading animation, I just love the "twist to check the chamber" but it's a bit twitchy. Can it even be improved?

I can try to tweak it a bit. I had watched an instructional video on handling of AR-15 type carbines, and they usually do the twist to see that there isn't a weapon jam, so I liked the idea of including it. I need to extend it a bit and not put too much of a wrist turn into it, but I suck at animation unfortunately.

(08-03-2014, 07:53 PM)Alwarren link Wrote: [ -> ]I can try to tweak it a bit. I had watched an instructional video on handling of AR-15 type carbines, and they usually do the twist to see that there isn't a weapon jam, so I liked the idea of including it. I need to extend it a bit and not put too much of a wrist turn into it, but I suck at animation unfortunately.

Yeah, that's how I was trained with this weapon as well. Good call on adding it.

(08-03-2014, 07:57 PM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]Yeah, that's how I was trained with this weapon as well. Good call on adding it.

I generally think the BIS anims are too "static". I mean, you will usually rotate the weapon sideways to see where you put the magazine in. Most of the time, the BIS anims just keep it straight and level. EDIT: just checked them, it's mostly the older weapons, the newer ones like the SMG's are much better.

The magazine movement, as I said, is very limited. I have proposed a way to animate the magazine by a proxy in the ManSkeleton (see here and please vote up ) but so far, not noticed *sigh*

The crux of this is also that the two reload anims for standing/crouched and prone need to match, since the magazine movement is a function of the weapon, not of the anim, and always the same. It also means that the M203 reload doesn't open the breech, and in fact, if you look closely, you'll see the magazine slide out and magically reappear even if you are reloading the GL (both on my and BIS' weapons).

Nice review HK.