Arma 3 alpha is go. In fact, the only thing standing between you and it is a £19.99 fee and the time it takes to download 20 km² of virtual island via Steam.
The alpha is currently limited to four showcase missions (Infantry, Vehicles, SCUBA and Helicopter), a subset of weapons and vehicles, two multiplayer scenarios, a scenario editor and – miraculously, for an unfinished game – all the mods Arma’s community can throw together.
Buy alpha access via Steam and you’ll get the full game upon release, as well as three invites for friends to join a ‘Lite’ version of the alpha – free of multiplayer and modding but otherwise all there – from March 14th. Alternatively, buy Arma 3’s £34.99 digital deluxe edition for maps, guides, a soundtrack and a copy of Arma: Cold War Assault (or Operation Flashpoint, as everybody else knows it).
Stratis is less than a tenth the size of the final game’s second island, Altis, which will be a whopping 270 km². Nevertheless, Stratis still finds room to smuggle away “rugged terrain, expansive forests and a man-made airbase”. See all of that walked over and spectacularly flown about in below:
I’m convinced there’s a point where verisimilitude becomes absolutely terrifying. Do you think we’ve hit it?