If XCOM reminded us of the value of loss in 2012, DayZ was a valuable lesson in hardship. The Arma 2 mod was one of the least-forgiving and most intimidating games of the year. It was a shooter that you entered without a gun. Arma’s control scheme made actions such as inventory management a hassle; its 225km2 landscape asked you to run mini-marathons to get around, often without a map. Permadeath and persistency lent consequence to every action. And in its alpha state, DayZ was buggy and vulnerable to hackers.

1.3 million people played it.

DayZ is heartening; it reinforces what players are willing to put up with in exchange for novel, self-authored experiences. It’s a rare shooter that gives banal tasks such as searching for water or riding a bicycle as much meaning as firing a gun.

Among bandit pursuits, lucky loot runs, mourning the death of friends, and castle raids, one of my unforgettable moments is when my friends and I accidentally orchestrated our own sniping mission. We’d arrived outside Chernarus’ Northwest Airfield: treacherously naked terrain with the potential for military loot.

With empty backpacks, two teammates moved in. If they fired a shot, they’d ring a dinner bell for the undead. But 500 meters away, atop a hill, my sniper rifle was out of earshot. This was an escort mission: their lives were my responsibility, and Arma 2’s ballistics meant I had to lead targets on two axes, manually dial-in my scope, and read my map to estimate ranges. It was a pure and exhilarating shooting experience, but more importantly, an expression of our teamwork. Moments like this in DayZ arise simply as a result of the mechanics, vulnerability, and players’ natural storytelling ability. By being so hands-off with us, DayZ gives us ownership over every moment.

Read More: DayZ Photo Diary.

Runners Up: Black Mesa Source, Sith Lords Remastered.

On Monday, zombie survival shooter-MMO The War Z became available on Steam as a "Foundation Release." The same day, complaints began to arise that the game's page in the Steam store misrepresented and exaggerated its content by mentioning features that weren't yet integrated. This morning, Valve took the game off sale, admitting that a mistake was made in "prematurely" making The War Z available for purchase. Valve has extended an invitation to refund purchases through Steam Support, an exception to Valve's usually-rigid refund rules. Those who bought the game through Steam are still able to play it, and The War Z remains for sale on its website.

Following these events, I contacted executive producer Sergey Titov via email to ask about The War Z's troubled release on Steam, if he agrees with Valve's decision to take the game off sale, and what he expects the game's immediate future to be.

Sergey's comments are presented unedited and as they were provided to us from The War Z PR.

PCG: As of this morning, The War Z is no longer purchasable on Steam. Was this a surprise to you, or has Valve been in communication with you after release?

Sergey Titov: No surprise, Valve contacted us to let us know their concerns based on some of the info circulating in the press and we completely understand their need to sort things out and make certain we are communicating correctly to their audience before we relaunch with them. They have an obligation first and foremost to their customers and we recognize that.

Do you agree with Valve’s decision to temporarily unpublish the game from Steam?

Titov: Yes, we think this is the best way to serve their customers and we respect their decision. As you know we’ve been publicly available since October 15. Over that time I think we (the developers) got used to and took it for granted that players knew what state the game was in and how it was a constantly evolving project, with new features being added on and ongoing basis. Clearly the release on Steam introduced the game to players who never followed War Z and we made the mistake of not communicating effectively to the Steam community. Also, during our pre-holiday crunch time with development extending late into the night, there was a major disconnect between our development team and marketing team that resulted in some of the "coming soon" features being listed as current features on the Steam sales page. Namely the following:

1. Servers being able to support up to 100 players—This is actually true, but at the moment we launched the servers were capped at 50 as a result of an in-game survey we had conducted. That information had not been communicated properly to our marketing team that was handling the Steam integration. Currently the servers support both 100 players and 50 players.

2. Map Size—We have always stated that our maps would range from 100—400km squared and that we would launch with one map "Colorado," and then follow up with additional maps in the first quarter of 2013. Nothing has changed, however I believe the wording on the Steam page could have been interpreted as there currently being more than one game world available.

3. Server Rental/Strongholds and Skill Tree—Again, this was not communicated correctly to the marketing team and once it was realized it was corrected.

We recognized the above quickly and made the update to the Steam page within the first day of going on sale, however we completely understand that players were upset and felt that we mislead them. We absolutely take responsibility for these inconsistencies. Ultimately, despite all the controversy that has surrounded The War Z - even since the early Alpha launch, we have cultivated a large and loyal player base that is very active in the game and we want to make sure that new players coming into the game now will be satisfied and feel that they are getting a great game experience.

When will The War Z be purchasable on Steam again? When you do relaunch the game, how will The War Z be different?

Titov: We are working currently with Steam to ensure that they are comfortable that all of our communication is accurate—which it currently is. As for differences—this will be the same WarZ game as available on our own website. For Steam version—our goal right now is to clear up all support requests and refund requests for Steam users.

From our very first hours of being available on Steam and right up until sales were disabled, The War Z was the number one top grossing game title on Steam. We really feel that this is not only a testament to the game's popularity, but also largely due to our loyal and vocal community. We are looking forward to getting things sorted out and being available again soon.

The War Z is still purchasable and playable through thewarz.com, correct? Will the game continue to be playable through your launcher?

Titov: Both the Steam purchased and standalone versions are available to players without any restrictions. That is, anyone who purchased the game through Steam can obviously continue to play it through Steam.

A comparison of The War Z's Steam store description page at launch, and today.

It’s since been updated, but why did the game’s initial description on Steam not reflect the content of the game? Who’s responsible for that error?

Titov: Ultimately, it's our responsibility and no fault of Steam at all. The description on Steam was basically reflecting a list of all the features that either our engine is capable of ( like number of players per server—which can be much higher than 100 for example) as well as our immediate development tasks. The big problem was with some internal communication. As a result of this mistake, our company board reviewed the situation today and we will be making some changes in our structure and with some of our key team members.

The current version of the game changed the amount of time players wait to respawn individual characters from one hour to four hours. You also introduced a paid method for instant respawning. These are significant changes to make as the game appeared on Steam—how would you defend these design and business model decisions?

Titov: Actually this was part of the original design we did for Normal and Hardcore modes. In Normal mode you die and you have a cooldown period before you can play using the same character again. Our original plan was to have this cooldown period be 24-48 hours, but we’ve lowered it to 1 hour during alpha and beta periods. We conducted a large group survey and asked players what they feel cooldown time should be—starting with 1 hour and up to 24 hours. Most users said that it should be 4 hours—40% out of over 80,000 respondents.

As for ability to revive your character using micro transactions—okay once again that was a convenience feature that we planned from the start. So neither of those features were actually tied to the Steam release itself.

From the alpha version of The War Z.

What does your roadmap look like for features in The War Z—what do you expect to add to the game in the next three months?

Titov:

Dec 2012-early January:

Leaderboards
Improvements in Clan system

January 2013:

Server rentals, introduction of Stroghold maps to public.We’re going to basically introduce whole new meta gameplay for War Z, which we hope will change the game dramatically for those who are looking for a more engaging PVE type of experience.
More “barricade” types and new “building blocks” items that will allow you to customize your Stronghold experience.

February-April:

More stronghold maps
More characters
More items, weapons, content updates
Skill Trees

For the time it was available, The War Z was at the top of Steam’s top sellers list. How many copies did you sell?

Titov: We can’t really comment on this yet, however the game performance on Steam exceeded our expectations. Overall this is a very good thing for us—even with all the bumps, The War Z proved to be a very attractive game for players. Good thing is that our daily performance indicators—number of concurrent users, number of daily players are growing—despite all the negative press recently. I can tell you that as of today we have close to 700,000 registred players, with close to 180,000 players playing the game daily.

The Steam release was labeled as a "Foundation Release." Why did you make the decision to call it that, rather than a continuation of the beta, or full release?

Titov: Basically as all buildings have foundations, every online game has what you can say is a critical set of features. We feel that we’ve reached this stage. As we move forward—we’ll be adding new features to the game to expand on that foundation. The War Z is a game that we will never call "final" because we will continue to develop and add new features based on community feedback.

How would you evaluate the quality of The War Z right now?

It’s definitely a very fun game, though it lacks the polish of titles like COD, Far Cry, PlanetSide 2, etc.—but it’s very solid, stable and fun game. And we’re working non stop with frequent updates to make it even better. From the feedback we've received from the vast majority of our players, they like the game and feel that it is a good value. I think as we continue to add features that sentiment will grow and we will continue to attract more and more players to The War Z.

How do you intend to win back the trust of players who feel misled by the way the game was initially represented on Steam?

Titov: Well—we really hope that those players will understand that we weren't looking to intentionally mislead anyone. I personally hope that they will give the game another look and find that it actually is worth the purchase—or maybe talk to some of the people playing the game that are really enjoying it.

We are already talking internally about some things we can do to reward those that have been loyal to us and also to help mend the relationship with new players. I'm glad I had the opportunity to do this interview and hopefully explain the facts (without being defensive) and have the community understand that we don't take this lightly.

We've celebrated the realistic fake war-waging of Arma 2 community ShackTac in our Realism Theater posts this year. We admire ShackTac's "Serious Fun" approach to playing Arma 2: even outside the context of mil-simming, it's inspiring to watch a bunch of people invested in each others' fun and to see them express that through mods, missions, and videos they create themselves.

ShackTac founder and documenteur Dslyecxi has put up his annual "Year In Review" video, a six-minute cut that represents thousands of collective man-hours of organized Arma 2.



Behold: many articles about Arma 3.

Games get a bad rap for being a solitary, violence-obsessed form of entertainment. But they can also be a collaborative, violence-obsessed form of entertainment. Just ask the close-knit PC Gamer team.

Tom F: Co-op based games teach us the value of teamwork better than any kitten based motivational poster, by showing us how many more of our enemies we can crush if we can just learn to work together.

Graham: They’re not just violent either. We can build giant penis statues together in Minecraft. No, wait, that’s bad. We can control egotistical millionaires in FIFA! Oh God, no. Rich?

Rich: Well, Supreme Commander celebrates the pioneering spirit, by asking us to build a host of clanking deathbots... I got nothing. Chris?

Chris: Uh. Diablo III shows that hell is easier with other people? Hm. Senior? Bail me out?

Tom S: I can’t, I’m too busy shooting these damn zombies. Stop intro-ing and let’s go play together.



Portal 2 - 2 players, Online
 
How does it work? You and a friend play comedy robots in co-op-only test chambers.

Why is it good?

Tom F: The puzzles get magnificently complicated when designed for two. You can jump through each other’s portals, so you’re often setting up a jump that your partner will perform. And because every puzzle requires two players, you’ve got to figure out where to put four different portals, and coordinate your approach. It bent my brain in the same ridiculous ways that Portal 1 did.

Graham: I use my portals to make a corridor slick with gloopy paint. Tom places his at either end of the corridor, creating the world’s first infinite slip ’n’ slide. I run down it and build absurd momentum, and as I reach terminal velocity, Tom moves one of his portals so that when I exit, I’m flung out over a chasm filled with acid. Co-op Portal 2 means entwining not just your portals, but your brains.



Minecraft - 2 to many, online or LAN
 
How does it work? Join a server and collaborate with friends – or strangers – to build the biggest, best, and most phallic structures you can.

Why is it good?

Rich: Within minutes, I was building a spa. I don’t know why I was building a spa. No one had said “let’s build a spa” in the chat channel, but there it was, forming before us. Graham, now-departed Craig Pearson and I, had hollowed out an underground chamber, constructed a raised dais of glass, and diverted water to create a lovely jacuzzi pool. Our subterranean sauna was lit by lava, and we sat in it, content.

Graham: My first time was on a new, private server with a few folks from the PCG community. In three hours we dotted the landscape with giant Darwinians, and built an underground bunker with launch missiles, library and steam rooms to avoid a player who had built an ugly golden bridge around the world. It felt like I’d spent an afternoon building sandcastles with friends.



Fifa 12 - 2-5 players, local
 
How does it work? Two or more players join forces to defeat the nefarious forces of Computron, the dark lord of kicking.

Why is it good?

Rich: Football is incredibly frustrating. FIFA recreates that frustration perfectly: genius moves undone by idiot players. But in co-op, I managed to reduce that frustration through one simple method: blame someone else. I think I’m great at FIFA 12 at the best of times; when I’m playing in co-op, I’m flawless. Graham, on the other hand, is terrible.

Graham: And Rich smells bad. For a while, we were playing two-on-two, but then our fourth man lost interest. We started playing two-on-one. Here’s what we found: the player controlling a team on their own has the advantage. To work together in FIFA is to anticipate the other’s moves, making runs and pulling away defenders. If you do it right, you’re unstoppable. If you’re Rich and I, Rich smells bad.





Diablo 3 - Up to four, drop-in, drop-out co-op across the whole campaign
 
How does it work? Every player you add to a game of Diablo III boosts the health of your enemies, increasing the challenge – but far less than it did on launch, when damage increased as well. Otherwise, it’s just Diablo III with more people.

Why is it good?

Chris: D3’s normal difficulty is very easy, but it gains a lot of life if you’re doing it with friends. Experimenting with new skills adds a slapstick dimension to demonbashing that’s better with other people. It’s basically that bit from Lord of the Rings where Legolas and Gimli are competing to kill the most orcs, strung out over 15 hours.

Tom S: Having a friend or two around gives you more freedom to experiment with new abilities. If you’ve got a Barbarian chum to wave and shout and take punches to the face, you can sacrifice a defensive ability for that demonic ghost bat bombing run skill you’ve been dying to try. Few things amaze and terrify a co-op partner as effectively as an unannounced demonic ghost bat bombing run.

Chris: It used to be that co-op Diablo III didn’t work: it was too diffi cult, and actually reduced the amount of loot you seemed to get. Patches have since redressed the balance, and working together to crack Inferno is a satisfying challenge.



Alien Swarm - Up to 4 players, online

How does it work? It’s a top-down shooter where you control a squad of four marines shooting aliens in a scripted campaign.
 
Why is it good?

Rich: People love swarms. The swarms of aliens in Alien Swarm (clue’s in the name), are best dealt with by coordination: one of your group becomes point-man, clearing rooms with shotguns and flamethrowers. Another takes up the rear, machinegun blaring to dissuade any would-be alien pouncers. This coordination is the result of a kind of natural, happy trance that players fall into, rather than tiresome enforcement.

Tom F: I’m a Medic, which used to mean I was the sensible, cautious, team player. Until I realised I could take a chainsaw. It’s terrible. It’s a terrible weapon, don’t use it. You can’t just charge into alien hordes, blade revving. OK, just one more go.



Trine - Up to 3 players, online or LAN
 
How does it work? Each player can transform themselves into a thief, warrior or wizard at any time. In the mode we play, you can have two Thieves at once if you like.

Why is it good?

Tom F: It’s a physics-based platform puzzler, which in co-op means dropping heavy objects on each other for fun. The wizard can create boxes and levitate them, and your co-op partner can stand on them. Most of our solutions involved carting each other around on telekinetic elevators.

Graham: Trine’s best class is the grapple-hooking, arrow-firing thief, because of the arrow-fi ring but specifically because of the grapple-hooking. In the singleplayer game, you’re forced to switch away from the thief to navigate obstacles and fi ght larger enemies. In co-op, two thieves are better than one, and combined you’re able to spend more time as a swinging idiot. The best kind of idiot.



Left 4 Dead 2 - Up to 4 players, online or LAN
 
How does it work? - There are lots of game modes now, but the one we play most is still the campaign: four players against the AI-controlled zombie hordes.

Why is it good?

Tom S: I ran through Left 4 Dead 1’s campaign on its hardest diffi culty setting with a group of regulars. We played in the 4 6 5 same small room for many hot, panicked hours until our cries of fear overruled the rattling pistol fire coming out of our speakers. The defence events and climactic mission fi nales offered us a chance to take stock and plan, but the best moments happened when those plans disintegrated in the face of an unexpected Tank charge, or a perfectly placed Witch.

The AI director never quite offered the longevity that it promised, and the monsters lost their scare factor after a while, but Left 4 Dead is still a superb, if harrowing, co-op experience. Ever since Valve ported the fi rst game’s superior maps into the sequel, Left 4 Dead 2 has been the better choice of the pair.

Tom F: There’s an achievement for winning a garden gnome on the fairground level, and taking it all the way through the rest of that campaign. For me, that is the game. It takes both hands to carry the gnome, so whoever’s holding it can’t fi re their weapons. You can set it down and grab it later, but among huge crowds of zombies and charging Tanks, it tends to get kicked around with alarming force.

So you take it in turns to sacrifice your firepower and carry the precious cargo, relying completely on your friends to protect you and your porcelain companion when it’s your turn. If a zombie does get to you, all you can really do is bash him with the gnome.

The carnival finale, set in a huge stadium, was just too intense for any of us to survive it gunless. So when the helicopter finally arrived to bail us out, the real challenge was a frantic scavenger hunt for a chipped red hat among the seething infected. Finding him, grabbing him, and making it out alive was the most nail-biting co-op experience I’ve ever had with the game.





Half Life 2 - 2-10 players, online or LAN
 
How does it work? The Synergy mod enables two or more of you to jump straight into Half-Life 2, Episode One or Episode Two’s singleplayer campaign.

Why is it good?

Tom F: Half-Life 2 is a huge and amazing adventure. And while there are a lot of great co-op games, there aren’t many that are huge and amazing adventures. People don’t make long, varied, story-driven journeys through meticulously detailed and gorgeous places when they’re making a co-op campaign. So a mod that makes Half-Life 2 and its two episodic expansions work cooperatively is an amazing discovery. I don’t know how it works, but it does.

Graham: Tom and I played through the entire of Half-Life 2, and into Episode Two, over many happy lunchtimes. The best part is the Highway 17 segment in Half-Life 2. You’re both given your own buggy to drive across the countryside, and the solitary bungalows that dot the coast are perfect for cooperative assault: one person bursting through the front door while the other circles around the back. The Combine only seem to be expecting one of you, for some reason...



Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 - " players in campaign mode, 2-4 players in terrorist hunt, online or LAN
 
How does it work? We play Terrorist Hunt: you and the other players have to clear out a big, complex building in which a fixed number of terrorists run around and try to ambush you. It’s brilliant.

Why is it good?

Tom F: Terrorist Hunt is an immediately exciting concept, because it feels more like a simulation of a real armed-response firefight than any campaign level could be. You can’t be sure the level designer isn’t going to have the terrorists suddenly come from behind you, because the level designer doesn’t make that call: the terrorists do.

Graham: It’s doubly cool in co-op, because the challenge is so overwhelming. Even with the foresight of a snake camera under the door, it’s just tough to take out six terrorists in a room before any of them kill you. So you plan: I’ll take the left two... You throw a frag... I’ll come from the other door... You rope down to the window. And then you completely screw it up.



Mass Effect 3 - Up to 4 players online
 
How does it work? Fight to complete a mixture of objectives on small but open levels against randomised enemy forces. Level up characters and promote them into the singleplayer campaign to improve Shepard’s chances.

Why is it good?

Chris: ME3 multiplayer takes what is good about co-op survival modes – last-stand heroics and impromptu acts of daring – and adds incredibly varied races, classes and weapons that prevent it from ever becoming samey. Right now, I’m enjoying a Quarian infi ltrator that disintegrates enemies at close range with the Reegar Carbine, a gun we’ve come to call THE PLASMA HOSE. I’m just as happy charging around as a Krogan vanguard, or racking up headshots as a Turian sentinel carrying a Black Widow.

Tom S: New classes and bizarre new weapons are added regularly through free updates. You’re always holding out against waves of familiar enemies, but the variety of ways in which you can off these enemies expands every month. The N7 classes BioWare added recently push the boundaries of what the Mass Effect universe can sensibly contain. The Shadow can dart across the map and slash foes with a psychically infused katana, the Destroyer’s weighty carapace gives him the grounding to wield a rapid-fire grenade launcher with decent accuracy and the Slayer is a teleporting martial arts expert. With so many powerful abilities to choose from, playing with friends becomes more about showing off than anything else.

Chris: BioWare’s free updates to the game have been excellent and generous, particularly the new maps. They’ve drawn me back to the game and kept it feeling fresh, which is essential for co-op.

SCREENSHOT MISSING

Supreme Commander - 2-7 players, online or LAN
 
How does it work?

Start a multiplayer game, put all humans on team 1, and some nice tough AIs on team 2. Crush.

Why is it good?

Tom F: It’s not the first co-op game you think of, but playing it cooperatively is how we’ve had the most fun with it. It can be dauntingly complex, so it’s great to have friends in there to help out if you forget to build anti-air or crash your power economy. In theory. In practice what usually happens is we beaver away on our own bases in silence for seven minutes then one of us says “Shit, fuck, they’re dropping in my base and I forgot to build point defence again, have you got anything that can help?” and the other says...

Graham: No, soz :(

Tom F: It’s about hatching your own masterplans, surviving long enough to see them complete, then raining the giant robotic fruits of your labours down on the enemy at the same time. My giant laser spiders are ready! Your flying fortresses are ready? Let’s go! My towering Galactic Colossus is ready! Your swarm of invincible death bricks is ready? Let’s go!





Dawn of War: Last Stand - Up to 3 players online
 
How does it work? - Unlike the main game, Last Stand gives you only one hero each. You’ve got to fi ght off increasingly tough waves of enemies until you die (likely) or beat wave 20 (unlikely). After the match, you usually unlock new equipment for your character.

Why is it good?

Tom F: I didn’t really get Last Stand until I levelled up a few times. The fun is in discovering new builds, and the role they can play in your group. As the Ork, I thought I was the longrange damage dealer: my autocannon certainly works for that, and when enemies get close I use my teleporting armour to get away. The notion of using the much tougher set, the one that can’t teleport, seemed pretty ridiculous. Until I unlocked the knife. The knife doesn’t do much damage, but it regenerates your health. Add some armour bonus trinkets, a self-healing trait, and an item that stops me being knocked down, and I can turn myself into an unstoppable tank. Suddenly I’m the guy charging into a nest of Tyranids to keep them off my friends, and coming out at full health.

Tom S: In the grim darkness of the future, three dudes battle ridiculous odds in a small stone circle. The setup may seem contrived, but DoW2’s overlooked co-op mode does a much better job of realising the Warhammer 40K fantasy than the campaign. Absurdly powerful heroes dominate the fiction, so I got a kick out of levelling up my venerable Space Marine captain and testing him against the hordes.

Last Stand understands 40K’s scale as well. The final waves throw more foes into the arena than you’ll see in any of the singleplayer missions, so victory may seem impossible. After a few levels you can start combining your heroes’ most powerful abilities to create a maelstrom of death. The glorious slaughterfest that results is worthy of a Space Marine’s final heroic moments.



Killing Floor - Up to 6 players, online or LAN
 
How does it work? Fight together to fend off waves of mutants, then stock up on guns and ammo at a shop that’s never in the same place twice.

Why is it good?

Chris: Without its guns, Killing Floor would be the bleakest, muddiest depiction of Britain at the end of the world since a bunch of Romans said “let’s go home, it’s cold and everyone here is mental.” With its guns, it’s one of the most satisfying co-op shooters around. My favourite is the bolt-action rifl e, which takes mutant head-popping and turns it into an avant garde musical genre. Bang! Chunk. Click. Bang! Blargh! Splatter.

Rich: I like the dual desert eagles. They go ‘whump’, like a pie dropped down a hole. But a really big pie, one that kills anyone unlucky enough to be standing under it in a spray of arterial blood. And when it kills them, this pie, it makes everything slow motion for a while, so your team can marvel at your incredible pie-dropping-stroke-gun-shooting skills.

Chris: Definitely play it with voice chat, though. Partly so that you can coordinate properly and warn your friends when they’re about to be sawn in half, but mostly so that you can talk over the truly, deeply dreadful voice acting. I started playing it during the Portal 2 promo campaign, when all the shopkeepers were replaced by GlaDOS. It was a huge improvement.



Borderlands 2 - Up to 4 players, online or LAN
 
How does it work? The whole campaign is playable in drop-in, drop-out co-op.

Why is it good?

Tom F: Two reasons – for one, the different abilities of each class mix well in a team fight. It’s great to see your Siren pluck a boss up into the air, and into range of your Commando’s turret and your Gunzerker’s... gunzerk. Secondly, cooperative play is good for diffi culty spikes, and Borderlands 2 sure has those. Dealing with an inordinately tough boss is less frustrating when there’s a whole a bunch of you coming up with new ideas and tactics, and a wider variety of weapons to try.

Tom S: Almost anything can pop out of Borderlands 2’s unfolding robot boxes. It could be a revolver that shoots lightning grenades, it could be a glowing, five-foot-long sniper rifl e with an enormous bayonet on the end. Whatever you get, it’s always better to have friends there to go “WOAH” or “whaaaat” or “give me that immediately.” Borderlands 2’s batty enemies are more fun to fi ght in a team, a constant stream of new gadgets to crow over makes it feel like the best sort of trick or treat trip, the sort where you get bazookas instead of sweets.



Arma 2 - 2 to many, online or LAN
 
How does it work? Players can join and play custom missions with each other, or mess around in the weapon playground add-on pack, Private Military Academy.

Why is it good?

Rich: The first time I played an Arma 2 custom mission with Marsh and Owen, it ended with me rolling sideways up a hill and giggling like a maniac. The second time, we were shot before we realised what the ‘open backpack’ key was mapped to. The third time, we found ourselves on a hillside, standing next to a crumpled chopper. It was dark, but the sky was brightening slowly as the sun rose somewhere off in the east. It would’ve been idyllic, were it not for the crowd of ornery locals taking potshots at us.

Together, we made it into a nearby settlement, where our rendezvous chopper was settling down into the dust. We sprinted towards it, tracer fire whistling over our heads, as we howled fears for our safety down our microphones. We were silly men, but Arma 2 quickly made us feel like (mildly inept) soldiers.

Marsh: Most of the time, my Arma 2 experience seems to consist of dying instantly or getting stuck in rocks. But occasionally, you roll the incredibly-complex-emergent-behaviour dice and get a scene as gripping and fluidly dramatic as anything from Full Metal Jacket. I don’t mean the toilet-suicide sequence. Running for that chopper with a busted leg and three shots left in my pistol as the enemy tightened the noose was one of the most extensive workouts my heart has undergone in many years. And it wouldn’t have been half the experience without Owen and Rich bellowing, “COME ON! YOU CAN DO IT!” as I lurched the final few yards.

Bohemia Interactive have today announced that they will be postponing the release of Arma 3 after what they, as kings of understatement, describe as "an eventful year".

They are, of course, referring to the arrest and detainment of Ivan Buchta and Martin Pezlar, Bohemia employees who were charged on suspicion of espionage while on holiday in Greece.

Joris-Jan van't Land, who recently took over as Arma 3's project lead, said in a press release, "We’ve been in the process of implementing changes that will help us innovate as a studio under unexpected circumstances - facing problems we simply couldn't have imagined.”

"We're still trying to make sense of the situation and hope that our colleagues will be released soon. Although their plight has certainly affected us on a personal level, we continue working on the tasks identified as key to the release of Arma 3."

The studio had planned to enter closed beta with Arma 3 this month, but are now pursuing an unspecified "2013" date. They expect to make a more complete statement at the beginning of next year.

Last week, the lawyer representing Ivan and Martin filed a second appeal, which is due to be processed in the new year. You can keep up with the community's efforts to support the pair at the website helpivanmartin.org, which includes a recently released Arma machinima film explaining the situation.

Thanks, PCGamesN.

Project Cars by Darkdeus

Project Cars may secretly be the best looking game of the year. It's only playable for Project Cars team members at the moment, but there's no shortage of gorgeous screenshots for the rest of us to gawp at. Efforts like this one from Darkdeus demonstrate how much closer racing games come to photorealism than other genres. Humans are safely hidden behind reflective windscreens, which makes it easier for racing games to navigate the uncanny valley and deliver sublime shots like this.





The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim by Chewiemuse

Bethesda's decision to support modders with Steam Workshop support and the Creation Kit have paid dividends in the year since launch. Texture packs, shader tweaks and new character models and armour have turned a good looking game into something a bit special. Chewiemuse shows us how with this shot of a warrior disposing of his foe with the archery equivalent of a triple tap. Boost your own copy of The Elder Scrolls V with the help of our Skyrim mods guide.





Arma 2 by Blackhawk

The Arma 2 engine is certainly powerful, but it's not exactly pretty. It's rare for screenshots to capture the satisfaction of a well executed military manoeuvre, but Blackhawk does it with this shot of a team of soldiers securing a drop zone. Arma is as much about organisation and teamwork as good shooting, and the bleak colour palette is quickly forgotten in the tension and sudden drama of Arma's combat situations. Captured at just the right angle, Arma skirmishes look almost real, as ITV discovered when they accidentally used Arma 2 footage as part of a documentary last year.





Max Payne 3 by Glottis8

Yes, GTA 4 was a shoddy port, but Rockstar have done a much better job with recent releases like LA Noire and Max Payne 3. Glottis8's image of Max surfing an explosive shockwave shows off the improved textures and sharp lines of the PC version in dynamic fashion. It could only be improve if Max was perpendicular to the explosion. And his fingers were wrapped around a pair of handcannons. And he was wearing a trenchcoat. And it was snowing. In New York.

Okay, the third game got away from some of the elements that made Max Payne unique, but that's hardly Glottis' fault. Let's just sit back and enjoy imagining how good that explosion probably sounds.





The Mario Brothers in Garry's Mod
by DOAmaster

What's this, the MARIO BROTHERS on PC GAMER? Thanks to the magic of Garry's mod and DOAmaster's screenshotting abilities, the impossible has come to pass. As pleasing as I find those blazing colours, I still haven't figured out exactly what's going on here. If I don't attach a narrative to this thing I'll never make it to the next page and we'll be trapped here in Nintendo world forever. Let's say that Mario and Luigi are holding a belt (small plank of wood?) and this squad of chipmunks (gophers?) is attempting to limbo (???) under it. Plausible? Good enough! Next.





Sword and Sworcery
by Glottis8

The pristine and ageless pixel art of Swords and Sworcery is excellent subject matter for trigger happy screen-grabbers. S&S was released on iOS systems originally, but the artwork shifts up to larger screens rather nicely. That's lucky, because it's designed as a cohesive audiovisual tapestry, and it would be a shame for poorly upscaled graphics to spoil Jim Guthrie's marvellous soundtrack, Ballad of the Space Babies, which you can hear here. Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery is available on Steam.





Project Cars again
by Leviathan

Yep, it's more Project Cars, but look at the stupendous detail on show here. The foil folds of the headlights reflect the horizon of the approaching terrain. Every nut and bolt is present and correct. Look, you can even see the tiny silver mouse periscope popping out of the bonnet in front of the windscreen wipers. Impressive. This slot was a toss up between the picture above and this shot of a car carving up a shiny tarmac track. Not bad, eh?





Team Fortress 2
by Rossrox

Remember when Team Fortress 2 turned into a sparkling, cheerful extension of the Pyro's demented psyche earlier this year? I was happy to be reminded by Rossrox' glittery and violent portrayal of the conflict. I especially enjoy the fact that TF2 has chosen this moment to remind players to be respectful to one another, as a soldier lies burning to death on a floor, and another readies a rocket launcher against a charging Pyro. It's important to remain polite in the face of impending doom. Jolly good show.





The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
by Zloth

There was always going to be more Skyrim in this roundup. There's something about that world's frozen peaks that make folks want to take pictures. Screenshots can fail to do justice to the sense of discovery and wonder that Skyrim's most impressive vistas tend to evoke. This grab from Zloth does the job quite nicely, though. Unfortunately it means that any human who looks upon it must endure a sudden urge to jump back into the world and go adventuring again, sinking yet more hours into Bethesda's fantasy juggernaut. The only cure is to look away, so follow me as we go travel onto the next page and absorb the final selection in our round-up of the best screenshots from the PC Gamer community 2012.





Battlefield 3
by RPhilMan1

It's Battlefield! I was a little surprised that there weren't more shots of Armored Kill maps like Alborz Mountain, but this sandy overview of a sprawling industrial warzone will do quite nicely. Look upon it and imagine the different skirmishes that players are having down there. Engineers will be trying to out-ferret each other in the maze of storage crates on the left. The plume of black smoke hints at the presence of a flaming tank corpse behind the tankers in the centre. A small collection of squads will be having their own private war for the squared off mountainous base on the left. It's a good overview that lays bare the variety and complexity of Battlefield 3's maps and drops in a chopper for good measure.

And that's your lot for this year. You can see plenty more on the screenshot thread in our forums. Browse at your leisure, and feel free to drop in a few of your own favourite gaming snaps while you're there. You never know, you might secure a slot in next year's round-up.

In a handwritten letter addressed to their supporters, Arma 3 Creative Director Ivan Buchta and artist Martin Pezlar say “we are treated well, but we feel we should rather be with our families rather than here.” This is the first public statement from the pair of Bohemia Interactive developers, who have been jailed in Greece for now 80 days after being charged with espionage in September.

The letter is dated November 22, and is printed in full below.



We also spotted English-translated footage of a public demonstration by supporters of Buchta and Pezlar in the Prague, shared below. Thanks to the volunteers at helpivanmartin.org, who shared the letter with us directly and provided the translated footage. View more photos from the protest here. http://www.helpivanmartin.org/2012/11/express-solidairity-with-the-protesters-in-prague/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=-pk525Hkm_0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=3HwQ9dTpYGs

The end date for Greece's strike within its justice system has come and gone, but Bohemia Interactive developers Ivan Buchta and Martin Pezlar remain jailed in what the studio called "an unmitigated disaster" after both men were charged with espionage while on the Greek island of Lemnos. In a report by Czech news site Rozhlas, a Greek court dismissed Buchta and Pezlar's petition to appeal and denied bail, effectively sealing a required trial with a sentence up to 20 years for a guilty verdict.

Buchta and Pezlar have remained in jail for nearly 70 days. Their families have asked for the direct assistance of Czech President Václav Klaus and Prime Minister Petr Nečas. A Foreign Ministry representative told Rozhlas the government is "working very intensively" on the issue on "virtually all possible levels." A fan campaign calling for the pair's release acts as a hub of up-to-date information regarding the incarceration.

"Our boys no longer tell us on the phone that it’s alright, that they’re handling it," Buchta's mother, Hana Buchtova, said. "After the court's decision, we only hear from them something that no parent ever wants to hear: 'Mom, Dad, please save us.'"

Bohemia is hustling on the standalone version of DayZ, hoping to have an initial version of the game out by the end of the year. In the meanwhile, modders continue to tinker with the DayZ mod code, either by adding new maps, questionable gambling metagames, or wholesale mods within the mod. This practice of modception, for the record, is something we endorse.

DayZ 2017 is one of these, a work-in-progress from modder "shinkicker," aka Luke Hinds. Hinds hopes to reintroduce the feeling of item scarcity to the mod by eliminating military equipment, in a setting a half-decade after DayZ. "I went for ragged and worn, hobo-like survivors," says Hinds.

Arma 2 custom map Celle will be the setting for DayZ 2017. It's 100km², landlocked, and full of open roads that connect about 35 towns.

Hinds says the goal of the project is to go "back to basics." He says he "noted a consensus that the abundance of military equipment, plentiful loot and vehicles were taking away from the ethos that made Rocket's mod so great to start with; that being the scarcity principle plus the sociological implications that arise from such conditions." In loose canon terms, DayZ 2017 will take place five years after DayZ, when (presumably) all that fancy military equipment has been used up.

Hinds wants to populate the mod--set on a different, existing Arma 2 map called Celle--with more rugged, "The Road" or "The Book of Eli"-style survivors. "Instead of the clean looking baseball cap wearing survivors, I went for ragged and worn, hobo-like survivors--think plastic grocery bags for socks. I had quite a few attempts at modeling without much real luck and then found some old abandoned Arma units, did some tweaks, and got them running in DayZ. It all took shape from there."

When I asked Hinds what features he'd add to the game through DayZ 2017, his response was an interesting one. "I suppose it will take away as much as it will add," he said. "Sometimes less is more. My hope is the immersion is notched up and the social aspects take a more prominent position again. Going on my own early experiences with the mod, I remember literally having to stop playing and pace the room as the adrenaline dumps were too much to deal with (and that was just from scrambling out of Cherno with a can of beans and a watch). If I can get it close to that again, then it's 'mission accomplished.' The main changes will be taking out most loot and making whats left very rare." Hinds says that more features are planned, which he'll reveal once he gets the foundation of the mod up and running.

DayZ 2017 isn't available for download yet, but Hinds hopes to release something before Christmas. Keep an eye on the mod at Luke Hinds' blog, Zombie Treats, or on opendayz.net.

http://youtu.be/SCPdMck_Yc4

We've been playing the The War Z alpha on and off for a few weeks—long enough to collect some initial thoughts on the open-world zombie survival game and how it compares to the genre's progenitor, DayZ.