America's Army: Special Forces (Overmatch)

Release Notes (Version 2.8.5)

=======================================================

What's new

=======================================================

This release includes ES2 updates to three maps, SF Courtyard, SF Hospital,

Urban Assault. The maps have been updated with additional ES2 objects to discover

and report. ES2 Bridge is a revised version of the classic Bridge Crossing

map with new elements added such as ES2 objects with a new types of intelligence

functionality. The new functionality includes unlocking access to a new path

under the bridge, and supplying intelligellence on enemy positions.

SF Courtyard

"Intelligence reports that an illegal arms dealer is planning to

transfer stolen top secret material to an agent of a known terrorist

organization. Location of sensitive material is only known to be

located in vicinity C94M98A04. Reports confirm that there are willing

informants who know the exact whereabouts of the sensitive material."

SF Hospital

"Following an ambush by enemy forces, a wounded Resistance leader

escaped to a neutral hospital for treatment of his wounds.  The

leader is a critical member of the Resistance government within

Unconventional Warfare Area of Operations (UWAO) JAZZ."

Urban Assault

"A coalition convoy was raided and the cargo was stolen. It has

been confirmed that the insurgents and the cargo are based in a

residential area of the city. Due to the dense urban nature of the

area it will be necessary to do a house by house assault on foot."

ES2 Bridge

"Enemy forces masquerading as refugees have ambushed the US forces

defending bridge at grid WS663429. Your force returning from patrol

is now on the hostile side of bridge, and must link up with your company

headquarters to pass along time-sensitive information."

=======================================================

System Requirements (have not changed):

=======================================================

The current Minimum System Requirements for AA:SF (Overmatch) are as follows:

            - 3-D graphics card with 128 MB memory and support for hardware transformation and lighting

            - 2.4 GHz processor or equivalent

            - English version of Windows(r) 2000/XP Operating System with latest updates

            - 512 MB RAM

            - 3.5GB of uncompressed hard disk space for game files

            - 4X DVD-ROM (not required for downloaded installations)

            - Windows 2000/XP compatible system (including compatible 32-bit drivers for CD-ROM drive, video card, sound card,

              mouse and keyboard)

            - DirectX(r)9.0

            - 100% Compatible DirectX 9.0 soundcard

            - 56kbps Modem or other network connection

            - *Nvidia® nForce™ or other motherboard/soundcards containing Dolby Digital® Content Encoder required for

               Dolby Digital® audio.

The current Recommended System Requirements for AA:SF (Overmatch) are as follows:

            - 3-D graphics card with 256 MB memory and support for hardware transformation and lighting

            - 3.0 GHz processor or equivalent

            - English version of Windows(r) 2000/XP Operating System with all updates

            - 1 GB RAM

            - 3.5GB of uncompressed hard disk space for game files

            - 4X DVD-ROM (not required for downloaded installation)

            - Windows 2000/XP compatible system (including compatible 32-bit drivers for CD-ROM drive, video card,

          sound card, mouse and keyboard)

            - DirectX(r) 9.0

            - 100% Compatible DirectX 9.0 soundcard

            - Broadband Network Connection

            - NVIDIA(r) nForce(tm) or other motherboards/soundcards containing the Dolby(r) Digital Interactive

          Content Encoder required for Dolby Digital audio

=======================================================

Technical Notes

=======================================================

     ********************************************

     ** IMPORTANT NOTE FOR SERVER HOSTS/ADMINS **

     ********************************************

NOTE: The cooperative missions will take significantly more CPU resources to run during normal gameplay

      due to the additional AI processing load (shared between the server & client). Server hosts planning to run

      Co-Op servers should plan accordingly. In addition, players running a Co-Op server and client on the same

      machine will experience heavy CPU demand.

      It is recommended that server rotations switch only from Co-Op level to Co-Op level, or MP to MP level for

      best performance.

--------------------------------------------------------

GAME PORTS:

--------------------------------------------------------

The internet ports currently required to be open for America's Army v2.8.1 are listed below:

            UDP - 1716, 1717, 1718, 8777, 27900

            TCP - 14200, 20025-45, 20046, 20047, 20048, 28910

            UDP ports explained:

                  1716 for the Game,

                  1717 for the GameQuery,

                  1718 for the Master Server Query,

                  8777 for the Standard UT Query, and 27900 for GameSpy.

        TCP ports explained:

                  28910 for GameSpy

                  20025-45 for MBS Game Server,

                  20046 for the Auth server,

                  20047 for MBS, 20048 for DCDS, and 14200 for LAN.

=======================================================

What's Fixed

=======================================================

NOTE: This list only includes bugs present in v2.8.3.1 that have been fixed.

Bugs fixed related to new v2.8.4 features and certain security/exploit fixes have been removed from this list.

-------------------------------------------------------

Map Specific

- ES2Border: Rebuilt map to re-add lighting to interiors.

- ES2Border: Adjusted Civilian AI logic to reduce the chances of civialians running into the line of fire

- ES2Border: ES2 Points are now more evenly awarded to the reporting player as well as live team members

- ES2Border: Scoring for ES2 objects has been re-evaluated and is now the same for all maps. Points are

now reflected by the value of the reported object

- ES2Border: Fixed terrain and player sticking issues

- ES2Border: Fixed various building anomolies

- ES2Border: Changed all Triggers and Objectives to be hidden while viewing in single player.

- ES2Border: Fixed issue with IED exploding even when not visible

- ES2Border: Fixed ES2 objects that did not spawn flags when reported

- ES2McKenna: Fixed AAR Instructor's face and hands

Miscellaneous

- Fixed issues with Friendlies showing up as Op-For when spectating in a co-op mission.

- Fixed a problem with ES2 objects not showing up after the game round is restarted.

- Fixed issue with the camera sinking through the ground while ragdolling in first-person. It was caused

by a counter not being incremented unless the ragdoll was being rendered. Bumped the eye position up a

few units when the player is dead just to ensure the camera doesn't even partially look through the ground.

- ES2: Added capability to damage ES2 objects. Added several damageable ES2 objects to the ES2 maps.

- ES2: Added objectives to the list of grenade damagable objects

- ES2: Tweaked spawning probabilities of certain ES2 objects

Improvements

- AI: ES2Border civilians should now take appropriate cover when approached by US Forces or fired upon. Civilian