Bohemia Interactive on Serious Games, Virtual Battlespace, and the USMC - Jason Dobson

Military-themed games represent a significant potion of the serious games market. Whether in the form of training simulations or even games aimed at treating PTSD is soldiers returning from war, serious games have become more and more prevalent as tools used by various arms of the military.

Along with this, recently it was announced by representatives from developer Bohemia Interactive, best known for the Operation Flashpoint series of titles, that the United States Marine Corps (USMC) purchased an enterprise license for the company's Virtual Battlespace (VBS) software. Recently Serious Games Source spoke with Peter Morrison, lead developer of VBS2 at Bohemia Interactive, to get a bit more information concerning this recent news, as well as what it means for Bohemia Interactive's contributions to the serious games space.

Hello, and thank you for taking the time to speak with us today regarding Bohemia Interactive's VBS, and the recently news regarding your company's involvement with the USMC. Before we dive into that, however, could you give us some background on Bohemia Interactive itself?

Thanks Jason, Bohemia Interactive was formed in 1999, residing in Prague, Czech Republic. From the beginning our goal was to develop state of the art 3D computer games, and to this end we’ve developed our own game engine known as ‘Real Virtuality’. The Real Virtuality Engine powered the virtual environment behind our first release, Operation Flashpoint, which offered gamers an open-ended experience with large playboxes and dynamic gameplay.

Operation Flashpoint was highly successful and appealed to the serious games market from an early stage, and for this reason we released Virtual Battlespace 1 (VBS1) in 2002. VBS1 added functionality such as after-action review, to provide a more useful tool for training or experimentation. We now have studios in both the Czech Republic and Australia, and both Operation Flashpoint (also known as Ambush! In the US Army) and VBS1 is employed by a wide range of organizations.

Feedback received from both the entertainment and serious games markets have shaped the latest version of our game engine, ‘Virtual Reality 2’, which combines high-fidelity, large scale virtual environments with cutting-edge graphics technology.

In December 2001 Bohemia Interactive opened a studio in Australia and started the development on VBS, which your website describes as a “special military training simulation.” Can you give us some more background on this tool, and also how Bohemia decided to make the leap from mainstream game development to training simulators?

Over the past decade there has been growing interest in the employment of computer games to support military training, experimentation and decision support. Whilst most computer games are affordable in comparison to purpose-built virtual environments, they often lack key features or functionality areas. For example, the military training cycle demands after-action review to confirm learning, and most games lack data output and therefore objective evaluation of performance becomes very difficult. We modified Operation Flashpoint to provide a more functional training tool, incorporating after-action review, in-game observer modes and real-time scenario editing, and VBS1 was borne.

The ‘leap’ to developing training simulators was quite natural and has complimented our game development. Military feedback helps drive the development of our engine, which results in a better product. Quite often the military pushes our engine to the limits, for example running large multiplayer sessions or very long scenarios. We strive to meet the ever-changing requirements of ‘serious’ customers and in doing so our engine continues to improve. The flexible nature of VBS1 has also allowed us to compete directly with more established military simulation companies, for example we are now developing a loadmaster training simulator for the Australian Defence Force and also a product to help train first responders.

How is VBS used today? Is the USMC the first organization to adopt its use? Has your company been approached by other organizations, especially in the wake of recent news that the USMC purchased an enterprise license for VBS?

Both VBS1 and Operation Flashpoint is already used by a wide range of organizations, ranging from military (including the Australian Defence Force, USMC, US Army and Canadian Armed Forces) through to academic (for experimentation) and also corporate (as a flexible 3D visualization engine). Our biggest ‘serious’ market is certainly the military, as tightening budgets have forced training organizations to examine low-cost simulation as a supplement to live (in-the-field) training. The USMC is the second organization to purchase an enterprise license (the Australian Defence Force was the first). We are focusing on the requirement of these two organizations as we finalize our new military training simulation, VBS2.

Did the USMC approach your company regarding its potential use of VBS, or did you pitch the idea to them?

The USMC first purchased a number of licenses of VBS1 in 2002, so it has been used in a limited capacity at various simulation centers for a number of years. The enterprise license was secured once Bohemia Interactive demonstrated the improvements made in VBS1 in accordance with the requirement of the Australian Defence Force, and the prototype VBS2 product that is being designed specifically for the military market. Our Australian studio is dedicated to VBS and as such has been able to effect changes in the game engine very quickly, and I think that this appeals to our customers (we’ve been told that it takes either a lot of money or a very long time to have code changes implemented in most other game engines).

How will VBS be used by the USMC? What does it offer them, as well as other potential suitors, that is not already readily available?

VBS will be used by the USMC for networked mission rehearsal and tactical training (up to the combat team level, ie 100 human participants). VBS allows for combined arms training, for example tank crews can operate virtual vehicles and interoperate with infantry or air. We are also linking VBS into the USMC Deployable Virtual Training Environment (DVTE) via HLA, so VBS participants will be able to participate in scenarios involving a number of different simulation systems.

A user can create any imaginable scenario in VBS without requiring contractor support, from helicopter insertions onto roof tops through to a complex combined arms assault. We can (and have) simulated almost all military hardware available ranging from ground vehicles through to ships and aircraft, and also systems such radar and even a multiple launch rocket system (MLRS). And of course VBS remains commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS), requiring no special computer hardware!

VBS is built upon the Real Virtuality engine. Is this an in-house developed technology? What makes this engine stand out from other similar software development tools?

The Real Virtuality engine was developed entirely by Bohemia Interactive, and we’ve developed all of our own tools, from modeling software through to applications for terrain import and modification. From the beginning Real Virtuality was designed to be open-ended and customizable, and this is the main difference between it and the myriad of other game engines available today. We also strive for realism; our engine provides simulation of wind and weather, ground clutter (such as grass), day/night cycles, tides, waves, fatigue modeling and even ‘ambient life’ – birds and insects that help bring an otherwise static environment to life.

Along the same lines, what will be introduced with Real Virtuality 2, and by association Virtual Battlespace 2?

Real Virtuality 2, the game engine behind VBS2, offers large scale (up to 100km square) virtual environments that do not compromise (trade-off) fidelity for size. Simulations typically do either urban environments or large open areas, but after seven years of development our Real Virtuality engine can do both. VBS2 also delivers ‘rapid terrain development’ and this is a very exciting feature, as previously satellite-mapped geo-specific 3D virtual environments were often cost-prohibitive. We also offer the customer the ability to develop these terrain areas in-house, without the requirement for contractor support. In accordance with customer feedback we’d developed a constructive interface for command and control, new agent-based customizable AI, a myriad of interface improvements and real-world physics, and all of these improvements are included with VBS2.

VBS itself is available in two flavors, ‘VBS1 Developer' and ‘VBS1 Lite’. What are the key differences between these versions? Are they targeted to different audiences?

To put it simply, VBS Developer requires a USB dongle in order to run, VBS Lite does not. VBS Lite is limited in terms of functionality (it does not have after-action review, for example), whereas VBS Developer is fully-featured. So I suppose the two different versions are primarily designed to help our customers manage software licensing without compromising security. We also offer the customer the ability to encrypt their own content so classified scenarios or add-ons (new weapons or vehicles) aren’t compatible with the commercial computer-game versions of our engine.

VBS Lite can be used for any imaginable purpose, for example the Australian Defence Force will be providing VBS Lite to soldiers for individual training at home (perhaps navigation or weapons training). We also offer VBS Lite as a low-cost recruitment tool, for use in a similar manner to Americas Army.

Looking ahead, what is the Virtual Tool Kit? What are you company's plans with this tool?

As the name implies, we hope to provide ‘Virtual Tool Kit’ with VBS2 that allows the customer to modify the simulation themselves, to suit their own needs, without requiring an intimate knowledge of how the simulation works. The traditional model demands that once a simulation is purchased the customer must them engage the developer and fund modification, whereas the editors provided with the VTK should allow the customer to carry out a wide range of modification in-house.

The Virtual Tool Kit (VTK) therefore comprises a suite of editors that will compliment the VBS2 product. In addition to the standard model and terrain editors, the VTK includes a Configuration Editor (allows simulation characteristics to be quickly and easily modified in a graphical interface), a Weapons Editor (allows the user to create new weapons based on existing ones in-game, and create new unit types), improvements to our terrain editor to allow import of digitized 2D maps, and also a range of improvements to the VBS2 Real Time Mission Editor to allow AI tasks and behaviors to be more easily defined. The VTK development will probably be sponsored by the USMC and also include a number of engine improvements, including deformable terrain, thermal imaging and an API to ‘plug-in’ external AI.

Thank you very much for your time today. Is there anything you would like to add?

Thank you, we will be exhibiting at the Serious Games Summit in Washington DC this year, demonstrating both VBS2 and the prototype of our Virtual Responder Trainer (VRT). Keep an eye out for the Bohemia Interactive stand.