COMMERCIAL-IN-CONFIDENCE

Copyright 2010

Serious Games for the Royal Navy
Peter Morrison CEO, Bohemia Interactive Simulations COMMERCIAL-IN-CONFIDENCE For UK Ministry of Defence Use Only
Introduction to Bohemia Interactive History of maritime games Serious maritime games for training
Dangerous Waters Ship Simulator Pro 24 Blue / Scuba Sim

The way ahead?

VBS2 and why it is different
To integrate, or modularize?
Maritime concepts in VBS2 (UK, ADF) Boat gunnery training Aircrewman training

Bohemia Interactive?

Bohemia Interactive Studio (BIS)
Formed in Czech Republic, 1999 Real Virtuality Engine for Games Operation Flashpoint, 2001 Armed Assault, 2006 Real Virtuality Engine for Simulation Virtual Battlespace (VBS) point of sale Australian company formed in 2001 Czech company formed in 2009 US company formed in 2010
Bohemia Interactive Simulations (BISim)

Technology

Entertainment (BIS) 2010 Military Training (BISim) ArmA (2006)
Capability enhancements for military organisations

VBS2 (2008) OFP (2001)

VBS1 (2003) Game Engine

The VBS2 Open Platform

For more information visit http://www.vbs2.com/whitepaper

History

Harpoon II, 1994 (MS-DOS) Harpoon 3, 2002 (Windows) Simulates air and naval ops Complete 1980-2015 Order of Battle for more than 60 countries
Janes Fleet Command, 1999 Submarine, surface, naval air, electronic warfare US, UK, Russian, Indian, Chinese units Developed by Sonalysts
Janes 688 Hunter / Killer, 1997 Successor to 688 Attack Sub Los Angeles class sub sim Developed by Sonalysts
Silent Hunter II, releases (Silent Hunter I 5) U-boat simulation Ultra-realistic

So lets exploit games!

But as game consoles take over, simulation games are becoming rarer Only AAA sim release in 2009 was DCS: Blackshark! Demise of Microsoft Flight Simulator You need to figure out how to exploit disruptive game technology and promote a market.

Maritime 'serious' games

Dangerous Waters
Produced by Sonalysts (United States) Sonalysts have a long history, starting with 688 Hunter / Killer Employed extensively by US Navy for desktop training Limited to air and naval simulation
Ship Simulator Professional
Recently renamed Nautis Produced by VStep (Netherlands) Use cases:
Piloting ships of many different shapes and sizes Bridge simulation Tug simulation Harbour familiarization

Videos

24 Blue and ScubaSim
24 Blue simulates carrier operations ScubaSim provides highly accurate underwater simulation Both developed by Breakaway (US)

Developers of Mosbe

24 Blue video ScubaSim video
In summary: All of these products are developed by small, niche game companies, and have been used successfully in training. All of these serious games are tailor-made for specific training needs. Re-use and combined training is difficult. The way forward? Two options:
1) Integrate, or 2) Modularize
Integrating maritime games?
Dangerous Waters (Sonalysts)
Integration by HLA / DIS / APIs
VBS2 (Bohemia Interactive)

Terrain

Ship Simulator (VStep)

Mosbe (Breakaway)

ScubaSim (Breakaway)

Advantages

HLA and DIS are proven standards Gateways are relatively inexpensive (one-off cost per simulator)

Disadvantages

Each game must be licensed separately Each game has visualization limitations
Size of terrain, number of models, range of models
Terrain must be correlated Latency, complexity of configuration

Modularization?

Use a common image generator platform and different providers build simulations externally, and connect via an API In the game industry this is called middleware Main advantage
Simulations become independent of the visualization, allowing re-use

Main disadvantage

One-off cost to integrate each niche simulator

Middleware API API

Game Engine

Proprietary Standardized

VBS2 for maritime applications
VBS2 simulates water, tides, sea state, weather, day/night, waves on the shore, underwater To date, VBS2 has only been used to demonstrate maritime concepts, not to train operators

ADFWC

Basic submarine, Torpedo, Harpoon, air-to-air refuelling

UK MOD

Type 45 for amphibious ops / familiarization
Hovercraft, landing craft, realistic ship physics

UK Type 45

Boat gunnery training Video
Aircrewman Virtual Reality Simulator (AVRS) AVRS MVRS (Marshalling)
VBS2 development methodology
The majority of VBS2 development is now driven by military organizations through development funding New VBS2 capability is then provided to all enterprise users*
*(Gold support arrangement required)

VBS2 long term goal

VBS2 is moving beyond desktop simulation US Army image generator enhancements
Multi-channel, fixed frame rate, SimulWeather for weather simulation
UK tank gunnery enhancements
Configurable optics, weapon systems, ballistics
Terrain paging VBS2Fusion (incl CIGI)
To provide a game-based simulation platform that can be used across the entire virtual simulation spectrum Solve interoperability issues (latency, terrain correlation) by using the one virtual environment The Government is positioned to recommend use of a standard IG across many simulation systems Abstraction through standardised APIs provides future-proofing

The way forward?

There are niche simulators available for naval applications, and they are very good UK MOD should examine a common visualization platform and modularize for long-term cost savings
Solve latency and correlation issues Facilitate re-use of terrains, models, simulated systems (Until something better comes along) You already own it!
VBS2 could be the common platform?

VBS2 demonstration

Basic submarine, Torpedo, Harpoon, air-to-air refueling

VBS2Fires

A modularization case study

Questions?

Presented by Peter Morrison, CEO of Bohemia Interactive Simulations Contact: Website: Whitepaper: Email: Buy ArmA2: Testimonials: It saves a lot of money. It saves a lot of ammo. It saves lives because you dont have the training accidents that do occur. Mike McCaffrey, US Army We all play computer games, but this isn't just a game. It's serious. Pte Frank Boateng , UK MoD http://www.vbs2.com http://www.vbs2.com/whitepaper sales@vbs2.com http://store.steampowered.com/app/33900