What Is VBS2?
Virtual Battlespace 2 (VBS2) is a desktop military training simulation made by Bohemia Interactive Australia, later Bohemia Interactive Simulations. Built on the engine behind the game Arma 2, it became the worldwide standard for game-based military training, and thousands of Soldiers trained on it before deploying to Iraq and Afghanistan. VBS3 replaced it in 2014.
Training That Saves Lives
I have spoken to commanding officers who have told me that the repeated drilling of troops in the correct procedures using VBS2 means that, when faced with real situations in-theatre, they are far more effective; and this has saved lives. (Source: UK Ministry of Defence)
Virtual Battlespace 2 (VBS2) is the product that revolutionized the military simulation industry. Built on the game engine behind Bohemia Interactive’s commercial game Arma 2, it quickly became the worldwide standard for desktop military simulation. The U.S. Army began fielding it in 2009 through its Games for Training program.
VBS2 vs. Arma 2
If you have played Arma, VBS2 will look familiar. Both grew out of Operation Flashpoint, and both run on Bohemia Interactive engine technology. The difference is who they are built for. Arma is a game for players. VBS2 is a training tool for militaries, sold to armed forces and defense companies rather than in stores. That is why it has features a game does not need:
- Trainee gameplay including infantry, land, sea and air vehicles, and civilian role players
- Instructor tools, such as a 3D mission editor that works during live multiplayer sessions
- A massive content library with thousands of working weapons, vehicles, characters and props
- A comprehensive After Action Review (AAR) tool for debriefing trainees
- Interoperability with other military simulations through the DIS and HLA protocols
- A suite of developer tools
Built for Real Operations
Thousands of Soldiers trained with VBS2 before deploying to Iraq and Afghanistan. Its features were designed to prepare them for the realities of modern counter-insurgency warfare.
A Model of Continuous Improvement
VBS2 followed a different business model from Bohemia Interactive’s games. Game studios usually release a new title every few years (Arma, Arma 2, Arma 3). Military simulations follow an enterprise software model instead, so Bohemia Interactive Simulations kept updating the same VBS2 product for years.
Militaries around the world paid for those updates. As a result, almost every feature in VBS2 was built for a specific training need of some Soldier, somewhere. VBS3 and VBS4 work the same way.
What Came Next
In 2014 VBS3 replaced VBS2, built on the engine behind Arma 3. In 2020 VBS4 replaced VBS3 with a whole-earth simulation.
My Role
I joined Bohemia Interactive Australia in 2006, at the very beginning of VBS2 development. Like many of the early team, I was recruited from the Operation Flashpoint modding community. We were a handful of developers working out of a shed in rural Australia. At first we didn’t even have running water, but the beach was a few hundred meters away for a surf at lunch. We had never met in person, yet we already knew each other from the game’s community.
As a technical game designer, I wrote gameplay features directly in the engine’s scripting language and configuration files, which let us prototype and ship quickly. I designed and scripted many of VBS2’s core systems:
- Weapons, munitions and ballistics
- Injury and knockout effects
- Player inventory
- Vehicle interaction
- The scripted functions library
Like any startup, everyone wore many hats. I also handled testing (there was no dedicated QA team for the first year or two), installer and build pipeline updates, project management, product support and customer training courses.