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The year is 1997. Two brothers from Czech Republic, Ondřej and Marek Španěl, alongside their business partner Slavomír Pavlíček started working on a new game. The team had envisioned an open world realistic tactical shooter and so Poseidon entered development. Flash forward to year 1999. The three form a new game development studio titled Bohemia Interactive and Poseidon eventually gets released in 2001 as Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Rising, published by Codemasters.
Following it's massive success, Bohemia started working on so called "game 2", a sequel to Operation Flashpoint. However BI and Codemasters went separate ways after several conflicts and Codemasters kept the flashpoint licence. Eventually in 2005, Bohemia released a sequel to Operation Flashpoint, titled Arma: Armed Assault. It's massive success led BI to kickstart the Arma franchise as the official sequels to the original Operation Flashpoint.
Inspired by their success, Codemasters followed and released two of their own Operation Flashpoint games, Red River and Dragon Rising. Their failure led Codemasters to abandon the franchise while Bohemia Interactive's Arma series thrived thanks to Arma 2.
In 2011, Bohemia signed an agreement with Codemasters and Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Rising was handed back to Bohemia Interactive, who re-released it digitally as Arma: Cold War Assault and so the series went full circle.

The game uses photoscanned textures and environments. While the models may look a bit blocky by 2001 standards, the textures hold up really well and the game also sports a good lighting system for the time and it also has a really nice visual style that holds a lot of magic. The sound design is pretty good for the time aswell, especially with the EAX sound system. The gunfire echoes realistically through the environment, the developers even coded sound travel time simulation, the gunshot sounds are meaty and the ambience is pretty good. The voice acting sounds a bit unnatural due to the way the voice lines are handled but this system also allows for a huge variety of different situational voice calls that very few games have even today.
The soundtrack is also pretty amazing. Composed by Ondřej Matejka, it is a combination of orchestral music and synths and feels like a 1980s action movie score. There are plenty of great and memorable tracks and it's definitely worth giving it a listen even outside the game.
What really sells this game though is it's unpreceeded attention to detail and raw realism. While it may not seem that advanced nowadays, it's pretty damn impressive for 2001. The maps are huge, have realistic terrain and a lot of small hidden details and easter eggs. You can use gas stations, climb up elevator shafts and so on. Since the game is set in 1985, it also faithfully replicates the atmosphere and feel of the 1980s with period accurate uniforms and weaponry (with the exception of the PP-19), vehicles etc.
You die in a few shots, there's a radio calls system and different soldier specialisations with different equipment and role. The levels are huge and very open aswell, allowing you to approach situations in a lot of unique ways. You can also drive a variety of vehicles and the game sports strong mod tools as well as a very nice mission editor. The game does feel a bit janky but you'll quickly get accustomed to the controls and gameplay. It's a hardcore shooter which requires you to tacticise and you cannot go in guns-blazing.
The main campaign takes place in 1985 and follows 4 main protagonists from the US Military: Corporal David Armstrong, Lieutenant Robert Hammer, Captain Sam Nichols and Captain James Gastowski fighting in an armed conflict on the Malden Islands against the Soviet Army.
The Steam version also gets pre-packaged with the Resistance expansion where you play as Viktor Troska, a guerilla fighting against the Soviets on the island of Nogova three years prior to the events of the main campaign.
You get a nice variety of different missions on several different islands. The missions are unique, the storyline is cheesy but fun and memorable.
A second expansion titled Red Hammer also came out, but it was developed by a different studio and is non-canon.
Simply put
+ Soundtrack
+ Sound design
+ Story
+ Graphics
+ Mission structure
+ Realism
+ Level Design
+ Resistance is included
- A bit janky in some areas
Simply a great game made by a passionate and small team from Czech Republic that deserves more recognition. If you've ever played any of the newer Arma games, make sure to get this one aswell to see how the franchise began back in 2001 and you'll definitely feel right at home here and get a lot of fun outta this one. This game is the father of the modern milsim genre and is definitely worth getting.