The Showdown Between "Virtual Battlespace 2" vs "America's Army 3" Featured at Training and Simulation Journal

Well folks, the last issue of Training and Simulation Journal (TSJ) came packed (as usually happens when I/ITSEC is near), so bear with me.

Today I want to give a heads up on Michael Peck's article "Battle of the Video Games" (page 32 of the print version, December2009/January2010 issue) ...
Apparently, America's Army 3 (AA3) has lost its competition with Virtual Battlespace 2 (VBS2) to be the official soldier training tool of the US Army . Reasons for VBS2's win are many and the article cites:

• Ability to mod the simulation
• Interoperability with other simulations
• Simulation of battle command systems
• Large maps

The crux of the issue appears to be VBS2's enormous flexibility available right out of the box, even for non-expert end users. This is something AA3 can't deliver in its current state.
These passages of the article cracked me up:

The Army itself seems curiously ambivalent on what games its soldiers should use. In the old days, instructors would head down to Best Buy and get whatever game they thought would work.

 "We lost because it didn't [AA3] have enough water towers or cars with orange bumpers" -Col. Casey Wardynski, the guy who conceived America's Army in the late 1990s

 Cheers,