The GameSpy has discontinued its services and due to this reason Bohemia Interactive a. s. (BI) have offered an alternative for the BI Community. BI has released the update 1.63 for ArmA 2: Operation Arrowhead (see changelog). Besides the fixes and optimizations, the update focuses on the transition of the multiplayer online support from GameSpy to Steam services. Because the Steam based matchmaking requires Steam client software, this update is only available via Steam website. If you have purchased a retail version of the ArmA 2 titles, you can activate all the CD-keys on Steam website. (see walkthrough).

For the other game titles affected by the GameSpy service shutdown, but not updated to work with Steam services, and also for those players who wish to stay with the retail version of the game titles, BI have implemented the Server Browser for hosting and connecting to servers without the GameSpy services. Here server owners may add their servers and players may use the IP addresses to connect to them. Also BI have added articles for each game title to the support website and the technical support is ready to help via e-mail.

The game titles affected by the GameSpy service shutdown:

• Arma Cold War Assault
• Arma Armed Assault
• Arma Gold
• Arma 2
• Arma 2 Operation Arrowhead
• Arma 2 Combined Operations
• Arma 2 Complete Collection
• Arma X Anniversary edition
• All the Arma 2 DLCs
• Take On Helicopters

How to connect to server?

To connect to a server you need to know the its IP address and port. Usually, these can be obtained from the server host (in most cases, they would have a website with the server details), in this case you can use the Server Browser.

If you know the server data, do following :

1. Start your game

2. In the Main menu bar, select Multiplayer mode item

3. In the Network games on <your IP address> dialog box, click the Remote button

4. In the Host IP Address dialog box, set following:

4.1. in the Address field, enter the IP address of the server

4.2. in the Port field, enter the port number of the server

5. Click the OK button to close the Host IP Address dialog box

6. In the Network games on <your IP address> dialog box:

6.1. Select the server entry from the list

6.2. Click on the Join button