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Virtual Battlespace 3

Monday May 19, 2014

What is it?

Virtual Battlespace 3, or VBS3, is the Army’s flagship training game. It is a tactical training and mission rehearsal, three-dimensional, first-person military training simulation program. Facilitated by U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command’s Combined Arms Center-Training, VBS3 provides an immersive, visually rich gaming environment with flexible scenario and terrain options and includes more realistic graphics than previous versions. VBS3 has been accredited to support more than 102 combined arms training tasks, from the individual Soldier level to company collective. Below are some of the tasks units and leaders can perform in VBS3:

  • – Integrate indirect fire support
  • – Conduct an attack
  • – Conduct a defense
  • – Establish an observation post
  • – Enter and clear a building
  • – Breach an obstacle
  • – Conduct route reconnaissance
  • – Conduct convoy security
  • – Conduct a roadblock and checkpoint
  • – Conduct an artillery raid
  • – Perform tactical air movement missions

What has the Army done?

VBS3 is the latest version of Virtual Battlespace, the Army’s premier first-person simulation game. VBS3 has increased capabilities that reflect the transition of the Army toward decisive action operations and an expeditionary mindset. Previous versions reflected the operational environments in Iraq and Afghanistan with a counterinsurgency focus. VBS3 retains this counterinsurgency capability and provides higher-fidelity combined arms scenarios. The training support packages that are available with VBS3 are being updated to reflect the Decisive Action Training Environment.

What continued efforts does the Army have planned for the future?

The Army is adopting the VBS3 game engine in several simulators to include the Dismounted Soldier Training System and the Close Combat Tactical Trainer. Using a common game engine to provide the image generation simplifies integration of simulators and facilitates larger exercises using multiple simulations.

Why is this important to the Army?

VBS3 facilitates less expensive, more efficient live-training events by allowing Soldiers and leaders to exercise on a variety of tasks at the “crawl” and “walk” levels of proficiency. VBS3 enables Soldiers and leaders to enter their training event at a higher level of readiness, reducing the resources required to achieve proficiency. The software is free to authorized users under an Army enterprise license and can be downloaded off of the MilGaming website. The site requires a common access card and explains the minimum computer system requirements needed to download VBS3.

Resources:

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