ArmA II due out in Q1 2009

505 Games has announced that it will be publishing ArmA II in Europe during Q1 2009.

Bohemia Interactive's follow-up to the excellent original game remains PC-exclusive for now, according to the publisher, and you can see what it looks like in our sexy new ArmA II screenshot gallery.

Like its predecessor, ArmA II is a simulation-heavy military first-person shooter, this time set in a fictional post-Soviet country called Chernarus, where you play as one of the US Marine Corps Force Recon squad sent in as peacekeepers.

Specifics are relatively thin on the ground, but we're promised more squad combat, a "comprehensive playbook of military tactics", massive battlefields and a story "full of political intrigue and plot twists, which blurs the boundaries between fact and fiction". Slightly disorientating, but we like it.

As you would expect for a simulation from Bohemia - who developed Operation Flashpoint before moving on to Armed Assault - artificial intelligence is also a focus, and team-mates and enemies will now make use of cover and coordinate their actions.

If they're not enough of a challenge for you though, you can always head out in the wild and kill real people thanks to "comprehensive online multiplayer modes".

And if you hate the entire game (bit early for that if you ask us, but this is the internet), there's always the prospect of Armed Assault's "extremely strong modding community" taking a sledgehammer to Bohemia's hard work and coming up with something else.

All of which are good reasons to check out our Armed Assault review to see what you were missing and to click through to the ArmA II screenshot gallery at the second time of asking.