We're sending out word that the PC version of America's Army: Special Forces has recently been updated to build 2.8.3.1. This new update will address several bugs and issues that were present in the game's previous version. More details are available in the full article.

Remember "The Last Starfighter"? The premise for that particular 1984 movie was based on the urban legend that video arcade games were in fact being used by the military to test for suitable recruits. Well, right now, the U.S. Army is currently under fire for bringing that very same urban legend to reality.

According to Yahoo! News, anti-recruitment groups are slamming a US Army deal to sponsor a computer war game channel at the Global Gaming League website in June. The centerpiece for the channel will be the five-year-old FPS title America's Army, a game that's based on the army training manual.

The Army aims to use the channel to find potential soldiers among gamers in the cherished recruiting age range of 17 to 24. Playing at the channel will be free, but players who sign up will also have to agree to "additional contact from the Army." Those who oppose the Army's move said that it's "wrong for military recruiters to use technology and pop culture to entice young people to enlist without showing them the ugly sides of service."

Oskar Castro of the "admittedly anti-war" American Friends Service Committee, who said he had played America's Army before, also recounted meeting young gamers inspired to be soldiers by their love of playing the game. "It was really bizarre to actually see that," Castro said. "They had every plan to go into the military and they didn't have a full vision of how the military works."

"If you are going to show what war is like you should show what war is like," said Castro. "You don't have 'game over' and start again. 'Game over' means you come home in a body bag and a casket."

America's Army, one of the only free FPS games worth downloading, has surpassed 8 million users and is still going strong. Having actually downloaded the game myself when it first came out, it sure has come a long way.

This game has found its way onto many personal computers of youngsters, want-to-be soldiers, and even those real, life-saving people called heroes. The game, which is both used as a recruiting tool (who would've guessed?) and a training tool has reached a milestone and will continue to reach new ones as there is an average 150,000 users added each month!

After you go through the rigorous training session in the game, you are set out on an online battle against other players, and with 8,000,000 users having registered, there shouldn't be a problem with finding people to play with! At the top of the article you'll find a distribution map of registered players (approximate locations), which leads me to believe that we should recruit outside of the Americas in order to get more troops.