LOS ANGELES -- Being all that you can be is going digital, and Uncle Sam is footing the bill.

The U.S. Army hopes to attract military recruits with two new computer games that simulate life as a soldier in combat and basic training.

The military has supplied advice to video game makers for other titles over the years, but "America's Army, the Official U.S. Army Game" is the military division's first foray into creating games itself.

The PC software consists of two separate titles, "Soldiers," a role-playing character-builder akin to the popular "real life" simulator "The Sims," and "Operations," a first-person shooter game that takes the player on missions to attack enemies. They were introduced Wednesday.

"The Army's not a game, but we use war games in our training and this is kind of an extension of that. It's just a new way of connecting with young Americans," said Lt. Col. Casey Wardynski, director of the office of Economic and Manpower Analysis.

Recognizing that movies like "Top Gun" and "Black Hawk Down" can help attract recruits, the military often cooperates with entertainment producers on projects the Pentagon believes present the organizations fairly. But it's rare for the military to initiate its own projects. Wardynski proposed the idea for an Army video game in 1999, arguing that military vehicles and equipment will require greater computer familiarity in the future.

The games are expected to come out in July or August, and all the software will be free, Wardynski said. Most of the 1.2 million discs released will be attached to popular video game magazines.

By September, the Army expects to have paid about $7.5 million to create and distribute the games, he added.

The announcement came at the start of the Electronic Entertainment Expo, the interactive gaming industry's annual worldwide convention. Visitors were greeted by a camouflaged Humvee and a small tank parked near the entrance while soldiers distributed fliers about the games.

John Hiles, one of the creators of "Soldiers," said the game was set on an Army base to show players that even the less glamorous side of military life can be rewarding.

There are no terrorists to hunt in that game, no borders to protect - but it does feature barking drill instructors, target shooting and other training exercises that offer character-building points.

Characters who pay attention, follow orders and work hard advance on scales that measure loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service and honor. That gives them greater skills and options later in the game.

"If your guy has values, he continues in his career," Hiles said. "If he's there to party and minimize his work, then maybe he gets stuck and doesn't make it."

The "Operations" game is a more traditional shooting adventure, featuring battles to defend U.S. interests like the Alaskan oil pipeline or eliminate enemy forces such as a terrorist training camps.

"The game does include violence, but only in the same way the real Army uses force in defense of our country," said Michael Capps, a designer of "Operations." "We wanted to portray it as a value-laden organization."

"Operations" is played online with a squad of other remote gamers, and just like "Soldiers," it rewards positive military behavior.

Any gamer who logs in to cause havoc by shooting at fellow members of the special operations team gets kicked out of the game. The joke is they can still log in - but their point-of-view is locked behind bars in the Fort Leavenworth military prison.

On the Net: http://www.americasarmy.com

Lt. Colonel Casey Wardynski, the father of the promotional concept, said the five-year project seeks to both inform prospective recruits about the varied jobs the Armed Forces unit offers, and to serve as a kind of ''screen test.''

''We want to want to provide enough information so the young American can see if this is something they would be interested in doing,'' he said in an interview at the Electronic Entertainment Expo conference in Los Angeles, the video game industry's annual trade show.

''And we would like them to keep their eyes open so they can know 'Here's what the Army expects and here's what we expect from you,''' he said, noting that the program is expected to reach computer users in high schools and colleges.

The free game will be available in August via Internet download, magazines and Army locations and Web sites. The game was built by Department of Defense experts, in conjunction with privately held developer Epic Games.

The game features 20 single and multiplayer scenarios, including training missions ranging from navigating obstacle courses at Fort Benning, Georgia to parachute drops in preparation for assignment to the 82nd Airborne Division.

The campaign casts the Army in a kind of basic training in the $20 billion gaming industry, where military shoot-em-ups such as ''Real War,'' from Simon and Schuster Interactive, a unit of Viacom Inc. (VIAb.N), and Electronic Arts Inc.'s (Nasdaq:ERTS) ''Medal of Honor,'' as well as those developed by the likes of best-selling author Tom Clancy, are among the most popular.

NO ''GUYS TEARING OFF ARMS''

Violent video games have been a commercial hit recently but have also attracted the scrutiny of regulators in the United States and elsewhere. Wardynski said that while the Army's scenarios are informed by real environments, neither countries nor ''hostile forces'' are labeled with actual names.

In the ''Soldiers'' role-playing portion, players undergo Army training and adventures while encountering tactical, technical and physical challenges -- similar to experiences recruits might face in their first tour of duty while on and off duty.

Unlike similar combat games, the primary goal of ''America's Army'' is not killing a massive number of enemies, but instead completing tasks and setting career goals. ''Is the violence gratuitous? Will there be guys tearing off arms and using them for clubs? No. Because the Army would never do that,'' he said.

''The employment of force in the game is as it is in the Army,'' he added. ''There are rules ... and if you break those rules, you can see what trouble is like in the Army -- can sit out a round in Fort Leavenworth (military prison in Kansas) listening to a guy play harmonica.''

The Army expects by September to spent about $7.5 million on the program -- less than 1 percent of its total recruitment budget. Moreover it will break even if it woos a relatively small amount of people to enlist, Wardynski said.

''The game pays for itself if only 300 Americans say that this gaming experience convinced me that this is the right thing to do,'' he said.

The 62,000 video-game executives flooding into the Los Angeles Convention Center on May 21 might have thought the security staff had gone overboard. Parked out front were a Bradley Linebacker fighting vehicle, an Avenger Humvee, and a cadre of soldiers. But they weren't there to deter terrorists. This convention was selected for the unveiling of a suite of video games called America's Army. These are 3-D action games like dozens of others, except for one thing: They're created by the U.S. Army.

Inside the convention center, site of the 2002 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), attendees sampled the games in a 1,400-square-foot Army command post, which featured real-live air-assault sergeants rappelling down ropes from the ceiling. Quite a show for the first-ever appearance by the military at E3. Fictional soldiers have long starred in video games. But unlike other publishers, the Army won't try to reap millions off its games. Starting in August, it'll distribute its titles free to young people considering military careers.

SIMS WITH A MISSION.

To start the games, players create their own customized soldier characters, then guide them through boot camp and various missions -- kind of like The Sims but with barracks, M-16s, and stints in Fort Leavenworth military prison. The players can also participate in Web-based team missions with other potential recruits from all over the country. "We want to teach kids what it's really like to be a soldier," says Casey Wardynski, director of the Army's Office of Economic & Manpower Analysis.

America's Army is the latest link in the military's partnership with the $9 billion U.S. video-game industry. The armed forces have long used computerized combat simulations to train service personnel. Now, they're relying on the game industry to add richer, more realistic graphics and countless plot twists.

In 1999, the Army teamed up with the University of Southern California to launch the Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT), a collaboration among entertainment executives and gamemakers committed to dreaming up new systems for training soldiers. America's Army was developed at another new institute called Modeling, Virtual Environments & Simulation (MOVES) at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif.

SHOOT TO KILL.

The games-and-defense partnership makes sense in terms of both technology and recruitment, since most game fanatics are males in their teens and twenties. "We need to attract more people from this tech-literate group," says Michael Zyda, director of MOVES.

Clearly, realism is a big draw. Designed with $6 million in Army grants for the PC, the games feature real video footage from Army sites, such as caves in Afghanistan and the obstacle course at Fort Benning, Ga. Bits of recorded speech add depth to the action: Smoke cigarettes in boot camp, and your drill sergeant shows up, barking reprimands. "There are millions of potential speeches and scenes," says executive producer John Hiles, a research scientist for MOVES.

When it comes to killing, the game doesn't pull any punches, which may alarm video-game critics. Warns clinical psychologist Jeanne B. Funk, a University of Toledo professor who writes about violence and the media: "Games meant for older audiences get into the hands of young children."

ODD ALLIANCE.

Unlike Halo and Grand Theft Auto 3, however, where part of the fun is shooting everything in sight, America's Army uses death as a means of completing missions. "You don't get points for killing," Wardynski says. And trigger-happy players who hit fellow soldiers wind up at Leavenworth.

At ICT, folks look forward to more collaboration. "Hollywood weirdos, computer nerds, and the military -- what a combo," says Executive Director Richard Lindheim. "But it's changing the way the Army does business." Parents be advised: The situations in these games may be real.