Massively Multiplayer: Gaming In The New Millennium
- Thread starter RySenkari
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I actually have a show pitch that might fit this tl? It wouldn't come around till like, 2011 but if you guys are untreated then I could put it in? Its for an old project that I nver finshed.Mmm, we'll figure that out when the time comes
So your taking so suggestions for tv shows again. I remeamber suggesting a tv show called third world planet to you and told me that you had the tv sheudlue for the timeline planed the foreseeable furture. Should i pm you about thrid world planet again
Well yeah you can PM stuff to us, though we might not always get around to it right away, but PMing does at least put it there for us to look at when we have time to do so.
Fall 2006 (Part 8) - Console FPSes Are Just Getting Started
Call Of Duty 4
Developed by Treyarch and published by Activision, Call Of Duty 4 is the fourth game in the Call of Duty series of FPS titles, and the final World War II based game in the series. It takes place in the Pacific Theater, and features a single campaign, putting the player in the boots of an American soldier participating in several battles during the "island hopping" campaign, with the last half of the story mode taking place on Iwo Jima. During the course of the campaign, the protagonist, a soldier named Billy Schubert, will fight alongside a number of soldiers whom he becomes friends with, though ultimately several of them will lose their lives as the battles progress. The story mode makes a serious effort to make the player care about Billy, telling the story of his life before the war, his girlfriend Jessica back home, and establishing the relationships he has with his fellow soldiers, many of whom are also given backstories of their own. The campaign is probably the most difficult to date in a Call Of Duty game, with realistic battle sequences and the series' most advanced AI yet. The game also makes an effort to humanize the Japanese soldiers who are opposing the player, showing cutscenes of them preparing for battle in between missions, and showing different expressions on the faces of individual soldiers, to make each of them stand out. Despite the effort given to the game's story mode, which concludes with Billy among the Marines raising the flag on Mount Suribachi, the real attraction, as it has been with all the Call Of Duty games, is the multiplayer mode, which gives players the option of fighting battles on numerous Pacific islands, as well as in the Philippines and on Borneo. The multiplayer mode includes both local and online gameplay, and though not much has changed from previous titles in the series, there are a few new elements to change things up, such as item drops and dynamic battlefields. The dynamic mission system has been changed from the previous game so as not to serve as a handicap to winning teams. Call Of Duty 4 is released for the PC, the Wave, the Xbox, the Katana, the Xbox 2, the Supernova, and the iPod Play. The campaign mode is fairly identical across all release platforms, though the handhelds lack multiplayer functionality. The PC and Xbox 2 versions are considered the best, with the Xbox 2 version featuring outstanding graphics and the PC version featuring a robust online community, excellent graphics (especially on decent hardware), and access to a variety of mods. All in all, Call Of Duty 4 achieves strong reviews (in the mid to high 8s) and strong sales, setting the stage for 2007's Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare to become a massive hit.
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Battlefield: Eastern Front
Released for the Wave, Katana, Xbox, and iPod Play, Battlefield: Eastern Front is intended to be a console-exclusive FPS that serves as the series' final game on sixth generation hardware. It takes place on the Eastern Front of World War II, and features a campaign allowing the player to play as a soldier in either the Red Army or the Wehrmacht across a variety of battles spanning from the early stages of Operation Barbarossa to the Battle Of Berlin. It also features a multiplayer mode that allows for 32-person play on the Wave and Xbox, and 16-person play on the Katana and iPod Play. It serves as somewhat of a "companion" to Battlefield 2142, released exclusively on the PC, and plays similarly to that title, though obviously there are massive differences between the two games due to the 200 year difference. It features a more streamlined and focused style of gameplay reminiscent of the Call Of Duty and Delta Force games, and though the campaign is fairly epic and polished, it, like most FPS titles on the market, is designed with multiplayer in mind. Though it would ultimately achieve excellent reviews (in fact, it scores better than Battlefield 2142, and that's with the slightly lackluster Katana and iPod Play versions tugging down the average), some longtime series fans would see it as an "afterthought" compared to Battlefield 2142, and a step down from 2005's outstanding Battlefield 2. Ultimately, the decision would be made to attempt to "unify" the PC and console games with Battlefield 3, though there would be another console-based game first in order to give the developers a chance to get used to the new seventh generation console hardware. Eastern Front would put up decent sales, with the Xbox version selling the best and the Wave version trailing close behind. Once again, the iPod Play version of a game would outsell the Katana version, indicating the handheld's popularity and the willingness of gamers to play triple-A console games on a smaller screen.
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The console playerbase for multiplayer FPS titles has grown rapidly just over the past two years, and all three major online console communities now boast over a million players, making the console FPS scene nearly as big as the much more venerable PC one.
Tom Clancy's Delta Force 2, released just four months ago, is currently the most widely played FPS title on consoles. Its multiplatform release gives it a leg up over its closest rival, the Xbox exclusive Cyberwar 2, and a massive awareness campaign by Ubisoft has no doubt contributed to the game's runaway success. It continues to top sales charts months after its release, with the Xbox 2 version of the game approaching one million units sold, making it the second most popular title on the system after Half-Life 2. The game's wide variety of stages and weaponry make every match different, with a large number of strategies proving to be successful. The game is also newbie-friendly, with an automated system that pairs up newer players against one another in matches, ensuring that blowouts with experienced teams crushing a team of greenhorns are rare. The game's popularity dwarfs that of most other console FPS games, including the Call Of Duty and Battlefield franchises, and only on the original Xbox is the game's supremacy challenged, with Cyberwar 2 enjoying a slightly larger playerbase on that console, the only console on which the game is available.
The Nintendo Wave has even seen an online FPS boom, with Velvet Dark: Conspiracy briefly the #1 online FPS on that console, usurping the original Delta Force. Conspiracy would trade the #1 spot with SOCOM II for about a year before the Delta Force sequel would knock both of them off the top. Still, Conspiracy is considered one of the most unique online FPS titles around, with a highly varied selection of weapons and gadgets that make its online action more like a spy thriller than a wargame. It continues to be extremely popular, ranking #2 behind Delta Force 2 in terms of total player numbers, and while Nintendo continues to do as little work as possible maintaining their online community, they (along with hardware partner Sony) do work hard to keep the servers running smoothly, with lag problems quickly addressed and cheaters frequently rooted out and banned. Cheating has actually played the Xbox more than either of its competitor consoles, due to the more open nature of the hardware, but Microsoft has promised to step up enforcement with the Xbox 2, and recently handed out its first wave of bans to thousands of Delta Force 2 cheaters who were using a glitch to force lag onto their helpless opponents. Apple has also promised to ensure that players of its iTwin console won't have to worry about cheaters, with Steve Jobs personally swearing to ensure that cheating on the iTwin's online service will get the perpetrator banned for life.
With broadband connections now in a majority of gamer households and more and more console games offering online play, FPS titles should continue to see a major boom at the forefront of the online trend, which shows no signs of slowing down as consoles enter the HD generation.
-from an article on Kotaku.com, posted on December 15, 2006
Developed by Treyarch and published by Activision, Call Of Duty 4 is the fourth game in the Call of Duty series of FPS titles, and the final World War II based game in the series. It takes place in the Pacific Theater, and features a single campaign, putting the player in the boots of an American soldier participating in several battles during the "island hopping" campaign, with the last half of the story mode taking place on Iwo Jima. During the course of the campaign, the protagonist, a soldier named Billy Schubert, will fight alongside a number of soldiers whom he becomes friends with, though ultimately several of them will lose their lives as the battles progress. The story mode makes a serious effort to make the player care about Billy, telling the story of his life before the war, his girlfriend Jessica back home, and establishing the relationships he has with his fellow soldiers, many of whom are also given backstories of their own. The campaign is probably the most difficult to date in a Call Of Duty game, with realistic battle sequences and the series' most advanced AI yet. The game also makes an effort to humanize the Japanese soldiers who are opposing the player, showing cutscenes of them preparing for battle in between missions, and showing different expressions on the faces of individual soldiers, to make each of them stand out. Despite the effort given to the game's story mode, which concludes with Billy among the Marines raising the flag on Mount Suribachi, the real attraction, as it has been with all the Call Of Duty games, is the multiplayer mode, which gives players the option of fighting battles on numerous Pacific islands, as well as in the Philippines and on Borneo. The multiplayer mode includes both local and online gameplay, and though not much has changed from previous titles in the series, there are a few new elements to change things up, such as item drops and dynamic battlefields. The dynamic mission system has been changed from the previous game so as not to serve as a handicap to winning teams. Call Of Duty 4 is released for the PC, the Wave, the Xbox, the Katana, the Xbox 2, the Supernova, and the iPod Play. The campaign mode is fairly identical across all release platforms, though the handhelds lack multiplayer functionality. The PC and Xbox 2 versions are considered the best, with the Xbox 2 version featuring outstanding graphics and the PC version featuring a robust online community, excellent graphics (especially on decent hardware), and access to a variety of mods. All in all, Call Of Duty 4 achieves strong reviews (in the mid to high 8s) and strong sales, setting the stage for 2007's Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare to become a massive hit.
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Battlefield: Eastern Front
Released for the Wave, Katana, Xbox, and iPod Play, Battlefield: Eastern Front is intended to be a console-exclusive FPS that serves as the series' final game on sixth generation hardware. It takes place on the Eastern Front of World War II, and features a campaign allowing the player to play as a soldier in either the Red Army or the Wehrmacht across a variety of battles spanning from the early stages of Operation Barbarossa to the Battle Of Berlin. It also features a multiplayer mode that allows for 32-person play on the Wave and Xbox, and 16-person play on the Katana and iPod Play. It serves as somewhat of a "companion" to Battlefield 2142, released exclusively on the PC, and plays similarly to that title, though obviously there are massive differences between the two games due to the 200 year difference. It features a more streamlined and focused style of gameplay reminiscent of the Call Of Duty and Delta Force games, and though the campaign is fairly epic and polished, it, like most FPS titles on the market, is designed with multiplayer in mind. Though it would ultimately achieve excellent reviews (in fact, it scores better than Battlefield 2142, and that's with the slightly lackluster Katana and iPod Play versions tugging down the average), some longtime series fans would see it as an "afterthought" compared to Battlefield 2142, and a step down from 2005's outstanding Battlefield 2. Ultimately, the decision would be made to attempt to "unify" the PC and console games with Battlefield 3, though there would be another console-based game first in order to give the developers a chance to get used to the new seventh generation console hardware. Eastern Front would put up decent sales, with the Xbox version selling the best and the Wave version trailing close behind. Once again, the iPod Play version of a game would outsell the Katana version, indicating the handheld's popularity and the willingness of gamers to play triple-A console games on a smaller screen.
-
The console playerbase for multiplayer FPS titles has grown rapidly just over the past two years, and all three major online console communities now boast over a million players, making the console FPS scene nearly as big as the much more venerable PC one.
Tom Clancy's Delta Force 2, released just four months ago, is currently the most widely played FPS title on consoles. Its multiplatform release gives it a leg up over its closest rival, the Xbox exclusive Cyberwar 2, and a massive awareness campaign by Ubisoft has no doubt contributed to the game's runaway success. It continues to top sales charts months after its release, with the Xbox 2 version of the game approaching one million units sold, making it the second most popular title on the system after Half-Life 2. The game's wide variety of stages and weaponry make every match different, with a large number of strategies proving to be successful. The game is also newbie-friendly, with an automated system that pairs up newer players against one another in matches, ensuring that blowouts with experienced teams crushing a team of greenhorns are rare. The game's popularity dwarfs that of most other console FPS games, including the Call Of Duty and Battlefield franchises, and only on the original Xbox is the game's supremacy challenged, with Cyberwar 2 enjoying a slightly larger playerbase on that console, the only console on which the game is available.
The Nintendo Wave has even seen an online FPS boom, with Velvet Dark: Conspiracy briefly the #1 online FPS on that console, usurping the original Delta Force. Conspiracy would trade the #1 spot with SOCOM II for about a year before the Delta Force sequel would knock both of them off the top. Still, Conspiracy is considered one of the most unique online FPS titles around, with a highly varied selection of weapons and gadgets that make its online action more like a spy thriller than a wargame. It continues to be extremely popular, ranking #2 behind Delta Force 2 in terms of total player numbers, and while Nintendo continues to do as little work as possible maintaining their online community, they (along with hardware partner Sony) do work hard to keep the servers running smoothly, with lag problems quickly addressed and cheaters frequently rooted out and banned. Cheating has actually played the Xbox more than either of its competitor consoles, due to the more open nature of the hardware, but Microsoft has promised to step up enforcement with the Xbox 2, and recently handed out its first wave of bans to thousands of Delta Force 2 cheaters who were using a glitch to force lag onto their helpless opponents. Apple has also promised to ensure that players of its iTwin console won't have to worry about cheaters, with Steve Jobs personally swearing to ensure that cheating on the iTwin's online service will get the perpetrator banned for life.
With broadband connections now in a majority of gamer households and more and more console games offering online play, FPS titles should continue to see a major boom at the forefront of the online trend, which shows no signs of slowing down as consoles enter the HD generation.
-from an article on Kotaku.com, posted on December 15, 2006
Interesting seeing how the fandoms of these FPS games turn out. It’s also intriguing to see the Wave has less trouble with dishonest online practices, like cheating. Compared to Xbox, it seems that the Wave has a greater grasp on the conduct of its players in the server and the server itself.
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Beyond Good and Evil gets a sequel here? Good, it always kind of stunk that in OTL it's been in development hell for 15 years at this point.
A part of that is that the Wave is locked down somewhat more in terms of hardware, so it's a tougher nut for hackers to crack, as is par for the course for Nintendo-based consoles. Also, with less players on the Wave's online ecosystem, there's less cheaters and less incentive to cheat. That might change with the Sapphire, but we'll see.
Three reasons for Beyond Good And Evil's exponentially greater success than IOTL:
1. A greater appreciation for female protagonists ITTL.
2. Ubisoft didn't get Prince Of Persia, so all the development and promotion that would've gone to Sands Of Time went to Beyond Good And Evil.
3. Nintendo wanted big tentpole Wave exclusives for the launch year and Beyond Good And Evil fit the bill. It backfired on them a bit because the game overshadowed Squad Four: Upheaval somewhat, but ultimately Nintendo appreciates having the franchise as an exclusive to their consoles.
If there’s still the same level of lockdown, if not stronger, then I don’t see much concern for any increases in troll activity. Plus, Nintendo could hire moderators to help police the online environment should it become rowdy.
I hope someone ITTL makes a meme of Steve Jobs standing in the server room with a massive banhammer, ready to personally strike every cheater.
I actually forgot the Wave had online capabilities at all. They aren't really talked about, unlike Xbox Live.
And on the topic of Xbox, can the Xbox 2 play Xbox games at all?
There will absolutely be Steve Jobs banhammer memes ITTL.
And I forgot to mention it, but yes, Xbox 2 is fully backward compatible with all OG Xbox games.
I want the banhammer to have a stamp that says banned with the apple logo replacing the a.
AeroTheZealousOne
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Speaking of memes, do they or will they use the same or different font than OTL?
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