Spectator MP Feature?

[Gene-]

First and foremost, I admit I am not a veteran of the Combat Mission series, nor do I even grasp the concept of the classical wargaming genre with which most of you are so familiar. The things that are mentioned quite frequently such as PBEM and 56k modem connections honestly not only blow my mind but blow the minds of many of my generation. Because of these differences, I will try to approach this question from the perspective of myself and a relatively younger audience. I am not here to argue or anything, but merely wish to give a point of view that is somewhat lacking from these boards.

Group dynamics in games has grown to be an increasingly critical part of any multiplayer experience for my demographic. As such, the role of teamwork and interaction has become almost essential in terms of any multiplayer experience. The ever-increasing share of cooperative multiplayer reflects this move toward more and more intricate social interaction in gaming. Programs such as Teamspeak or Ventrilo are commonplace in both vocabulary and daily (ok, maybe not daily) usage.

One of the ways that myself and others have found to fully enjoy CMSF (in accordance with this teamwork trend) is to group up and tackle MP scenarios in a 2vs2 setup, bouncing ideas off of each other and such. Maybe we're just a little too enthusiastic (being cadets and all), but we find this use of CMSF extremely rewarding. However, because it is difficult to physically organize these hook-ups, CMSF, in turn, mostly sits on the backburner for other more viable options. A MP system that would allow more than one player to join each side would make these types of setups practical. Whether it allows all players to have some control on one side or even if it merely adds a side-limited spectator support, either option would be appreciated.

I believe there is a greater audience that is interested in approaching a realistic "sim" such as CMSF, but is generally deferred by the lack of modernization. AI opponents are rarely as worthwhile to outthink as a human player, much less multiple human players. Programs such as Teamspeak/Ventrilo as well as the multitude of social hubs that could potentially pop up to accomodate these interactions would naturally follow a single minor impactful development such as this. I do understand the technical limitations of a small dev team like Battlefront, and this is why I have toned my request in the most feasible manner possible, a simple side-based spectator mode.

Maybe I'm just shooting in the dark here, and maybe you all really do prefer singleplayer, but it's worth a shot.

[SlapHappy]

Now THIS is the way to argue your point for a feature request.

Other posters take note.....

[Gene-]

I try

EDIT: Can you clarify that statement about the "Multiplayer Lobby" thread, gibsonm? I only see comments on Hamachi, which just bridges clients in an artificial LAN to bypass any closed port issues. Is there something I'm missing?

[ February 04, 2008, 05:14 PM: Message edited by: Gene- ]

[gibsonm]

Well there is a sticky thread at the top of this forum entitled "Multiplayer Lobby" that goes someway to addressing the issue.

Note that this is still basically two player (even if a "player" is a team) TCP/IP which for now is not available as WEGO.

Not sure how far off true multi player (a la TacOps and Steel Beasts) is though, where multiple players interact on the one game (say a US Cbt Team of three players [one commands the Tks, another the Bradley's, the other is the JOST or Offensive fires guy]) fight against a multiplayer Syrian force, with still others just observing to get an idea before they start playing themselves.

[Hat Trick]

A multi-player option is planned for some point in the future, last I heard. I believe that it will not be implemented for CMSF, but should be in for the WWII game using the same engine. Its called Co-Play -- a search of the forums may reveal more about this.

[VonWebb]

Gene! Impressive and refreshing. Ditto on the co-play option. it should be amazing when they implement it.

[Cameroon]

Gene, what an excellent post (and first post, no less)!

Co-play is definitely a highly anticipated feature, but I'm with Hat Trick on the 'when' - not before the WWII game and probably not backported to CMSF. Who knows though, maybe they'll surprise us and stick it in the Marines module (hey, we did get eLOS in a patch after all)

The other thing that CM really, really needs for multiplayer is an in-game opponent finder lobby. Even a barebones, simple system would be better than none at all

[Cameroon]

Originally posted by Gene-:

I try

EDIT: Can you clarify that statement about the "Multiplayer Lobby" thread, gibsonm? I only see comments on Hamachi, which just bridges clients in an artificial LAN to bypass any closed port issues. Is there something I'm missing?

I can't speak for gibsonm so perhaps there's more to the Multiplayer Lobby than I thought, but as far as I'm aware it's simply a method for finding opponents.

[gibsonm]

Well you can use the toolbar (although I'm not a big fan of them as a concept).

Or as outlined in the "Multiplayer Lobby" post you can use something like Hamachi to see when other players are connected.