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Single Player Multiplay – The v8th Ops Phenomenon
by Joe "Impaler" HighmanOne such member is Michael Johnson, a 39 year-old Florida resident known to the forums as "Grizzly." Grizzly comments on the anger following the confirmation of the cancellation of multiplayer within B-17 II.
"With the news of the loss of MP (multiplayer), it seemed as if the entire B-17 II community went negative. Everyone flaming everyone else. If it had not been for a handful of innovative positive thinking members who promoted a project called Single Player Multiplay, I would have left the forums as well, as it was nearly 100% hostile."
The bomber carrying the Multiplayer code gets hit!
Promoters and enthusiasts are quick to point out that SPM does not suffer from the same limitations of a multiplayer campaign, such as latency, lag, server downtime, monthly pay-to-play expenses, being exposed to indecent or abusive language, and difficulties of coordinating efforts.
"Honestly, I don’t really care if there is multiplayer in a sim because I have a notoriously bad Internet connection and MP wouldn’t really work for me," Chuck Norton, 20, said. "SPM does something that NO OTHER MP title could ever hope to achieve. It allows a group of WWII aviation enthusiasts to recreate the 8th Army Air Force’s daylight bombing campaign on the grandest scale," he continued, "What commercial MP out there allows thousands of aircraft to take part in a single mission? None. But with SPM we can do this. We can fly 1000-bomber raids into the heart of Germany’s industrial nation, one squadron at a time . . ."
Gene Lewis, a 55 year-old Quality Control manager, known as "Doc" among the Bombs-Away.net forums, adds "there will be no worries of lag or having your server drop out on you at the worst possible time." Given that a B-17 bombing mission can easily exceed 8 hours from takeoff to landing, that offers a large window for Multiplay errors.
Coordination of mission efforts also presents a problem in the multiplayer campaign environment.
"There will be a time frame, say 72 hours, during which a mission may be flown rather than having to be on a server exactly at a certain time. Certainly an advantage for someone that has a busy schedule such as myself," Doc explains.
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