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MEDAL OF HONOR: AIRBORNE - PC MULTIPLAYER PREVIEW & EXCLUSIVE UPDATE by Whiskey from Planet Medal Of Honor

Monday, August 20, 2007 2:01:03 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

MEDAL OF HONOR: AIRBORNE - PC MULTIPLAYER PREVIEW & EXCLUSIVE UPDATE

INTRO
In mid-July of 2007, members of the PC and Console communities were invited to Ft. Bragg, NC, home of the 82nd Airborne Division of the US Army, to get a hands-on preview of the multi-player (MP) modes of EA's upcoming game, Medal of Honor: Airborne (currently targeted to ship on Sept 4, 2007 in North America for PC & Xbox360; November for PS3). This preview will focus on the PC platform only. While the PC version showed a lot of promise and potential, there were a few nagging issues that hindered the full gameplay experience and enjoyment of the game. Through a bit of luck and good timing, I was fortunate enough to be able to drop into the EALA studios a few weeks later and get another look at the game after these issues had been addressed. I will write this article as a culmination of the two sessions, with some call-outs to where things have changed.

MP is often largely based upon the single-player (SP) framework, so for a refresher on some items, you can read my earlier SP preview. I'll do my best to only skim over items/features that were already talked about in that article.

MULTI-PLAYER
There's a lot to cover in discussing the MP mode of a game, so I'll try to break it down into smaller headings to keep this from getting out of control and for better organization. You can also use them to skip to the sections that interest you the most, instead of having to read the whole thing.

Graphics/Environment; Audio; Physics
The game flat-out looks great. For whatever reason, still screenshots just don't seem to do it justice. Textures everywhere (walls, weapons, character models, etc) are rich and detailed, and make everything stand out more. Lighting is quite good as well, especially the stark contrasts between the bright outdoor environments, and the dimmer, often-shadowed indoor venues. Again many of the still screenshots so far show a strange "glow" on some objects, but I didn't notice this, or at least didn't notice it as much, when in-game and playing live. Your character's body-type/gear are determined by the primary weapon class you choose to spawn with…a sniper will look different from an smg'er, for example. The game will then assign a random head/face to your character from the database of textures it has for each team; one set for Axis, one set for Allies. Unfortunately, at this time there is no built-in method to customize your character's look. As always, you will need a powerful video card if you want to run everything on max graphics settings, but things will still look good, and the game still enjoyable, on the more mid-range settings.

The sounds in this game are terrific; this is something almost everyone has commented on. From the more subtle background noises of movement/footsteps and shells going off in the distance, to the "big" sounds of the weapons and close-by explosions, it all really adds to the realism/immersion factor. I've never fired these weapons in real life personally, but those who had commented on how authentic those in the game sounded. One of the members at the MP summit also confirmed that a question he had back during the SP event regarding sound directionality was in fact working properly once the correct audio/headphone settings were applied. If audio is a big selling point to you, I think you'll enjoy this experience quite a bit.

During some of the E3 videos, many people were concerned with what appeared to be some over-the-top physics, particularly in the way bodies reacted to being shot. Thankfully, this has either been largely solved, or at least toned way down in PC multi-player. I personally saw no out-of-place cartwheels or dead bodies moving/flying around unnaturally. One community member did comment that he saw an instance of a body part being stretched out during an explosion, and another where the momentum of a high-explosive round carried a player off a rooftop to explode in mid-air (this, however, does seem somewhat reasonable to me). So, while the situation may not be perfect, and you may encounter some extreme physics moments, again for the most part things seem to behave in a more or less realistic fashion.

Weapons & Upgrades
Here are the weapons that are in the game at this time, and should most likely still be there upon release. Note: I'm not a weapons-guru, so I'm using general terms for some of these so that a majority of people will understand what's what:

Allies
- M1 Garand semi-auto rifle
- Springfield sniper rifle
- Thompson sub-machine gun
- B.A.R (Browning Automatic Rifle) (machine gun)
- M18 Recoilless rifle (rocket launcher)
- Colt .45 pistol

Axis
- Kar98 bolt-action rifle
- G43 sniper rifle
- MP40 sub-machine gun
- STG44 machine gun
- Panzerschreck (rocket launcher)
- C96 Mauser pistol

As said before, the weapons sound very good, and more importantly "feel" very good. The smg's are deadly at close-range, and with the Garand or K98 in your hands, you have the confidence that if you take the time to line up your shot properly, you will take your target down. Rocket launchers are powerful and have a lot of "splash damage" when the round explodes, but they are slow to reload, and can only be fired in ironsights (aim-down-the-sight) mode. At this point, there are no smoke grenades; only fragmentation ones. Sniper scopes are now adjustable, giving various levels of zoom and focus capability (using the mouse wheel as default), depending on the range of your target and how precise a shot you need to make. Holding your breath will steady your aim as well. New to Airborne are brief smoke trails from a sniper's bullet that remain onscreen briefly (I estimate around 1 sec or so) when a shot is fired. If you're not looking directly at it, it is almost a flash of movement onscreen out of the corner of your eye, and when you turn around, it's gone. A cold fear then washes over you as your brain recognizes that there's a sniper in the area, and his bullet just missed you. This feature was added due to the more vertical nature of Airborne gameplay, which testing revealed could give snipers a greater advantage, making them much harder to spot. While I don't recall anyone at the summit complaining about this, we could see some folks in the community, especially on sniper-only servers, not being too fond of the smoke trails, so a recommendation was made to allow it to be a server-side option.

Each weapon, including grenades, have the familiar melee/bash feature. In close-quarters, you can club your opponent with your weapon to hurt or kill him. Back in SP, a sprinting-melee would be an instant-kill, but I didn't get a chance to try it out in MP.

Each weapon will have 3 available upgrades; the same ones from SP. A description of the various weapons and their upgrades, along with their official names/model numbers has now been posted on the main Airborne website. Clicking on a weapon will bring up Image, Details, and Upgrades tabs where you can get more information. As of this article, the Axis upgrades are still "classified". You can still get an idea of some of the upgrades by viewing the before/after image of each weapon, however. You can also listen to the sounds of the weapons on the Details tab.

At release, servers will be able to run with either all upgrades on, or all upgrades disabled. For weapons such as the Kar98 rifle whose upgrade is a grenade launcher, or the STG44 that has a scope, using the key assigned to Alt-Fire will attach/detach the upgrade for use. Some upgrades will also add to the melee damage inflicted upon an opponent.

At the time of our hands-on, the M12 shotgun was not available as a selectable weapon in MP. This will please some people, and disappoint others. Feedback was given to the Dev Team, with a fairly high priority, to implement a system to limit the weapons allowed on a server (ie. no rocket launchers, or rifles-only). If such a system is eventually put in, then perhaps Dev will allow the shotgun to be used at a server admin's discretion. Suggestions were also made to allow a bolt-action rifle for the Allies, and a semi-auto rifle for the Axis for proper balance, as rifles-only servers were quite popular in previous MOH's.

NEW - I can't give out specific details at this point, however I have seen some of the plans and work-in-progress models for new content to be released post-launch, and some additional weapons are part of that plan. Hopefully we'll be using them in-game as soon as possible after the game hits the shelves.

Maps
There are 6 MP maps slated to be available out-of-the-box at launch. 3 of these are re-done versions from Allied Assault: Destroyed Village, one of the best rifle maps of all time;

Remagen, the small-town site of many epic battles in the streets and over control of the central hotel/building;

and The Hunt, a classic objective map featuring a bombed-out main street of death and a huge church and courtyard.

The other 3 are maps converted from Airborne's SP operations: Husky, a night map in a small Sicilian town;

Avalanche, another night map set in Italy amid some Greek ruins;

and Neptune, the inland portion of the Utah Beach invasion during D-Day.

While the 3 re-done maps are faithful representations of the MOHAA originals, they also have their own twists. Most noticeable upon first glance are the textures; they're gorgeous. The rubble looks very realistic. Plain walls now have cracks, exposed pipes, and tattered coverings. More trees and foliage can also be seen. The overall detail, intricacy, and quality of textures really stands out. As another member at the summit wrote, it's like watching regular TV, then switching over to HD.

The maps are relatively similar in horizontal size as the originals, but some new routes/alleys/paths have been opened up here and there, as in The Hunt, to reduce bottlenecks and promote movement. Flanking maneuvers are now possible where they weren't before. Some old hidey-holes and camping spots are no longer as safe as they used to be, as there are some planks and objects that will allow more access points to them, as in Destroyed Village. Old areas that were just for show before are now useable, like the clock tower in Remagen. Windows that were only decoration before can now be shot through. The "verticality" of Airborne also now plays a part in these maps. Rooftops are totally accessible to Allies airdropping in, and many if not all of these also available to Axis by climbing up. So while the horizontal playing field is roughly the same or slightly bigger, the vertical component adds quite a bit to each map. And it's an important component too, allowing players to quickly cross areas that may be hostile on the ground, or provide sniper cover for their team-mates below, or just to survey the battlefield and track movement of the enemy.

The 3 SP conversion maps are no slouches either, but I don’t want to give away too many details on those just yet. Again, verticality will be an important factor in all of them, as you will now have to be very aware of what is above and below you, not just to the left and right, front and back. Husky's small-town setting will have many rooftops and narrow alleyways to battle in. Avalanche has an abundance of ruins to use for cover, and an aqueduct system to quickly traverse distances and fire on unsuspecting opponents below. Neptune features a fortified bunker system with several levels, as well as a more open field with trenches and obstacles in front of it. Great graphical detail on these maps as well.

A small, but important visual aspect to these maps are the "fairways" - the area surrounding/outside of the playable map area. Instead of plain, boring textures or a really blurry, foggy space outside of the border, the Airborne Dev Team has found a way to make these areas look as if they were part of the map. They are quite detailed, and help to give everything a larger, more realistic feel.

You can only get a partial feel for them in screenshots, but you really notice them when airdropping in. It all adds to the immersion, and they're very well done. It's a really nice touch, and whoever figured this out did a great job.

NEW - Although quality is almost always better than quantity, 6 maps, no matter how well done, will only keep people entertained for so long. Everyone, including the Airborne Dev Team recognizes this. I'm happy to report that along with new weapons, some new maps are also already in development, and part of the plan to be released sometime post-launch. Again, I can't give away specifics, but they are there and are scheduled to be rolled out in waves as they are completed. One of them in particular has some very exciting implications. No timelines are available yet, but some will come sooner than others. Keep your fingers crossed.

Game-Types
Airborne will ship with 3 game-types out-of-the-box at release: Team Deathmatch (TDM), "Airborne" TDM, and "Airborne" Objective.

The first two are very similar. In Team Deathmatch, both teams spawn on the ground and compete for kills. The winning team is the one with the most kills at the end of the time limit, or the first team to reach a pre-determined kill (frag) limit. In Airborne TDM, the twist is that while the Axis still spawn on the ground, the Allies now spawn in the air, and parachute in to wherever they choose on the map. Axis forces will be able to shoot at the Allies as they drop in, however there is a form of protection logic in the game. More about that in the Gameplay section.

Airborne Objective is poorly named, as it has very little to do with the classic Objective (OBJ) mode we all know from previous MOH's on PC. It is instead more like BF2's method of flag-capturing, or COD's Domination mode. In Airborne Objective, there are 3 flags on the map, the Axis spawn on the ground, and the Allies spawn in the air. 1 flag is in the Axis spawn, 1 is on the other side of the map (referred to as the Allied spawn/flag for simplicity), and 1 is centrally located. The flags at either end of the map only need 1 player to capture them, by standing in close proximity for several seconds. The flag will change colour (red for Axis, blue for Allies) depending on who controls it, and there are 3 circular indicator icons at the top of the screen which change colour in the same way to show progress/ownership of the flags. The middle flag requires 2 players to be there at the same time to capture it. The winning team is the one to capture and hold all 3 flags simultaneously. With players working properly as a team, and the Allies' ability to airdrop into whatever area they desire, this mode can be a lot of fun. Teamwork is essential however, as you won't survive long as a lone-wolf.

NEW - Although the "Airborne"/spawning-in-the-air feature is a great addition to the game and will serve to give a new twist on tactics and teamwork, as with the limited number of maps, having only 3 game-types will get stale for many players relatively soon. Especially those whose favourite gametypes from the older MOH versions were not included in Airborne. Once again, there is some good news on the horizon. New game-types are also part of the plan to add additional new content to Airborne through future patches and updates. Details and timelines can't be given out, but again will roll out over the course of the first few patches. I can tell you that work on some of the modes has already begun. I think that a lot of people will be very pleased with the results. I got pretty enthused thinking about all the possibilities of these new game-types, and how they would interact with the new maps.

Health-System
I'll be brief on this one - it's basically the same as in SP. Your health indicator has 4 segments/bars, each representing 25%, and blue colour fills up each segment to indicate how much health is left. If you get injured and lose only part of a segment, then you can take cover to rest, and that segment will fully regenerate and fill up again. If you take enough damage to lose an entire segment's worth of health, that segment will not regenerate. To get that segment back, you need to grab a health pack from another player who was killed (when a player dies, he drops a health pack). Again, lose part of a segment, and you can regenerate it by taking cover; lose an entire segment, and you need to find a health pack to get it back. This health system seemed to work well in the limited play time we had with the game. It will be interesting to see what players think of it once the game is released.

The Airdrop
Back in my SP preview, I wrote that the Airdrop/non-linear gameplay along with the Affordance AI was a revolutionary combination that would greatly affect how Airborne's SP was played (and probably other games as well). Well the Airdrop also has some significant potential to impact how MP will be played as well. No longer are you bound to a single spawnpoint; or a set of selectable spawnpoints; or a living "team leader" spawnpoint who just as often as not turns out to be a total n00b. Now, you've got some real freedom to make choices in your attack.

When playing in the "Airborne" game modes, the Allies no longer spawn on the ground, but instead in the air. The very first spawn of the round is aboard the C-47 transport aircraft. The interior lights go from red to green, and you get the audio cue to "Go! Go! Go!" to exit the plane. Although I didn't try it myself, other members reported that you could switch places with other players while in the plane, thus jumping earlier or later depending on your position in line. After this initial jump out of the plane, all future jumps in that round take place with you spawning in the air to save time. Some have asked exactly where in the sky you will spawn…the answer is that there is a "jump window" area, and you will start somewhere within that area. It is somewhat random as to where you will appear, but there is also some game logic working behind the scenes that will affect your position.

On the way down in your parachute, you have a lot of control over your steering. I found that you had more control in MP than I remembered back at the SP preview. As before, you can drift lazily down, speed up, flare to slow down, turn Left and Right. I don't recommend drifting slowly down in a straight line, however, because the Axis team on the ground can and will shoot up at you, and yes, they can kill you while in the air. But, it's not that easy. First of all, you can take evasive action while descending, changing speed, making sharp turns, etc, etc. This makes you much harder to hit. In addition, there is a form of spawn protection for the Allies dropping in. Basically, the higher you are, and the further away from an opponent you are, the less damage you will take. This helps give the Allies a chance to survey the battlefield from above to decide where they would like to try to land before being killed too quickly, and also helps prevent cheap kills by Axis snipers who would only like to sit back and pick off people in the air. As the Allied player gets closer to the ground, and to an enemy, then they become more vulnerable to damage. One of the reasons for this is the Allied ability to perform a melee-drop-kick on an opponent (or more than one opponent at the same time!) for an instant-kill while descending. This is, and should be a somewhat risky maneuver, so the Allied player is susceptible to being shot while attempting it with no artificial protection.

While descending, the Allied player will have an expansive view of the battlefield below:

He'll be able to see both Axis and Allied players moving from place to place, see who is massing at which flag, see if any of his players are pinned down and need help, etc, and be able to take action on it. He can come screaming in behind some Axis troops and shoot them in the back before they can finish off his team-mate. He can land on a rooftop, rifle the Axis below, then slide down and capture a flag. He can land in a tower and take out an Axis player who is owning the battlefield sniping from a high position. He can quickly reverse a flag that was just captured. You get the idea. Your tactics can now change both as an individual and as a team, as you now have this increased freedom to not only land where you want, but to get there quickly (while being careful not to get shot).

Because of the power of this feature, it might need some balancing once a large number of people are playing it in the real world. Several suggestions have already been given to the Dev Team regarding this as well.

I personally really enjoy the Airdrop, both descending as Allies, and shooting back at them as Axis. And from all the hooting and hollering I heard both at the MP summit and EALA, I think a lot of people are also going to have fun with this feature as well. As I also said in the SP preview, this feature just can't be done proper justice with words; once players try it for themselves, they'll see just how many applications and how powerful it is. And as a little teaser…when I think about how the Airdrop will interact with some of the new content planned post-release, then things get very interesting indeed.

In-Game Features
First, let's get some of the basics out of the way. When walking, the familiar "head-bob" motion of past MOH's returns instead of your character just "floating" across the landscape. It's there, but it's not too extreme. At the MP summit, we noticed significant motion blur onscreen when you made a quick mouse movement across a wide field, but this had either been removed or toned down significantly by the time I saw the game again at EALA. This is a good thing, as most of us felt it was too much/too distracting. When sprinting, your weapon lowers/is held across your body, your crosshairs disappear, and the screen zooms in a bit narrowing the field of view (FOV). The screen will bounce more than the normal head-bob as your character jogs across the landscape, complete with louder breathing. Sprinting was still unlimited when I saw the game last. Although some may like this, some good arguments were also made against it as well from the MP summit, and that feedback given to the Dev Team. Again in SP, a sprinting melee hit would be an instant-kill, but I wasn't able to try this out in MP. After being killed, the screen goes black and white, the camera hovers and then rotates above your character's body, then moves toward the location of your killer in a sort of death-view. This isn't from the first-person perspective of your killer, however, so it won't necessarily directly give away his position. In-game taunts, commands, goal messages, etc, return as in previous versions of MOH, along with their corresponding audio. At this point, there is no VOIP built into the game. Those interested in recording their playing adventures can still use FRAPS to do so, however there isn't a demo/gameplay recorder built into the software. The popularity of such a feature was mentioned to the Dev Team, and they took note of it; it may or may not make it into a future patch or update. There is currently no spectator mode enabled in Airborne. This was again mentioned to, and noted by the Dev Team as something useful for in-game recording for those who enjoy that sort of thing. It stands to reason that if the classic OBJ game-type was ever implemented in Airborne, then spectator mode would be a necessary feature along with it for those who are killed early in the match, and then need a place from which to watch the rest of the battle.

Gameplay
During the MP summit at Ft. Bragg, there were unfortunately a couple of issues that cast a shadow on Airborne's gameplay. One of them was a mouse-lag delay in movement/aiming, the other was generally low frames-per-second (fps). I have seen the fixes personally, and can report that these have now both been resolved. In my hands-on test at EALA recently, mouse movement was crisp and accurate, as it should be. I had no issues at all in quickly acquiring the target I wanted. The frame-rate issue was largely improved, and I'll go into a bit more detail on that in the Performance section.

With these 2 issues out of the way, and no excuses, the question can now be asked - is the game fun? You bet it is.

The game moves along briskly, but not overly fast. Similar to Allied Assault, I'd say, and a bit faster than Spearhead. If the sprint is toned down, or made adjustable server-side, then I think that could affect the game speed quite a bit.

The Airdrop, as said before, is a BIG factor adding to the enjoyment of this game as well. This video was taken during the MP summit back at Ft. Bragg. The 2nd half of the vid shows gameplay in action, and the majority of folks you see talking on camera were from the PC crew, particularly those at the very beginning of that segment, and at the very end. Even with the hindering issues present, the players adapted and were still enjoying the game, largely due to the Airdrop features.

At EALA a few weeks later, it was even more so. Matt Pruitt from PlanetMedalofHonor was also there to check out the updated version, and we heard the yelling and trash talking before we even got into the room, and once we were in-game, it was on. I was surprised to spot Patrick Gilmore on the other side of the table with a huge smile on his face as he was concentrating on his fragging. You can try to fake having a good time, but it's easy to spot. These folks weren't faking anything.

After being a good reporter and checking out the issues that needed verification (while being mercilessly killed left and right, I might add), I grabbed a trusty Kar98 rifle and went into battle for real. There were no issues at all in acquiring and quickly dispatching my targets on the ground and in buildings. I wanted to see for myself how hard it was shooting down the Allies dropping in, so that was my next test. I quickly spotted one that appeared a medium distance away and was drifting more or less in a straight angled line to the ground. Even with a simple drift downward, the target is still in motion and not a given to hit. Also remember that there is a height/distance protection factor in play. It took me 4 hits from the Kar to kill her, the last one just before she would've disappeared behind a large tree. In another attempt later on, I was able to kill one in 3 shots, getting very lucky with a headshot to finish them off. Even so, I had to hurry to do so. This player didn't seem to be making much of an attempt to take evasive action either, thus leading to his (or her) doom. Neither of these targets was very far away, thus not having as much protection; and I had to hurry or I would've not been able to take them out. I was pretty satisfied with these results, based on the distance, time I had, their "soft" descent, and number of hits. Once people become more proficient at this, the tables may turn, however the Allies will also become better at taking a more varied path to the ground as well. Server-side options could also help smooth out any balance issues. Red "X" icons still appear to indicate a successful hit on an enemy. These don't bother me personally, although they could perhaps be a bit smaller. I believe this was another item put on the list to eventually be made a toggle, either server or client side.

We played on a server that had all upgrades enabled, so I then pressed Alt-Fire (middle mouse button) to put on my grenade launcher attachment. My crosshair now changed to a familiar gradient/tree-like icon in order to judge distance/elevation and pressing fire now lobbed a nade at my hapless opponent, blowing him to smithereens. Damn, that felt good. One of the other fellows at Bragg mentioned that he had some difficulty adjusting to the regular hand-thrown grenades, so I tried those out next. Now, I've never been a nade whor, uh…master, so I just kept it a simple test of throwing a nade through a window a short-med distance away. Seemed OK; they didn't seem to sail on me or anything. I find most games give a different "weight" to grenades, so perhaps it's just a matter of getting used to it.

There wasn't a lot of time left, so I switched to the MP40 for a bit of smg action before the night was up. At close range, that thing's a killer. It was easy to control and fired in a tight pattern. Matt was making good progress with a sniper rifle, racking up a number of kills quite quickly from a rooftop. Seems his opponents didn't look for the smoke trails.

I wasn't able to find any cover to shoot under using the peek/lean system, but I did use it over and to the side of a small object I was hiding behind, and it worked quite well. I don't know if my opponents saw me or not, but if they did, they didn't seem to show it and they were dispatched forthwith.

Those of us at the MP summit back in July saw little moments of fun here and there, as was written in several of the reviews at the time, but weren't quite sure of what the game had to really offer due to the problems with shooting. Even though the session at EALA was brief, it was enough to show that with these issues resolved, Airborne's MP gameplay could properly shine through. For those who haven't yet seen it, here's an HD video of actual PC MP gameplay in action (with scenes from Destroyed Village, Remagen, The Hunt, and Neptune to name a few).

Scoreboard
At the end of each round is now a more expansive scoreboard. Stats tracked will depend on game-type, but some of the numbers now logged are kills, deaths, headshots, total points, team points, as well as a summary/awards screen showing the most accurate player, best teamplayer, deadliest player, etc, etc. It's a relatively small thing that other games have as well, but encouraged a lot of chatter and yes, more trash talk at the end of each match.

Performance
For those curious as to the performance difference in fps between the Ft. Bragg MP summit and my second look at EALA, here's the lowdown. At Bragg, the lowest spec PC was an AMD +3800 (2.0 GHz) Dual core, with 2 GB RAM, and an Nvidia 7800GTX 512MB video card. Frame-rate was mostly in the mid 20's to low-30's range. Most of the other PC's were a bit of a step up using 7900GTX 512MB cards (similar RAM and processor), and did a little better cruising at a mid-30's range.

Two of the exact PC's from Bragg were shipped to EALA for further testing. Optimization code was checked in, as well as more investigation into proper settings. At my visit to EALA, the 7800GTX now ran at a steady 40-50 fps, with the 7900GTX running above 50 fps. The Dev Team mentioned that they were actually still working on this, and were hoping to squeeze out a few more fps on these cards if things went well.

The rest of the PC's at EALA were Intel 2.66 GHz duo's, 2 GB RAM, and on 8800GTX 768MB cards, and ran smoothly at 60 fps with maxed out settings.

Servers
At the MP summit, 12-player "listen" servers (ie. your PC is the server, and you play on it as well) were used to demonstrate the game, as the dedicated servers were not yet functional. A few weeks later at EALA, we were shooting it out on full 16-player dedicated servers (ie. the PC running the server is only dedicated to running the server itself). In speaking with the Dev Team, higher numbers had already been tested with some success, and they were still working to get as many players as possible functional for release. They wanted us to make it clear, however, that specifics would not be released until both the number of players and the necessary supporting functions (which many of us forget about, such as changing scoreboards, database sizes, information transfer issues, etc) were implemented and fully tested. The game ran smoothly with no problems in a pseudo "real-world" environment. Basically, the dedicated server and all the PC's were in the EALA building, but were all connected to each other through the Internet (ie. not a LAN setup). Latency testing has also been done with other locations across the USA, with good results even against higher ping numbers, and is continuing in true "real-world" environments on the Internet.

There is an in-game server browser that will allow you to scan for various LAN or Internet games to play, along with filters to help narrow down your choices.

In regards to dedicated server install, the plan right now looks as if the entire game (both client and server files) will need to be installed in order to run a dedicated server (approx 7 GB total during the MP summit). However, since this often causes extra work for server admins during the patching process in having to determine which files have been updated, the Dev Team's goal is to have separate client and server-only patches available for download whenever an update is ready. While the initial setup will still take awhile, this should help make things smoother down the road for updates.

As for setting up a server configuration, a GUI application has been built to which different options can be selected. It is a very simple app with tick-boxes, text entry fields, and dropdowns to quickly create and configure a server file for launch. Options/selections are still being finalized and tested, but a list of these options will be released to the public as soon as they are more-or-less locked for the initial launch. It will be possible to add more options later through patches.

A separate, stand-alone remote (rcon) server app has also been created. This is a simple, command text entry app that will function very similarly to the console rcon of previous MOH's.

For those interested in Linux, work on this is in progress and looks quite promising for the near future.

Ranked vs. Unranked
There will not be any ranked servers on PC at release, and specific EA-partnered GSP's will not be necessary. Servers will be able to freely run with either all weapon upgrades enabled for use, or all upgrades disabled, with more options possibly investigated for future. Ranked servers will continue to be investigated and researched for possible inclusion sometime down the road in a later patch/update.

Anti-Cheat
There are currently plans for 2 forms of anti-cheat. Punkbuster will ship with the game out-of-the-box, and be available at launch. EA is also working with another A/C company, DMW, in order to have them be able to integrate with Airborne and also provide support. Once complete, admins will have their choice of the two.

We have also learned that users will have to set up a unique account name for use with EA in order to play. No two account names can be the same - each must be unique, and each specific account name will be linked to the user's CD Key and cannot be changed.

Modding
Not much information on this is available at this time. An SDK/MDK/toolset is a high priority item, along with HTTP redirect and auto-download functionality. Much of this will be dependent on future releases/updates of the Unreal3 engine by Epic. With UT2007 targeted for release in late fall/early winter, it is believed that more of the information needed will be available in the coming months. For anyone not keeping up on the news about this, it is a bit of a muddy situation. However, the Unreal 2.x versions of the engine have proven to be very mod-friendly in the past, so there is reason to be optimistic, but it may take a bit longer than we all want.

New Content
To recap what's in some of the above sections, I've seen both work-in-progress, and future plans for new weapons, new game-types, and new maps. In my opinion, many of these things are really exciting, and will make a lot of players happy.

Nothing has been finalized as of yet, however, and the Dev Team is taking a very cautious approach, not wanting to promise what they can't deliver on for certain. They are well aware of the failures of Pacific Assault, and the damage that has caused their reputation. An aggressive patch plan is already in place, with items/features/content prioritized accordingly, and would roll out in waves over a period of time.

Conclusion
This dev team itself is unquestioningly committed to providing robust post-release patch support to Airborne and its community. If EA Exec gives them the support they need in terms of time and manpower, and the MOH community also supports the game, then with a little patience I think we'll see some very impressive things in the not-too-distant future, making Airborne the game we all want it to be, and setting it up nicely for continued future success.

The SP demo is now just around the corner (Aug 23). Here's a taste of what's in store.

So until then, there's only one thing left to do…

"GET READY TO GET AIRBORNE!"

News Source : Here Technorati Tags: Medal of Honor Airborne, EA		Buy
posted by Churchy

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MEDAL OF HONOR: AIRBORNE - PC MULTIPLAYER PREVIEW & EXCLUSIVE UPDATE by Whiskey from Planet Medal Of Honor

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