Well the developer that USED to have it right was Zipper with SOCOM 2.

Possibly the best online shooter ever. The variety of maps was incredible. I think it had something like 16 maps. Sorry my mistake....22 maps.

The clan system was incredible, it wasn't a lousy three letter tag like most devs cheap out and do. You had an entire page dedicated to it, who was on, what room, their rank, the leader could post challenges and any news for gamebattles.

The ranking system was perfect, you had to earn your rank. Butterstick, double butter, cookie, wings and admiral. Not like every game now where if you play long enough (and suck) you get all the perks of the best people. Socom 2 had to perks by the way...Straight up skill.

Just saw that someone posted lobby system above....Also another reason why it was perfect.

Most of the weapons and other things that Zipper did 8 years ago weren't being done by others until 5-6 years later.

I like Online and split screen, online is only fun when people don't have to cheat to win a simple game.

Split screen is good when your friends wants to play but doesn't have the system or game or even internet.

So both are great in their own ways and its true that not to many games are doing online right, mostly doing it to get more money.

MW2 has a get online but the problem is mostly the host leaving or the severs kicking you out, MAG so far doesn't really have those problems Vs people using lag to kill you, other then that I say Halo and MAG are the two best for Online or even Uncharted.

Some get it right. Everyone needs to beta test. Beta testing could find unforeseen issues or undesirable features before the game releases. Beta testing isn't just for finding bugs in the gameplay.

I love the MP in Transformers, simple approach but still lots of depth in gameplay.

They seem to have their sh*t in order.

i think the one of the few developers that got multi-player right without any huge problems at least on the consoles is bungie. halo 3 like i said many times before is really solid to play. there are practically no glitches now and is balanced. didn't bungie even help naughty dog with their online and theater mode on uncharted 2? now that's telling you something right there.

*cough* mgo, fk konami id, game id, character id LOL

I like the simplicity of Warhawk.....no match making here, just list the games you want, then join.

There's nothing worse than sitting idle in a lobby waiting to play, and having to sit through an intermission at the end of the map.

Match making is a console cancer that has unfortunately made its way to PC due to lazy developers like Infinity Ward. Somehow, dedicated servers and a server browser are "features" when they've been a PC standard since the mid-NINETIES.

Consoles suck as servers... even home computers are not the best. Who ever is the host rules the game, this is an advantage... no lag. All the games I have ever played in multiplayer on a computer... Quake, Duke Nukem, Unreal and all the Battlefield games. All game platforms other than a computer are big bussiness making money off people that need less hastle to setup... where is the any key people... Plug and play. Ok so consoles crash and burn like computers because that is what they are. Hardware and software... So yes KISS, just keep a theme like outer space... wild west and be true to it...

Have fun gaming CC :-)

Guerrilla Games are the only ones that know how to get it right, for the most part.

@Rob Bateman

I am not confident your knowledge of College Level ANSI C would be enough to create the party systems you want in MAG. :) :) :)

Had you actually been keeping up with developments on these games you would know...

Zipper did not elect to tie clan squads together because it would have been unbalanced. Making MAG that clan focused early on would be a death nail to noobs.

How would you like it if your first game at MAG you were being OWNED by 2 Platoons all Miced up under the same clan tag. You likely wouldn't stay in the game. People leaving games like that presents a huge issue to the game play.

Furthermore, Zipper has gone on record saying there would be much more expanded clan support within MAG. If I remember correctly clan battles will be possible in the future.

I suggest you do a little research next time into WHY these games made those design choices.

You are suggesting the developers are just stupid or to lazy. Often the ideas players have are the same the devs have and when they implement them something breaks or there is an unbalance that needs to be addressed.

So what is wrong with the server list / server create functions?

1 - It takes people away from Mainstream game Queues.

2 - It creates "back alley servers" that cater to particular clans or groups.

3 - These servers often function as noob traps. Noobs log in to one of these Clan Servers, get owned, called bad things and creates a poor gameplay experience. Poor gameplay experience reflects on the title and the developer worse then a lack of features for people to take advantage of noobs. DICE, Zipper and IW did not spend millions of dollars to create bully servers.

4 - People creating their own servers sets up an Ownership and Entitlement mentality. Shooters have enough problems with TKing, glitches, cheats, lag, plain ole assholes, etc. Do they really need a clan feeling entitled to do these things? Pop in Warhawk if you don't know what I mean.

5 - Allows hackers and glitchers to work and experiment unfettered. At least when you play on public servers there is the benefit of random people being there to witness what is going on and possibly report it to the developers.

6 - New shooter players don't understand a server list as easily as "join game". Understand the shooter genre has been ridiculed for not being very open to noobs and in this day and age of a declining economy developers have it in their best interest for their game to be as open to any player as possible.

So there are 6 reasons off the top of my head why this feature may be going the way of the do-do bird.

BF:BC2 seems to have a pretty secure online multiplayer.

If dedicated servers were in a lot of games this wouldn't be a problem and also more features are welcome too.

Some games can't run on P2P. Battlefield for example needs dedicated servers. P2P can't handle huge battles, lots of vehicles, player amount, etc.

To stay on topic, every game will have it's faults. Some more than others. I believe every gaming company should have dedicates 'Fix it' teams. They are not necessarily part of the development team, but help post launch. This allows for the dev team to continue working on DLC or other games and the 'Fix it' team on bugs/glichtes.

It's the only game I know of that has problems "finding players". I bought the DLC and it is even slower.

My advice in general is to get the basics right first. Stop releasing games that are broken on disc with the intent of fixing months later. Because once this generation is over I don't expect to see the servers to be around...and I don't want to be left with a broken coded disc with no server to fix it.

Next? Start allowing ownership of things you buy and stop linking them behind an account. Sony needs to stop blocking copyrighted games and content from being backed up which is 90% of the purpose for a back up to begin with and 90% of the data on your system. Microsoft needs to lighten up on banning gamers from live and shutting them out of their game purchases in the process.

If Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, or any PC company can't get a simple online structure right then how can we be talking about getting developers into making multiplayer games right? It's like asking a tree to bear fruit when it is rooted in the desert sand.

Unreal Tournament III have this? I just remember it being if you played against good people then your rank would go up, but if you lost against bad people your rank would go down...or is TrueSkill something different?

Well you had nothing to say about Halo, and I must agree that Halo has the best multiplayer out there.

I think the real question is "Why can't gamers get multiplayer gaming right?". Most of the problems with online gaming are caused by the players themselves. The glitches may be present in a game (and developers should certainly stay vigilant about glithces), but it is the players who exploit them. It is the players who antagonize others on the mic. It is the players who are so concerned with their kill/death ratio that they actively avoid teamwork. It is the players who think it is funny to go around teamkilling.

Bungie seems to do it great every time.

Tell me again how the multiplatform strategy was supposed to fix everything. Look at your results and compare them to Nintendo, which keeps thriving with exclusives. Your loyal fans are gone. And let’s not forget the pile of IPs you purchased only to let them rot.

The worst thing is this is down from last years numbers/expectations which was down from the previous years numbers/expectations. You think about how long “down” has been a consistent part of the communication and you realize those subscriptions are what’s holding that boat together. The price cut of gamespass is still a price raise in a string of price raises. They are trying to use players to offset the missing revenue. Now call of duty is out of gamespass, which is literally WHY they bought the company. To draw people to the subscription. They realized they missed a boatload of money and that wasn’t sustainable. Now you pay for it like you would have if they never bought the company… so why buy the company? Mind you those billions still need to be paid back. Yeah it gives you a chance to say we make the biggest FPS… but the internal conversations must be brutal at high level on topics that really matter. Like revenue. Profitability. And ROI for the shopping spree.

Is this like the 10th quarter in a row they're down 33% on hardware how is that even mathematically possible. You would think their mediocrity would Plateau