Army Massively Multiplayer Project Interview ...

HomeLan Fed : Exclusives : Army Massively Multiplayer Project Interview : with Robert Gehorsam
As I noted, we are not designing a game so much as a large-scale, flexible and powerful environment that can be used for training and mission-rehearsal across a range of objectives. So unfortunately, it's probably a bit early to talk in detail about the gameplay. But simply put, the project will enable a commander of a unit to say, "Hey, my unit needs to train for its upcoming peacekeeping duties in Kumar." He works with a trainer to develop a specific environment and scenario (or better yet, modify an existing one out of a repository), figures out who is going to play the bad guys, the civilians and the "others" -- like the Red Cross, the UN, etc. -- and then prep his unit for the exercise. These exercises could last anywhere from a couple of days to months for all we're concerned, that's the beauty of an MMP, of course. And so at a certain time, the participants would start to show up. Bad guys would be given their assignments, good guys theirs, etc. and off they'd go. People play themselves, on the ground, interacting with their team, other units, civilians, the enemy, etc. It's not all combat by any means, there will be a lot of intelligence, patrolling, planning, collaboration, negotiation with civilians, etc. In many ways, MMPs do all of these things today, but each MMP today is highly specified for its particular entertainment and social goals. That's absolutely the right thing to do for a commercial product, but because There was always conceived of as a virtual world platform, it enables us to be more adaptive and general purpose. I expect there will be several dozen different styles of gameplay when this is up and running.