Rogue Spear: Hands On Preview by Bubba "MasterFung" Wolford
	Multiplayer: This is the area that I was most anticipating. I have four machines at networked and I installed Rogue Spear on them all. I invited a few friends over to test the multiplayer code and we got down to business. First point- Rogue Spear is only in Beta 1 right now. The anticipated release date is now set somewhere around September 15th and the team has lots of time to get all the bugs worked out. Do I sound like I am making excuses? The fact is that multiplayer is not totally stable in beta 1 but our LAN group played Adversarial games for 3 days. Did machines crash? Yes. Did we have a freaking blast playing? Yes. Did anybody mind rebooting after their machine crashed once every 5 games or so? Not a bit! For a first beta, Rogue Spear is VERY stable. Some new options available in multiplayer are the ability to restrict weapons and equipment that other players can access. I thought this was working pretty well as we played all the different maps with the different multiplayer options. Some multiplayer options worked and some did not. For instance, playing terrorist hunt was not working. There were no terrorists in the maps so we ended up hunting each other. Every other option we played that did not involve terrorists worked. Unfortunately, one option that does involve terrorists is Cooperative play. This was not working for us. Every time the server would click the button to start the game, that computer would drop to the Windows desktop and the rest would freeze. All the maps in multiplayer adversarial play were working just as well in multiplayer as in single player. One map not available in single player was the "Bunker" map. Since training was disabled in beta 1 you could only access this map through adversarial multiplayer. Of all the maps in the game, the Bunker map was our favorite. We played this one using pistols only, pistols and shotguns only, or all weapons available. Click to continue		Frame rates were outstanding and we found the game ran very well even on a P200 with a V1 card (with resolution turned down of course). On our 100mbs LAN, bandwidth was not an issue but as more press/ beta online games get setup, I will be testing it over the Internet to ensure it runs smoothly. A New Standard in Shooters The main thing I want to convey to everyone who likes playing Rainbow Six multiplayer is that RSE LISTENED to your requests and implemented them in the game. Although there are no major additions to team multiplayer options from Eagle Watch (see my review of Eagle Watch multiplayer here) they have entrenched lots of new tweaks to make playing Rogue Spear more involved and exciting. Playing with pistols only was never so easy! Also there is a ping utility to see who is lagging the game which allows the server to eject them if necessary. The addition of false HB sensor pucks is a very good idea and should add a lot to the strategy level. New heart beat (HB) sensors are also being implemented along with heart beat sensor jammers. Conclusion I can't put exactly how I feel about Rogue Spear into words. I expected this game to rock and it does rock! No game this year has me more excited than Rogue Spear, especially from what I see now. I am so excited about it I actually feel sorry I can't send everyone who reads COMBATSIM.COM™ a copy because I can guarantee all of you that you would love this game. It really is that good. Look for it to hit the stores around September 15th. Join a discussion forum on this article by clicking   HERE.
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