Multiplayer: Difference between revisions

[[Image:Oni MP at MacWorld NY 1999 3.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Kevin Armstrong, Oni's networking programmer, is seated at the computer in the background (MacWorld NY '99)]]

Perhaps the biggest blow to Oni's reception was that there was no multiplayer option. Combined with complaints about the AI, players wanted to be able to play against other humans, but this option, although developed internally at Bungie West, was not included in the release due to the claimed constraints of network latency. The public viewed this as another sign of the game's incompletion, comparing Oni to FPS titles with multiplayer such as Unreal and Quake, and failing to recognize that melee combat over the Internet was nearly impossible at that time (and still is; [http://wolfire.com/overgrowth Overgrowth] a.k.a. Lugaru 2 promises LAN support only; a notable exception seems to be [[State of Emergency]], a melee-oriented game that apparently had reasonably fluid online multiplayer).

It is not clear why Bungie did not at least include LAN play functionality, since it was being used in their office for netgames and can be seen in use about 30 minutes into this [http://hl.udogs.net/files/Gaming/Bungie%20Related%20Movies/MWSF%202000/Bungie%20TV/MWSF%202000/bTV_day2_big.mov Bungie video] broadcast from the San Francisco [[wikipedia:Macworld_Conference_%26_Expo|Macworld Expo]] on January 6, 2000 (you can see the 2-minute sequence on its own [http://iritscen.oni2.net/movies/Steve%20demoes%20netplay.mov HERE]; these 2 minutes are the only in-game Oni footage in all of the Bungie TV broadcasts). Visitors to Bungie's booths at the [[wikipedia:Electronic_Entertainment_Expo|E3]] of May 1999 in Los Angeles, the New York City MacWorld Expo of July 1999 and the San Francisco Macworld Expo of January 2000 were even able to play Oni LAN games (pictured at right). However, it is possible that multiplayer suffered from more than latency, and that, without more time to develop this mode of gameplay, the developers decided to cut it rather than frustrate players with an incomplete netplay feature.

Some words from the Oni staff on multiplayer (back when it was in development) can be found in the interviews with [http://oni.bungie.org/special/part1/kevin.html Kevin Armstrong] (networking programmer) and [http://oni.bungie.org/special/part2/steve.html Steve Abeyta] (3D animator, mentions "Oni Soccer" and kickable furniture).