xg4bx, on Mon Jan 9, 2012 4:31 PM, said:
maybe i'm just silly thinking that manning the guns of a dreadnaught or crewing a starship over xbl would be fun.
Actually this reminds me... long ago, before online gaming was huge and all they had were those mech games where you got into a little pod thing and they were all connected via cables, I envisioned a WWII bombing game where you were part of a B-17 bomber crew (or similar plane like a B-24 or Lancaster). You had a pilot, a gunner/bombadier, tail gunner, ball gunner, and two waist gunners (and maybe a radio man or navigator who manned another gun). You would fly simulated missions over German targets and get back again. In my original version, it would take hours to complete a game from take off, flight over the Channel, flight over the target and back again. With flak to avoid, fighters to shoot down, a target to bomb, and so on. On the trip back, the plane would be lighter and fly faster but might be damaged so it was no cake walk. Of course each position would be different enough that it would take some practice and skill to be proficient at it and rankings for individual positions could be posted based on stats peculiar to that position. I wouldn't want people always fighting over who got to be the pilot or whatever. I'd hope people would practice at one position to be the best they could be at that position.
Of course for today's online gaming this could be shortened so that the more boring uneventful parts were skipped, but I always thought that part of the fun/immersion of the game would be the waiting and watching for incoming fighters. Also, there could be others who were flying escort fighters or other bombers with their crews. Perhaps entire teams of people all flying in one simulated raid. And it could go the other way, too with German bombers flying over English targets with appropriate planes and positions and escort fighters... And of course, those fighters you were trying to shoot down could be other people playing the other side... And anything that didn't have an actual player could be simulated by the computer... tail gunner grounded (pun intended), the computer would take over that position. Picturing it kind of like playing a game of Rock Band when your drummer isn't there... he doesn't sign in so the drumming is done automatically. Of course, the computer controlled gunner isn't perfect and its skill level is based on the skill levels of the rest of the team.
But anyway, that was a game idea that I thought up long ago. It would probably work great for XBL or PSN as long as enough people were interested in the idea.