Harpoon3 Multiplayer

[kojusoki1]

Hi
I spend a lot of time playing Harpoon several years ago, I had a great time, but I was wishing to play H2H... Unfortunatly, I have heard that Harpoon 3 is pretty bugged and has plenty problems with multiplayer.

I can see there are only a few of you, addicted enough, to play H2H:) So could you please tell me how many players are multiplayer active (more or less of course) and more or less how the multiplayer game looks like. I mean how many hours do you usually play, what about time compression. Is it more like we start in the morning, we sent orders and do our job, while Harpoon is working and we just wait for any messages (time compresion is 1:1 or maybe more?)

Im just wondering if I want to buy it or not:)

[FreekS]

Number of players that occasionally play, maybe 10. Players that regularly play, maybe 2-4. Addicted players? Definitely 1!

Speed is not much of an issue, unless you play with dial-up connection. Even then a small scen runs fine. Easily 1:30s time compression. Compression is more limited by the level that the slowest player is comfortable with, so 1:15 is more likely.

There are fewer bugs that affect Multiplay than solitaire, I think. Yes there are game crashes, or players get dropped, but autosave works so its a nuisance but not disaster.

I've played MP full scens in an hour (small ones), or large ones in several sessions. Its always tough to make appointment for a new session but we finish most of them. Typically a session lasts 1-2 hours before one of the players has to leave, there have been some much longer sessions but they are rare.

Hope this helps, I'm sure Herman will jump in when he wakes up.

Freek

[hermanhum]

ORIGINAL: kojusoki1

I spend a lot of time playing Harpoon several years ago, I had a great time, but I was wishing to play H2H... Unfortunatly, I have heard that Harpoon 3 is pretty bugged and has plenty problems with multiplayer.

I can see there are only a few of you, addicted enough, to play H2H:) So could you please tell me how many players are multiplayer active (more or less of course) and more or less how the multiplayer game looks like. I mean how many hours do you usually play, what about time compression. Is it more like we start in the morning, we sent orders and do our job, while Harpoon is working and we just wait for any messages (time compresion is 1:1 or maybe more?)

Im just wondering if I want to buy it or not:)

ANW is currently buggy. However, some of them can be avoided. For example, there are many ways to crash a server but, if you are careful avoid certain practices known to cause problems, you can play a game relatively crash-free.

If you read through the thread, you can see that there have probably been close to 100 different players involved in MP. Some are still around, some are not. Freek is probably right about the number of players dedicated to MP at around 10.

We have played some 9 hour sessions, slept 8 hours, only to return and play 9 more! It really depends on how much time you want to devote to a game. Some players have kept games going for over 3 months by playing only 1-2 hrs/week. Some scenarios take hours while others can be finished in 30 minutes. Whatever your taste is, the PlayersDB can probably accommodate you.

If you are unsure whether or not you wish to purchase this game, we can make arrangements for you to try out an MP session to see if it meets your requirements.

MP is a continuous process. It is just like you are playing a normal solitaire game, except the AI is controlled by a human player. Time compression is selected by each player and the slowest one is used as the default.

[kojusoki1]

Thank you Herman for the PM. Im going to play a few single player games now to chalenge you:)
I work at home so I can shift my time pretty much. I spend lots of time with Matrix Close COmbat series and Dominions series in multiplayer games so I realize how things work. My only concern was that harpoon is not turn based from one hand and from second it is a game set for several ingame days. So I was wondering how do you  deal with this. But after your posts it seems game can be played and wife will not want to divorce