Let me start off by saying I don’t own a PS3 and I have absolutely no intention of purchasing one (even if I had the money, which I don’t).  However, that doesn’t stop me from occassionally reading about new games for consoles, particuarly if they seem to have something new to offer.  That (and the fact that it was based on a few negative notes on MW2) was the reason this article on Gamesradar caught my eye.  However, after reading the article, I came to realize that MAG offers nothing new to gaming (though it does to consoles).  Instead, it just made me realize that rehashing old game mechanics on new platforms seems to be the way to “innovate” these days.

If you don’t know about MAG, it’s basically a massive online shooter.  256 players per server, to be precise.  However, if I recall correctly, the maps are subdivided in such a way that although things happening on one section of the map may impact the other, the actual fighting “arenas” are much smaller in terms of population [Actually, early reports suggested mock-256 player maps and the first two modes of the game are like this but Domination, the final mode, is an open 256 player map. -Squiddy].  The long and short of the article is that MW2 is for 13 year olds suffering from severe ADD and who drink too much caffienated beverages (and whose parents appear not to care how many expletive-infused trash-talking diatribes their rather young child spews into their microphone).  MAG on the other hand is for the old and the slow.  It’s an attrition based game, slower in its overall speed and design.  But the more I read about the gameplay, the more it sounded like Battlefield 2 in Infantry-only mode.  BF2 is also slow and based on attrition for victory (who remembers the ticket drain of doom?) and relied heavily on squad tactics and their relation to what the rest of the team was doing.  Unlike the COD games, with their adrenaline-infused pace and their instant kills, BF2 allowed players to be slower and more thoughtful, and the distribution of different kits within a squad needed to be appropriate to what they were trying to accomplish (and medics were a must).

I don’t know if MAG is going to have things like medics and whatnot, but the Battlefield series has been doing the slower-paced tactical thing for years.  Ok, so Bad Company 2 (and I assume BC1, since I never played it) is faster paced, but it’s also not trying to supplant the BF2 experience, but instead bridge the squad based team aspect and the inclusion of vehicles with a somewhat faster combat model, putting it between BF and COD.  The only truly interesting thing that MAG has going for it is the 256 player server, but that puts alot of faith in a huge installation base in order to fill up servers.  Who remembers how hard it was to get a 64 player BF2 server filled?  Unless you were one of the long-established server communities, it was difficult at best and sometimes was totally impossible.  MAG is just going along the same lines that PC games have followed since BF2 (or arguably since 1942).  If MAG ends up being successful, I’ll be very happy to know that console gamers are finally growing up and taking more tactical and thought-intensive shooters seriously.

As a disclaimer, I must note that my knowledge of this product is limited and this is formed from my initial impressions through other parties.  However, if that’s the impression that players are giving off, I tend to think of it as a fairly accurate representation of the game itself.  I may revise this stance once I have more knowledge of the game.