The essence of Battlefield games are MPs. It was designed specifically to be played online, for people who are connected to the internet or people who are gathering together in a LAN party. The concept of SP-gaming in Battlefield games are fading with each releases of subsequent titles. I noted that BF2 is the worst of them all. They have the least SP maps, and let alone SP support.
Why SP?Elite MPers say they don't really need SP, because a lot of things, and most of the reasons revolve around the limited AI capability in offering them real challenge posed by opposing human players. Even Project Reality mod created their own Training Server, making their training environment in MP basis. Forgotten Hope simply doesn't have enough resource or let alone, big enough player basis just to do that. Most of the times, there are only 3-5 servers in western world (and 2 in east) filled with enough players to make a good game.
FH players simply say, the SP is there for newbies to train and professionals to hone their skills. That is not entirely true. The dev's statement isn't much different either, just more sensitive towards those with less better internet connection. It is there "to cater the SPers" player base. Perhaps it was meant to enlarge FH2 community, reaching aging population who rarely get the chance to enjoy fast-paced MP games, it may even potentially attract WW2 veterans.
OK, So What's In It for Us?We all always feel that FH2 creates a giant awesome step forward in Battlefield 2 game modification. When we saw the Normandy landscape at first, we were overwhelmed with astonishment. The game was so thoroughly crafted to produce such a beautiful in-game presentation. There are so much immersion in the game apart from its physical component glitch.
Single Player games, instead of MP offers you more scenario-ed gameplay, it offers you different story, it can potentially creates deeper immersion. Stay away from human players, especially 'pubbies' who often exploit bugs, glitches, do weird actions, for their own amusement, you'll only find bots who will play by the rules. They won't lash at you, show-off their awesomeness, or even displaying stupid act just for the show. The only thing that beat the experience is coordinated gameplay like tournaments, which is the most you can get from FH2.
I hope then we can get better support and attention. A lot of SP games out there receives huge attention, HL2 mods, Command & Conquer title mods, etc. They are all SP games, but they are hugely popular.
The Very Basic ProblemThis was the problem that is bugging most FH2 SPers. Since the game is mostly designed on MP basis and little SP thought, and by default, the bots are only optimized for 16-sized maps. It means that they are designed to be just as good as they are in smallest maps. Hence, you see a many problems regarding their behavior in intricately-designed maps such as Fall of Tobruk, where they leave the main base entirely to advance deeper in the city by spawning inside them. Smaller maps has fewer flag post and the distance between flags are closer, thus chance you will encounter this problem is little.
It may because of EA's cutting cost effort by reducing the AI development cost. But it is not important now, because we are in it! And i don't know anything about modding the AI codes. All i know about BF2 AI is making navmesh out of a map. It raises question regarding the AI-coding works that are mod-able:
- Can we really tune the bot behavior besides achieving the result by modifying their interaction with objects (guns, vehicles, statics), which i reckon, LegionDcX is doing?
- Are the behaviors are hard-coded in the game engine, which is un-mod-able? Or does tweaking it is not allowed by EA or simply making the game unstable/becoming a major change?
Then we can understand better, and suggest more do-able suggestions.