With Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond nearly just a week away from release, we still know surprisingly little about the game’s multiplayer component. Luckily we’ve got some details to share.
It was only yesterday that we got our first clear look of Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond multiplayer thanks to a new trailer which highlighted five games modes.
Now we’ve gleaned some specifics on the functions and features of the game’s multiplayer.
Cross-play Between Oculus and Steam
Because the game is the first Oculus Studios title to be released on both Oculus and Steam, one big question on our mind was whether or not the game’s multiplayer will support cross-play.
Luckily the answer is “yes,” says Mike Doran, Oculus Studios Executive Producer. But there’s a catch.
While the game will have cross-platform matchmaking (a shared pool of players queueing up for matches), individual player invites between platforms is not supported, meaning you won’t be able to invite a friend to your squad if they’re on the opposite platform.
“We don’t have a way for the social graphs to talk to each other as there’s no EA account required to play the game,” Doran explained.
That’s a bit of a bummer, but at least cross-platform matchmaking means the game’s population will be healthier than if the two were divided. Some cross-platform VR games have gotten around this cross-platform invite limitation by allowing players to join one another via a ‘room code’ which connects players to a specific room, so there’s at least some hope that such a system could be added after the fact if there’s demand for it.
Bots to Fill Empty Slots
To further support the health of the game’s multiplayer population, Doran says that Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond will automatically fill empty team slots with bots. That means that even a handful of players will be enough to get a match started—far better than sitting in an endless queue—and hopefully the game will be able to swap out the bots for real players as more people queue for matches.
Dedicated Servers, Private Matches, and Team Sizes
Speaking of matches, Doran also confirmed that, in addition to public matchmaking, players can also choose to host private matches. All matches, public and private, will use dedicated servers.
He also said that multiplayer matches support up to 12 players at a time. We’ve seen that the game offers team modes, meaning the maximum team size will be 6 vs. 6. Free-for-all modes are also in the game, pitting all players against each other, though we’re not yet sure if multi-team modes (ie: 4 vs. 4 vs. 4) will be supported.
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Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond also includes a full single-player campaign, which you can read about and watch here. Oculus has said it’s looking into the possibility of bringing the game to Quest 2 in the future.
