What does "Ad Hoc Online Play" mean?

Ad hoc is a Latin phrase that means “for the purpose” or “for the purpose of” this isn’t newfangled geek terminology. So, when something is Ad Hoc Online Gaming it is just saying For The Purpose of Online Gaming.

Ad hoc means that you are connecting directly to the other maching without the internet as a go-between. Ad hoc is usually used on wireless devices. That’s why an ad hoc network is simply two computer connected with each other.

Oh! So, basically, all non-online multiplayer (2 or more machines) is “ad hoc multiplayer”? Why did nobody use the phrase until the PSP?

They did actually. A lot of the early DS titles were Ad Hoc. The phrase didn’t really become popular until the DS/PSP used it. I’m not sure why but even with the gameboy (when you could connect two gameboys together with a wire it was technically an ad hoc network (even though no one called it that)

Most wireless cards will give you an options to join a wireless network or create and ad hoc network.

Back in the day when I was connecting machines for LAN gaming, we never called it ad hoc. It just wasn’t a popular phrase yet.

Typically, you’re not going to see ad hoc online multiplayer. That’s like saying, “I was driving down the street in my van car.” It just doesn’t seem right.

IP is your Internet Protocol address. It’s basically like your street address on the internet. It’s how you communicate with other machines. You are always playing your games from your IP address. I guess you could say that it’s your computer’s street address (or xbox or whatever).

SKU is a stock keeping unit. Typically if you go on a site to get technical help on a laptop, you might have to enter all or part of your sku (which is essentially a UPC). I’m not sure why gamers would be using this one.

Banhammer is just a fancy way to say you are banned. If someone bans your IP from playing on a specific server (in Half life for example), you might say that you were struck down by the banhammer. All it means is that you were banned from that particular server.

The phrase might have been “ad hoc wireless multiplayer”, not “online”. As for “ad hoc online multiplayer,” isn’t that technically what the PS3 “Ad Hoc Party” is going to be?

And I was joking about those terms, I’m familiar with them (I meant IP as in “Sony’s bringing out a new IP!!! [intellectual property]). Thank you, though! Lurve. None of my DS games use the phrase “Ad hoc multiplayer” I think it just uses the terms “DS Multi-card play” and “DS Download Play,” depending on how many people need the game card.

And I was going to ask, why don’t they just call it LAN play?

Because technically it’s WAN play. LAN would be local area network and WAN would be wide area network. If it’s on the internet, it’s WAN play.

Ad Hoc Party won’t actually be traditional ad hoc. I guess you could make a case for ad hoc over the internet if the clients were connecting directly to each other without the need of an intermediary but it seems that sony will be optimizing and load balancing the connections between the PS3s. With my admittedly old school definition it’s not technically an Ad Hoc Party. An Ad Hoc Party wouldn’t have Sony to chaperon.

Maybe it’s ad hoc in the same way that my car has horse power.

lawls, van car.

QUICK, YOU TWO! INTO THE VAN CAR! We have to make it to the ad hoc party!

ROCK ON. \m/ ^___^ \m/

An example could be using the “system link” feature between 2 Xbox’s connected to the same hub or router.