We've produced several mplayer programs during the last years. Currently we're in pre-production mode for a new multiplayer title made with gameStudio. I can not confirm such huge "problmes" you mentioned.

On our part, we want also that the Direct-Play part will be replaced by a more stable and faster one like, Rak-Net. For an MMO or other big multiplayer games this should be a must have.

When starting a huge multiplay project you have defentifly to think about the main concept (zones, multiple serves) before starting everything else.

Smaller Multiplayer-Games (1-8 players) are absolutly possible with GameStudio and even with DirectPlay! Perhaps the main problem is, that there is no real mutliplay-template which most users can use...?!