HQ
The Musketeers Squadron is, to our knowledge, the oldest, continuously-operating online squad existing in virtual space. We were officially established in Air Warrior by Athos (D. Barnett) on February 23, 1990, and for all these years we have existed as a continuously operating online squad. As far as we know, no other squad can claim this; period. We’ve survived the game that spawned us, games that supplanted it, and the proliferation of multiplayer on-line games. Before the Web, before X-box Live and Playstation, before clans and guilds, we existed.
As for this website, it’s a labor of love. My goal is to share with you information about The Musketeers Squadron (TMS), about massively multiplayer online games (MMOGS), particularly those depicting World War II combat, and about the spirit, skills, and stories that define our passion for these games. The squad and I also want to give you at least some understanding of what real air combat was all about in terms of the tactics and theories behind it.
I originally developed the site in 1997, on behalf of the squad, starting with nothing more than Microsoft Notepad and a printout of basic HTML codes, and eventually moved on to a WYSIWYG HTML editor. Since then, there have been a couple of versions of the site, each leveraging a bit more the Web’s huge technological advances. Currently, the site is powered by Wordpress, and frankly, I’m amazed that what took me months to do in 1997, I’ve rebuilt in a fraction of the time today, in my spare hours.
If you’re an avid computer or console gamer, you’re already familiar with online combat games, ranging from sci-fi and sword & sorcery themes to gritty, realistic air/land combat, and everything in between. You probably also know that literally thousands of websites dedicated to these games exist now, created by players, clans, and squads from all over the world. Many of these sites do a remarkably thorough and visually-appealing job of informing and supporting people with an interest in these games. Given that kind of dedication by our fellow gamers, our site can’t even begin to do complete justice to these topics. However, the rest of the squad and I endeavor to give you value for your time here; to give you quality, and eventually quantity as well. So, I’ll present our knowledge, experiences, and opinions with our best foot forward and you shall be the judge of whether or not this site is worth the visit. I believe it is.
So, with all that said, please check out our blog, hang out to read our thorough air combat training articles (ACM), historical profiles, and stop by our forum, The Bloody Blade. Finally, as always, check your six!
