Bully, Rockstar’s classic boarding school Bart Simpson simulator, is about to have another massive multiplayer mod fired at it from a slingshot. The mod’s dubbed Bully Online, stands atop the battered blazer of a previous attempt to let a bunch of folks play Bully together, and is set to arrive in paid early access this December.
Watch on YouTube
Bully Online’s being worked on by a group of modders which includes Rockstar-focused YouTuber Swegta, who’s announced the mod via the video above. It includes a trailer and some gameplay snippets showing off different aspects of the mod, including roleplaying-focused free roam, trolley racing, and minigames. The whole thing understandably seems very GTA Online-inspired, just with schoolkids mucking around instead of uber-rich criminals with dodgy tattoos and flying death bikes.
“Bully Online runs on the DSL script loader, which is a plugin for Bully that essentially allows for a way more versatile approach to modding,” Swegta explains. “A lot of the things that we thought were impossible just a few years ago can now be done, including making an online mode. We do have an official server for Bully Online and we plan on making that available to the public to enjoy in due time.”
Prior to that, the team plan to release the mod in paid early access this December, with those who pay $8 to support it on Ko-fi being let in ahead of the general public, as well as being granted perks like server queue priority and an in-game camera they can use to save pictures. “Supporting us on Ko-Fi means that we can spend more time working on this and us spending more time working on this means that it’s going to be available to the general public sooner,” Swegta says of the decision to go this potentially eyebrow-raising route.
As I mentioned earlier, this isn’t the first massive multiplayer mode modders have attempted to add to Bully. A Bully multiplayer mod was released back in 2018, with Swegta involved as a community manager, but since looks to have ended up dormant. The YouTuber offered his perspective as to why that project ran aground in a video six months ago, and says in the Bully Online announcement that “some of the ideas that did not make it into BullyMP have been repurposed for this project”.
“It’s been in the making for a very long time,” he added. “The cool thing about doing Bully Online is that we can add any kind of miniame or game mode that we feel is fitting for it. This is our project and we’re able to do anything we want with it.”
Given how that previous Bully multiplayer mod turned out, I think I’d take a wait and see approach with this latest one. Especially given there are the likes of Bully co-op mods already out there if you’re desperate to prank some nerds with a mate.
