
I'm making a bit of a joke here, but serious in this way. A good portion of the life of Air Warrior had many fewer players than Aces High, yet it was fun to play and very active, even down to only 4-6 players online. Why? Because players/area was still fine. When there were 4-6 players up, you flew and encountered them. They weren't flying off somewhere impossible to interact with.
Sectors in Air Warrior, by the way, were 12 miles x 12 miles. So the above map would fit in about 1.5 by 1.5 sectors in Aces High.
Action is all about players/area.
If you have 40 players, but a terrain where there is a person here, then 4 sectors away another person, and so on -- there will be no action. It will be no more exciting that flying offline.
If you have 40 players, but a terrain that is 3 sectors by 3 sectors, you will have action and plenty of it.
It just depends. Does your on-line multiplayer flight-combat company make more money in the long term catering to people who want an offline flying experience while flying online or catering to people who want many-on-many fighting while flying online?
I'm here for many-on-many fighting among humans. Without that, it has no appeal to me.