FPS and single player

[XHolySmokesX]

There is something about FPS campaigns that I'd like to point out here. With 'Call of Duty' apparently dominating the genre, whenever someone mentions FPS's, people automatically think of war games like 'Call of Duty', or other modern day alternatives such as 'Splinter Cell', 'Rainbow 6' or 'Halo'. However because of this one thing most people miss is that there are a lot of FPS's out there that we don't automatically associate as a FPS.

An example of this is 'Portal'. 'Portal' is more commonly seen as a puzzle game rather than an FPS and the one thing that asserts this image is the lack of the "guns that shoot bullets and kill things" part of the game (I would also like to point out that 'Portal' received a lot of awards and acclimation from critics). The FPS genre has been cemented with the bullet gun killing image, but all a game needs to have to be classed as a FPS is allowing the player to shoots something out of something to overcome obstacles.

So considering this you could have a game where you use a gun that shoots out puppies to distract dog lovers so you could sneak past them. or have a game where the character uses a scan gun to extract information from people to help out with an investigation into a murder. (don't steal my ideas... especially the puppy one =P)

So as far as the question goes; Yeah, I think FPS are lacking in strong campaigns. FPS's have potential to be original and awesome but my opinion is that the 'bullet filled guns' image is cutting the genres potential short.

 

[similar.squirrel]

I like the idea of co-operative play in campaigns, online or otherwise. I think games need to eschew competitive multiplayer and focus on story for a few years, though.

Or release multiplayer packs for single-player games separately, and after the release of the single-player mode.
Like Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, for example.

 

[Outright Villainy]

I play shooters solely for the single player. The days of decent split screen multiplayer are very dead.

Tf2 is the sole exception I give to online shooters.

 

[Vault101]

...except Halo has always cared about its campaigns and had an actual overarching story and background universe it explores.

Can't speak for Call of Duty... but my friend JourneyThroughHell can, and he says the campaigns are typically the best part of the games. And since he's a big fan of CoD, that's saying a lot.

This goes back to what I said in my previous post: it's all subjective when it comes to singleplayer. Come to think of it, it's all subjective when it comes to multiplayer, too. In fact, enjoyment of a game is pretty much all subjective. Getting story or gameplay mechanics so brilliant or terrible you can objectively call them brilliant or terrible is rare - usually it all comes down to preference.

The one thing I can think of that isn't subjective is graphics.

Ah, but then you get onto the subjective point of whether graphics are important.

Sorry, I couldn't resist that. You are right, of course. Gaming in (nearly?) all it's aspects is subjective to the player, and a rewarding experience for one will be a shallow washout for another. When it comes down to it, this is a trait gaming shares with every other entertainment medium.

I'm glad we agree. Wasn't in the mood for an argument anyway.

I guess what I was trying to get at was:

Soooooo....thing of the past?

or will it make a "comeback" like the "fun" shooters

Singleplayer FPS games don't need to make a comeback, because they never went away. Pretty much every FPS has a singleplayer. Whether or not you LIKE these singleplayers is another matter entirely.

Is there anything in particular you want from a singleplayer FPS? Right now your criteria are a bit broad for a proper recommendation.

ok I know some good games can still be short, but 5 hours is really rediculous and is hardly worth the money if your not into multiplayer, thats what turns me and Im sure other people off thease games...theres just not much there aside from multiplayer its as if single player is just an afterthourght

eather put some effort into it or dont bother, life TF2

 

[Sonicron]

As always, singleplayer is all that interests me in a game 99% of the time.

To answer your question about Bulletstorm, the singleplayer is a blast. Nevermind the fact that the story is a load of bollocks on a skillet, the gameplay and over-the-top silliness of the whole thing make it all worth it.

.

How long is it? Cos I really want to get it but I can't really afford it and Dragon Age 2 is coming so I want to make sure I'll get my money's worth if I splash out!

Well, I only played through it on easy difficulty so far to get through the story, and it took me about 12 hours. No idea into what kind of playtime that translates for you, but I feel like I got my money's worth.

 

[repeating integers]

ok I know some good games can still be short, but 5 hours is really rediculous and is hardly worth the money if your not into multiplayer, thats what turns me and Im sure other people off thease games...theres just not much there aside from multiplayer its as if single player is just an afterthourght

eather put some effort into it or dont bother, life TF2

I see, so you want a properly long game.

Well... in spite of all I've said about it, Half-Life 2 isn't. Then again, I expect you already have it (it's hardly unpopular). If you haven't, then it IS pretty long. Lots of this length is filler levels, but if that doesn't turn you off then maybe you should give it a go. On top of that, it's hugely cheap right now on Steam. Also, episode 2 is notable £1.49 at this moment in time...

Other than that, Halo CE can be grabbed for cheap off the XBL marketplace. I'm not sure how long the campaign is (since my copy doesn't work on my Xbox, gralgral) but for the price, I'd say it's worth a try.

 

[Wolfram23]

I always play single player campaigns in my games. I have to say that MW2 and Black Ops and even BF:BC2 had fun campaigns... but that's about as far as I'd go with it. But then those games are really meant to sell on their MP. I'd say most of these war games are meant to sell on their MP.

For good SP FPS games you need to get away from war games. Metro 2033, Cryostasis, BioShock 1&2, Fallout 3/NV (I know, FPS RPG), STALKER:CoP are all good examples of FPS games with excellent single player. Of course you have older games too like Half Life 1&2. I guess I should also mention Penumbra and Amnesia: The Dark Descent as they were all very good games I thought - Although they lack the "S" in FPS haha.

I'm sure Battlefield 3 will have a fun campaign, but probably not great. It'll also be more about a good MP experience. I'd say the next good FPS game will be Portal 2 (quasi-shooter lol) but other than that, I'm not sure. Gone are the days, it would seem, of FPS games offering grand adventure. Although, there are some great 3PS games still coming out! (3rd person shooter)

 

[Duskwolf]

Duke Nukem.

He's back to remind us how it's done.

 

[Netrigan]

Soooooo....thing of the past?

or will it make a "comeback" like the "fun" shooters

I dont know waht Bulletstorm is like anyway can anyone name a relitivley recent shooter with decent single player?

Depends on what you mean by "decent".

I'm of the opinion that the reason why first person shooters are so popular is that it's relatively easy to make a decent one. I can count on one hand the number of FPS I couldn't be bothered to finish and only one of them I considered irredeemably bad. For the record, that was the original Call Of Juarez... Call Of Duty 3 for the PS3 had me quit because of its god-awful stupid motion controls and the original Halo was a borrowed game (with borrowed games, I find I have a low boredom threshold... if I don't like it, I'll find any excuse to stop playing it).

Anywho, the core weapons and game play don't change much from game to game, so it's pretty easy to release something that is palatable to the fanbase.

The problem is that it's increasingly difficult to find a way to make your game stand out. You need to introduce some game play mechanic and make sure you polish it enough to make it fun. Go through the major franchise/title and you'll see that almost all of them advance the genre in some way. Wolfenstein 3D put down the basic rules, Doom introduced a z-axis (you still couldn't look up and down, but the game wasn't on a single plane) and turned the volume up to 11 on Wolfenstein's game mechanics. Duke Nukem 3D had realistic environments, destructible scenery, and usable items. Quake introduced true 3D. Unreal had lush expansive outdoor environments. Goldeneye introduced the sniper rifle, escort mission, and stealth elements. Half-Life introduced new narrative techniques. Halo was the first AAA campaign to incorporate vehicles seamlessly into the game play. I could go on and on.

Every new game is struggling to come up with some hook that makes their game stand out. For up-coming releases, we have Brink introducing the SMART system to simplify movement. Homefront is trying to convince us that they're making the single player story a much more visceral experience. Bulletstorm came up with a skillshot system. None of these things really just jump out at me as being a major game-changer... Brink's SMART system (if it works as well as they claim) will probably become a popular control scheme, but that doesn't necessarily sell the game... the first game that introduced mouselook wasn't a huge success.

As for length... I see two distinct issues.

First, a linear game is going to be shorter than an open-world one. Sandbox games can pad out their length by having you go back & forth and tossing random action at you. Once you create the world, they can easily create side-missions with text directions without having to deal with the expense of animated cut-scenes and voice acting. All content in a FPS has to be fully crafted and that's increasingly expensive, so you're not going to see a whole lot of campaigns that are longer than 10 hours.

Secondly, the major multiplayer franchises have discovered that they can get away with horribly short single player campaigns of around six hours. Not a huge deal if you're going to be playing on-line every day for the next six months... but the practice starts filtering out to the wannabe titles. I recently picked up three shooters (two third-person and one first-person) and not a single one of the campaigns took longer than six hours. Only one (Quantum Of Solace) seems to have had any life as a MP game, while Stranglehold had a MP mode that no one seems to have ever wanted to play and Wanted had no MP at all. Unless you're dealing with a famous license (007, Star Wars) or come from a popular developer (Epic, id); you're not going to be able to get away with this. And I think a lot of developers know this, which is why when they're launching a new IP, they focus on the single player game, as they did with Bioshock.

 

[BENZOOKA]

Of course not. Bioshock Infinite, Duke Nukem Forever and a bunch of others coming.

And there are already Bioshocks, Fallout 3 & New Vegas... And of course, CS:S. It never gets old.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

As always, singleplayer is all that interests me in a game 99% of the time.

To answer your question about Bulletstorm, the singleplayer is a blast. Nevermind the fact that the story is a load of bollocks on a skillet, the gameplay and over-the-top silliness of the whole thing make it all worth it.

.

How long is it? Cos I really want to get it but I can't really afford it and Dragon Age 2 is coming so I want to make sure I'll get my money's worth if I splash out!

Well, I only played through it on easy difficulty so far to get through the story, and it took me about 12 hours. No idea into what kind of playtime that translates for you, but I feel like I got my money's worth.

12 hours on easy souns like good value to me. plus I'd finally get to game with you !

 

[Tipsythegza]

i prefer playing MP but if i'm bored i will most likely play through the campaign.

 

[Sonicron]

12 hours on easy souns like good value to me. plus I'd finally get to game with you !

Haven't had a chance to try multiplayer yet, but from what I gather it's basically a horde mode where you have to coordinate your efforts to achieve team skillshots. Traditional DM, TDM or CTF does not exist in Bulletstorm.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

12 hours on easy souns like good value to me. plus I'd finally get to game with you !

Haven't had a chance to try multiplayer yet, but from what I gather it's basically a horde mode where you have to coordinate your efforts to achieve team skillshots. Traditional DM, TDM or CTF does not exist in Bulletstorm.

Wait... there's no co-op????

 

[JourneyThroughHell]

Wait... there's no co-op????

Uhm... Didn't I tell you?

It's a coop horde mode.

That's basically it.

Yeah.

I think Bulletstorm can wait for a bit. I have Killzone 3 on the horizons.

OT: I have no idea what any of you are talking about. The campaigns are by far the best parts of the CoD games and are a pretty big part of the Halo series as well.

A shame not that many people actually try them out.

 

[Netrigan]

Is extremely weird that there's no co-op mode, since there's not a single level I've played so far where I haven't had at least one of them following me around.

The lack of any sort of Deathmatch is also a bit odd, but then the game's mechanics are all about dominating weaker opponents. You could probably tack on a MP mode, but then a lot of the weapons would either be useless or not work they do in the main game (like the leash would work and the flail gun wouldn't immobilize).

But I continue to be a bit impressed with Epic's willingness to try out new things. Just saw a hands on report of Gears 3 and they talk about how they added mantle kicks (letting you melee attack someone behind or near a piece of cover). Going back to Unreal, they were adding dodge moves, double jumps, and wall jumps. The tag and bag mechanic of Gears where you can plant a mine and kick them into a crowd of people. Epic may love crafting really stupid stories, but I can't think of a FPS/TPS studio that so consistently tries out new game mechanics.

 

[Reptiloid]

Thing of the past? Nonsense!

As far as I'm concerned, single player is the ONLY way to experience an FPS game.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Single player focused FPSs are still around, they just don't get the exposure of games that have hundreds of thousands of people playing online at once. Didn't Bioshock 2 come out just last year, and isn't there a new Deus Ex game on the way? The inclusion of a multiplayer mode doesn't make those two games multiplayer focused anymore than a short campaign makes the modern CoD games singleplayer focused. It all depends on what the developers want to be the main draw, and what they include as an added bonus. From where I'm standing, there's plenty of games of both flavors coming out all the time.

 

[sylekage]

I don't have a solid Xbox internet connection half of the year, so I buy FPS's for the single player. Though they're short and try to shove a lot in there, they're still fun as hell to play. Especially if you know what you're doing and play it on easy just to plow through everyone