"If a game can't stand on single player alone, it's a bad game." Really?

[Owyn_Merrilin]

If a title calls itself multiplayer exclusive then it shouldn't have single player to begin with because we WILL treat it like it was meant to be a big part of the game

What about if the menu said "Tutorial" instead of "New Game"?

Isn't it obvious enough that I was referring to a campaign mode?
Do I really have to explain?

I actually think that "Tutorial vs. New Game" line is an excellent point.

EDIT: You do realize that he is stating that most players use the campaign as a "tutorial" to prepare for online multiplayer, right?

He can't know that for certain, that isn't a fact.
I might as well state that most people here don't play it for tutorial, I can't know that, it isn't a fact.

I can for certain say that SOME of them do.
And people playing single player as a tutorial doesn't automatically change the single player INTO a tutorial mode anymore than anybody that plays the single player for the romantic scenes makes the single player a porno.

Sorry, doesn't work that way, it still remains a single player, not a tutorial, however you may treat it, it is not it's purpose.

Unless the actual title WAS in fact, tutorial.

The fact remains that, on the games in question, the single player is a bonus given for added value, the way multiplayer used to be on pretty much every game that had it. What's so bad about allowing games like that to exist? We aren't saying you have to play them.

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

Does having no singleplayer, or a bad singleplayer make a bad game if the multiplayer is good?

No. I, however, am not saying singleplayer is unimportant and multiplayer are king; both are equally as good.

 

[Dr. Feelgood]

So... basically, you're upset that someone doesn't agree with your opinion on multi-player and wanted to ***** about it on a website full of his fans? Also, Yahtzee enjoyed team fortress 2, his only problem with it being a lack of variety in the maps that were out at that time.

I think what he was trying to say the a game should be judged on all it has to offer, not just one game mode. If every game were judged, or only had single-player or vice versa that would eliminate the purpose of reviewing a game.

 

[Karma168]

Why not let them do what they do? Everyone knew Black Ops was going to specialize in multiplayer online. We all knew it. I don't even know what to tell someone who claims they didn't. Living under a rock comes to mind. CoD4 was the last time CoD has a story worth a thumbs up. (I don't think it was stellar but it was pretty good.) Since then we have seen WaW and MW 2 riding on the back of CoD4's triumph which also focused primarily on multiplayer online BTW and had a good campaign.
The second tip off if that alone wasn't enough to clue someone in was that this game was made by Treyarch. Any looking up on them and you will find bland campaigns. Anyone who bought BlOps for a single player campaign was putting their eggs in one horribly crafted basket or are just completely clueless.

because if your not going to bother putting in a decent effort into the campaign why bother? if you are selling the game solely on MP and only put a campaign because that's the done thing then people who don't play online will feel cheated. remember not everyone pays close attention to the gaming world and only pick up a game in the shops if they like the look of it. As the box cant say "the campaign's not worth it" on the box the person would buy it, get a few hours of play and be left £40 out of pocket.

now if the game was made solely as MP plus an offline training mode for beginners then this wouldn't happen. the game could be made in half the time, an as a result cost half as much as all the expenses in the graphics, music/voice-over, story departments will become much lower due to MP not really needing as much work as a campaign.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Why not let them do what they do? Everyone knew Black Ops was going to specialize in multiplayer online. We all knew it. I don't even know what to tell someone who claims they didn't. Living under a rock comes to mind. CoD4 was the last time CoD has a story worth a thumbs up. (I don't think it was stellar but it was pretty good.) Since then we have seen WaW and MW 2 riding on the back of CoD4's triumph which also focused primarily on multiplayer online BTW and had a good campaign.
The second tip off if that alone wasn't enough to clue someone in was that this game was made by Treyarch. Any looking up on them and you will find bland campaigns. Anyone who bought BlOps for a single player campaign was putting their eggs in one horribly crafted basket or are just completely clueless.

because if your not going to bother putting in a decent effort into the campaign why bother? if you are selling the game solely on MP and only put a campaign because that's the done thing then people who don't play online will feel cheated. remember not everyone pays close attention to the gaming world and only pick up a game in the shops if they like the look of it. As the box cant say "the campaign's not worth it" on the box the person would buy it, get a few hours of play and be left £40 out of pocket.

now if the game was made solely as MP plus an offline training mode for beginners then this wouldn't happen. the game could be made in half the time, an as a result cost half as much as all the expenses in the graphics, music/voice-over, story departments will become much lower due to MP not really needing as much work as a campaign.

You're seriously defending people who don't do the research before they drop $60 (or more, if they're from Australia) on a product? If they don't bother to research a major purchase like that, they have no right to complain that it doesn't meet their expectations.

 

[Duncan Trice]

It depends, Call of Duty varies on time to time but the new one was weak in both compared to Modern Warfare 1 but single player should be more entertaining as it was around long before multiplayer, I enjoy single player more because I enjoy the work and story of the game and want to know what happens in the end.

 

[nohorsetown]

Single-player chess is horribly boring, so there's no way I'm gonna try out the multi-player. It'll just be like single-player, but with some dumb kid from Xbox live mucking it up worse than it already is. Same goes for sex, obviously.

 

[Karma168]

Why not let them do what they do? Everyone knew Black Ops was going to specialize in multiplayer online. We all knew it. I don't even know what to tell someone who claims they didn't. Living under a rock comes to mind. CoD4 was the last time CoD has a story worth a thumbs up. (I don't think it was stellar but it was pretty good.) Since then we have seen WaW and MW 2 riding on the back of CoD4's triumph which also focused primarily on multiplayer online BTW and had a good campaign.
The second tip off if that alone wasn't enough to clue someone in was that this game was made by Treyarch. Any looking up on them and you will find bland campaigns. Anyone who bought BlOps for a single player campaign was putting their eggs in one horribly crafted basket or are just completely clueless.

because if your not going to bother putting in a decent effort into the campaign why bother? if you are selling the game solely on MP and only put a campaign because that's the done thing then people who don't play online will feel cheated. remember not everyone pays close attention to the gaming world and only pick up a game in the shops if they like the look of it. As the box cant say "the campaign's not worth it" on the box the person would buy it, get a few hours of play and be left £40 out of pocket.

now if the game was made solely as MP plus an offline training mode for beginners then this wouldn't happen. the game could be made in half the time, an as a result cost half as much as all the expenses in the graphics, music/voice-over, story departments will become much lower due to MP not really needing as much work as a campaign.

You're seriously defending people who don't do the research before they drop $60 (or more, if they're from Australia) on a product? If they don't bother to research a major purchase like that, they have no right to complain that it doesn't meet their expectations.

yes, not everyone who buys games are gamers. parents often buy the games for their children not knowing the specifics of that game.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

It depends, Call of Duty varies on time to time but the new one was weak in both compared to Modern Warfare 1 but single player should be more entertaining as it was around long before multiplayer, I enjoy single player more because I enjoy the work and story of the game and want to know what happens in the end.

<link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_for_Two>Tennis for Two 1958

Spacewar! 1962

<link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Space>Computer Space 1971

<link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pong>Pong 1972.

What do these have in common, aside from being four of the earliest videogames, and half of them being commercial successors to scientific experiments? They were all multiplayer focused. The first three on the list didn't even have AI opponents, because the computers of the day weren't powerful enough to handle them. Just pointing out that multiplayer has been around a lot longer than most people in this thread seem to think it has

 

[StraightToHeck]

it honestly comes down to personal preference; I prefer a strong single player first and foremost; Borderlands marketed its multiplayer component strongly and yet I still enjoyed it by myself

I agree with Yahtzee personally

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Why not let them do what they do? Everyone knew Black Ops was going to specialize in multiplayer online. We all knew it. I don't even know what to tell someone who claims they didn't. Living under a rock comes to mind. CoD4 was the last time CoD has a story worth a thumbs up. (I don't think it was stellar but it was pretty good.) Since then we have seen WaW and MW 2 riding on the back of CoD4's triumph which also focused primarily on multiplayer online BTW and had a good campaign.
The second tip off if that alone wasn't enough to clue someone in was that this game was made by Treyarch. Any looking up on them and you will find bland campaigns. Anyone who bought BlOps for a single player campaign was putting their eggs in one horribly crafted basket or are just completely clueless.

because if your not going to bother putting in a decent effort into the campaign why bother? if you are selling the game solely on MP and only put a campaign because that's the done thing then people who don't play online will feel cheated. remember not everyone pays close attention to the gaming world and only pick up a game in the shops if they like the look of it. As the box cant say "the campaign's not worth it" on the box the person would buy it, get a few hours of play and be left £40 out of pocket.

now if the game was made solely as MP plus an offline training mode for beginners then this wouldn't happen. the game could be made in half the time, an as a result cost half as much as all the expenses in the graphics, music/voice-over, story departments will become much lower due to MP not really needing as much work as a campaign.

You're seriously defending people who don't do the research before they drop $60 (or more, if they're from Australia) on a product? If they don't bother to research a major purchase like that, they have no right to complain that it doesn't meet their expectations.

yes, not everyone who buys games are gamers. parents often buy the games for their children not knowing the specifics of that game.

That may be a problem, but that can be a problem no matter what game is bought for you. If someone who doesn't know anything about games is buying for me, and they aren't buying off of a list I gave them, I'm happy just to get something that isn't shovelware. Also, now you're defending parents for not knowing what the games their kids are getting contain? Considering the fact that there's plenty of adult games, like, oh I don't know, the CoD series, should we really be encouraging parents to know nothing about what they buy their kids?

 

[Savagezion]

-snip-

because if your not going to bother putting in a decent effort into the campaign why bother? if you are selling the game solely on MP and only put a campaign because that's the done thing then people who don't play online will feel cheated. remember not everyone pays close attention to the gaming world and only pick up a game in the shops if they like the look of it. As the box cant say "the campaign's not worth it" on the box the person would buy it, get a few hours of play and be left £40 out of pocket.

now if the game was made solely as MP plus an offline training mode for beginners then this wouldn't happen. the game could be made in half the time, an as a result cost half as much as all the expenses in the graphics, music/voice-over, story departments will become much lower due to MP not really needing as much work as a campaign.

You're seriously defending people who don't do the research before they drop $60 (or more, if they're from Australia) on a product? If they don't bother to research a major purchase like that, they have no right to complain that it doesn't meet their expectations.

yes, not everyone who buys games are gamers. parents often buy the games for their children not knowing the specifics of that game.

First off, this isn't exactly the same thing as that. Like I said, everyone knows what CoD is. Same for Battlefield Bad Company. There is no mistaking it through their marketing. Look at the back of the case, you can even see that the game is focused on multiplayer there. A small quip about the campaign might be able to be found amongst the sea of multiplayer information.

Thank you Owyn, you beat me to it. Consumer reports are out there for this very reason for the thickest of the thick. These same parents are the ones who later sue Rockstar because they had no idea what they were buying for their child when minor study of the case would show that this game isn't made with 6 year olds in mind. And guess what we gamers basically state, "Know what you are buying your kids."

It doesn't matter how many people do it, there is no defense for ignorance. Ignorance forfeits its right to ***** or to state a sound argument based on ignorance. If I buy Puzzle Quest under the assumption it is an RPG due to the word "Quest" I have no right to ***** when it turns out it is a puzzle game. It was my own ignorance. Once again going back to whoever doesn't know CoD and Battlefield is multiplayer focused has worked hard at that ignorance in American society. You have avoided the news, Tv in general, magazines concerning gaming and/or pop culture, areas populated by people who play either, etc. You have avoided a LOT to be truly clueless in the way of BlOps.

Yahtzee's logic should be able to stand on its own by this same logic and not need to grasp at people who don't know shit about the gaming industry... or pop culture for that matter. The problem is, if you were burned by BlOps specifically, you either assumed way too much about the title with no reason to do so (Neither franchise history nor developer history) or you didn't know what the hell you were buying. One is ignorant, one is stupid, and neither justify Yahtzee.

(I only refer to Yahtzee to phrase the title of the thread as 1 word instead of the whole phrase.)

 

[Olrod]

If a game has a single-player option, then I believe that game should be able to stand by that single-player functionality, otherwise what's the point of having it in the first place?

Why bother having single-player when you always have to play it with other people to get any enjoyment out of it?

Sometimes people want to play a "multiplayer" game on their own. Either their friends are busy with something else, or their internet connection is misbehaving, or for whatever other reason, they just want to play it by themselves right now.

If they can't do that on a game that claims to have single-player functionality, then that game isn't as good as it could, and should, be.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

If a game has a single-player multi-player option, then I believe that game should be able to stand by that single-player multi-player functionality, otherwise what's the point of having it in the first place?

Why bother having single-player multi-player when you always have to play it with other people alone to get any enjoyment out of it?

Sometimes people want to play a "multiplayer" "singleplayer" game on their own with other people. Either their friends are busy with something else over for a party, or their internet connection is misbehaving working, or for whatever other reason, they just want to play it by themselves with other people right now.

If they can't do that on a game that claims to have single-player multi-player functionality, then that game isn't as good as it could, and should, be.

You see the flaw in this argument? I'm not trying to be harsh here, but quite a few people have been using the same argument, and your post was really easy to do that to. If you don't like multiplayer, than don't buy a multiplayer focused game. If you don't like singleplayer, then don't buy a singleplayer game. The people who do like the type you don't would like to be able to play it.

 

[Olrod]

If a game has a single-player multi-player option, then I believe that game should be able to stand by that single-player multi-player functionality, otherwise what's the point of having it in the first place?

Why bother having single-player multi-player when you always have to play it with other people alone to get any enjoyment out of it?

Sometimes people want to play a "multiplayer" "singleplayer" game on their own with other people. Either their friends are busy with something else over for a party, or their internet connection is misbehaving working, or for whatever other reason, they just want to play it by themselves with other people right now.

If they can't do that on a game that claims to have single-player multi-player functionality, then that game isn't as good as it could, and should, be.

You see the flaw in this argument? I'm not trying to be harsh here, but quite a few people have been using the same argument, and your post was really easy to do that to. If you don't like multiplayer, than don't buy a multiplayer focused game. If you don't like singleplayer, then don't buy a singleplayer game. The people who do like the type you don't would like to be able to play it.

Yes, the argument works both ways.

My point (which I realise now I didn't actually get around to making) was that a game should either have both single-and-multiplayer modes in equal amount with equal effort invested into making both comparable to each other, or focus solely on EITHER single-player OR multiplayer.

If you try to have both, but one of the halves is half-assed, then it's better not to have it at all than to include it and actively detract from the overall quality of the game in question.

If I'm browsing a game shop and see a game I've not heard about before (for whatever reason) and it claims to have both single-and-multiplayer modes, then I expect that single player mode to be able to carry the game on it's own, just as I would expect the multiplayer mode to be able to carry the game on it's own.

I may only want to ever play one mode, and if I buy the game for that reason, I'm going to be annoyed if the mode I buy it for, is rubbish.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

If a game has a single-player multi-player option, then I believe that game should be able to stand by that single-player multi-player functionality, otherwise what's the point of having it in the first place?

Why bother having single-player multi-player when you always have to play it with other people alone to get any enjoyment out of it?

Sometimes people want to play a "multiplayer" "singleplayer" game on their own with other people. Either their friends are busy with something else over for a party, or their internet connection is misbehaving working, or for whatever other reason, they just want to play it by themselves with other people right now.

If they can't do that on a game that claims to have single-player multi-player functionality, then that game isn't as good as it could, and should, be.

You see the flaw in this argument? I'm not trying to be harsh here, but quite a few people have been using the same argument, and your post was really easy to do that to. If you don't like multiplayer, than don't buy a multiplayer focused game. If you don't like singleplayer, then don't buy a singleplayer game. The people who do like the type you don't would like to be able to play it.

Yes, the argument works both ways.

My point (which I realise now I didn't actually get around to making) was that a game should either have both single-and-multiplayer modes in equal amount with equal effort invested into making both comparable to each other, or focus solely on EITHER single-player OR multiplayer.

If you try to have both, but one of the halves is half-assed, then it's better not to have it at all than to include it and actively detract from the overall quality of the game in question.

If I'm browsing a game shop and see a game I've not heard about before (for whatever reason) and it claims to have both single-and-multiplayer modes, then I expect that single player mode to be able to carry the game on it's own, just as I would expect the multiplayer mode to be able to carry the game on it's own.

I may only want to ever play one mode, and if I buy the game for that reason, I'm going to be annoyed if the mode I buy it for, is rubbish.

But if that's the case, why not do some basic research to find out if the game actually interests you? I just don't get the idea that a small bonus, which clearly didn't detract from the quality of the main portion of the game, has to be seen as a bad thing. It would be like complaining that Final Fantasy X should have been able to stand on its own as a sports game, since that Blitzball minigame was such a major part of the game. [sub]As an aside, I think Squeenix missed a major opportunity by not releasing a Madden style standalone Blitzball game. I was severely disappointed by FFX as a whole, but I loved Blitzball.

 

[Olrod]

However, Final Fantasy X wasn't marketed as a sports game or even a Sports/RPG hybrid.

Games that are actually marketed as single-and-multiplayer games need to have single-and-multiplayer modes that work.

That's the biggest and most important issue with this whole situation, games that are marketed as having both modes, need to have both modes able to provide solid enjoyment of the game independently of each other.

Otherwise it's just false advertising, and any game that does this deserves any harsh criticism that it gets.

 

[Judgement101]

Ok look, I'll pay $30 for a multiplayer game, thats fine by me. But if they will charge $60 for a bad singleplayer but great multiplayer then I just overpayed by $30.

Example: TF2 is great (IMO) and BFBC2 is great (IMO again) but BFBC2 costs twice as much and has a terrible singleplayer I would never play. Portal on the other hand has no multiplayer and has great singleplayer so it stands on its own.

P.S. I know my logic is extremely flawed but this system works for me.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

However, Final Fantasy X wasn't marketed as a sports game or even a Sports/RPG hybrid.

Games that are actually marketed as single-and-multiplayer games need to have single-and-multiplayer modes that work.

That's the biggest and most important issue with this whole situation, games that are marketed as having both modes, need to have both modes able to provide solid enjoyment of the game independently of each other.

Otherwise it's just false advertising, and any game that does this deserves any harsh criticism that it gets.

Let me let you in on a little secret: marketers lie. It's kind of their job, actually. Besides, in the vast majority of the games we're talking about, the hype was put behind the multiplayer, basically saying "look at all the stuff you can do online! Oh, and it also has a campaign, I guess." Either way, if you're relying on the marketing efforts of the people who make the games to tell you whether it's worth playing or not, that makes you a sucker. A little research goes a very long way when it comes to videogames, or anything that costs money, for that matter.

 

[mexicola]

As I don't like playing shooters in multi player the statement is true for myself, others don't necessarily have to agree with that.