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

[GonzoGamer]

As long as something in the game is worth the price tag i don't care, unless it's focus is offline co-op. Surely there are others out there who like both single and multiplayer, however i would prefere a focus on on just one, as the other will be a waste for many people and each part will drag the other down.

Got to agree with you there. Unless they have a huge team, they should really focus on one mode and perfect it.

Speaking of price tag however, I do think that games made only (or mainly) for Multiplayer should be cheaper. As we've seen, those servers eventually go offline rendering the game unplayable (eventually, yes but if you're still enjoying it, that can be a bitter pill; just ask those guys who kept the Halo 2 servers running). So online games do have an invisible expiration date and I think asking for that same $60 is just not a good value.

So does it make it a "Bad" game? No, but it does make it a bad value.

 

[leon3789]

I agree with Yahtzee's quote for 1 simple reason. Unless the multiplayer works like CoD: Black Ops then it can NOT stand on multiplayer at all, because in years to come multiplayer will be left and the servers closed. Because of this I can not say "This game has an awesome multiplayer but horrible single player, I will get it" because when I get a game I would like to be able to enjoy playing it ANYTIME, not just before everyone leaves it.

Yet there are some great multiplayer only games, like L4D and TF2, however what happens when people stop playing TF2 and valve closes the servers to save money and be able to open servers for MORE multiplayer games? Well then TF2 was just a waste of money at that put and you might as well just delete it off your PC/Use your disc as a frisbee. If games take Black ops idea and make a multiplayer playable via AI's (And I use Black ops because TF2 only allowed AI's to be used on the PC version, so that doesn't count.) then the game can NOT stand unless it's single player is good.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

I agree with Yahtzee's quote for 1 simple reason. Unless the multiplayer works like CoD: Black Ops then it can NOT stand on multiplayer at all, because in years to come multiplayer will be left and the servers closed. Because of this I can not say "This game has an awesome multiplayer but horrible single player, I will get it" because when I get a game I would like to be able to enjoy playing it ANYTIME, not just before everyone leaves it.

Yet there are some great multiplayer only games, like L4D and TF2, however what happens when people stop playing TF2 and valve closes the servers to save money and be able to open servers for MORE multiplayer games? Well then TF2 was just a waste of money at that put and you might as well just delete it off your PC/Use your disc as a frisbee. If games take Black ops idea and make a multiplayer playable via AI's (And I use Black ops because TF2 only allowed AI's to be used on the PC version, so that doesn't count.) then the game can NOT stand unless it's single player is good.

The TF2 servers are run by the players, so there's no danger of Valve shutting it down. The only servers they really control are the anti cheat servers, so worst case scenario, they pull anti cheat support. Ah the joys of PC gaming...

 

[emeraldrafael]

Yes, really.

To me at least, you need a decent single player if you're going to have one in your game. Look at CoD4. That had a decent enough single player and some alright multiplayer. Besides, multiplayer is subjective and its hard to rate a game on it, cause everyone has a different experience. If you play with the hate spewing 8 year olds and pretentious megacunts that must play the game exclusively just so tehy can be better then anyone else who plays, then you'll say its a bad game. However if you play with friends, have fun, and dont really realize when you get killed, or at least when you do it doesnt really bother you, then you had a good multiplayer experience. Thats why I play outdated games' mulitplayer modes, to have the latter experience.

So the single player is what it will be judged on, and should train you for the muliplayer when you do make the jump. And really there's no reason why you cant make a single player good. Not all games have to be Mass Effect, or Halo: CE, or CoD4:MW, or Bioshock, but they can at least be different.

Then again, I'm a single player kinda guy, cause if I want to go out and play with friends, I'll go outside and play with friends.

 

[DarkChoclate]

...I think halo is a prime example. So with developers and publishers looking at Halo and saying "that really works" they basically copied that design. Sure there are differences with story, setting, weapon design, etc., but a lot of it obviously ties back to that original design. Yeah there can and are so new innovations to them, but these ideas get copied too, like perks for say...

So with that statement you say that HALO is one of the only original games with multiplayer?

Seriously. Doom had multiplayer for cryin' out loud.

Are you really going to say that halo didn't have one of the biggest influences on online multiplayer? And so what? That doesn't disprove my general point, it might even further it. And by the way i already mentioned Doom as one of the biggest and first influence for fps, so yeah.

 

[DarkChoclate]

...I think halo is a prime example. So with developers and publishers looking at Halo and saying "that really works" they basically copied that design. Sure there are differences with story, setting, weapon design, etc., but a lot of it obviously ties back to that original design. Yeah there can and are so new innovations to them, but these ideas get copied too, like perks for say...

So with that statement you say that HALO is one of the only original games with multiplayer?

"shooters have been basically copying some of the first shooters that established the genre like Wolfenstein or Doom. (don't crucify me if those are bad examples)So shooters then copied their basic gameplay elements. Now, look at what game(or games) really had the first success and defined multiplayer."

If you look back on the part right before you quoted me I say "games" and the fact that if halo was a bad fps, the multiplayer would have gone to shit. What makes it the shooter that it is? Games like Wolfenstein and Doom (I'm looking at you >_> -->Owyn_Merrilin)halo just came to mine, and last time I check its not a bad example. You can prove me wrong but hey i tried.

 

[radioactive lemur]

Last time I checked, 21000 man YEARS have been spent playing black ops online. I'd HIGHLY doubt that kind of time has ever been spent on a single player campaign.

 

[omicron1]

It depends person-to-person. I'll never buy a game for the multiplayer, and so games that charge $50-$60 for what is, essentially, a 6-hour campaign and a big multiplayer component are just not worth the purchase. Generally, for these I will wait until they go on sale.

I recognize that other people like multiplayer, however, and for them these games are probably worth it. I just really wish there was a way to spend $15, say, and get just the singleplayer campaign from one of these games (And even that is a bit pricey, since that's $3 per hour of entertainment).

But we all know that Yahtzee is a very opinionated fellow, right?

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

...I think halo is a prime example. So with developers and publishers looking at Halo and saying "that really works" they basically copied that design. Sure there are differences with story, setting, weapon design, etc., but a lot of it obviously ties back to that original design. Yeah there can and are so new innovations to them, but these ideas get copied too, like perks for say...

So with that statement you say that HALO is one of the only original games with multiplayer?

"shooters have been basically copying some of the first shooters that established the genre like Wolfenstein or Doom. (don't crucify me if those are bad examples)So shooters then copied their basic gameplay elements. Now, look at what game(or games) really had the first success and defined multiplayer."

If you look back on the part right before you quoted me I say "games" and the fact that if halo was a bad fps, the multiplayer would have gone to shit. What makes it the shooter that it is? Games like Wolfenstein and Doom (I'm looking at you >_> -->Owyn_Merrilin)halo just came to mine, and last time I check its not a bad example. You can prove me wrong but hey i tried.

MrJKapowey and I were calling you out on your claim that Halo was the first game to really define multiplayer, when online multiplayer had been a standard feature of FPS games for a good 7 or 8 years by the time Halo came out, let alone Halo 2, which introduced online multiplayer to the console versions of the series. The PC version, interestingly enough, had online from the get go. I'm not arguing that you didn't see a lot of games copying Halo after it proved to be so successful, but you need a lesson in gaming history if you think it was the first successful shooter or multiplayer game on anything but the Xbox. It did define the modern console shooter, but I'm not alone in thinking that that definition was a step backwards from the one put forth by Rare and, later, Free Radical, which was much better suited to a gamepad than Bungie's school.

I sound angrier than I really should about this, but basically there's this perception among the PC gaming community, or at least there was around the time Halo was new, that there were a lot of people who thought Bungie single handedly invented the multiplayer FPS, which rubbed those of us who had been playing the genre for years the wrong way. Pretty much any time someone starts talking about Halo like it invented online multiplayer, those old wounds get reopened.

 

[Drummie666]

I don't have a problem with multiplayer specifically, but I always have a problem with the people playing it. BF:BC2 is the best example I can think of. The multiplayer was built extremely well and had HUGE variety in gameplay... The problem with it and the reason I stopped playing it was the simple fact that everyone playing it has no idea what they are doing. It's a team based, objective based game, why is everyone always hanging back, trying (And failing) to get a huge amount of kills, every time leaving me by myself to slowly make my way to the objective.

I do really like the AC:B multiplayer though, mostly because in wanted, the mode I like playing the most, I win almost every time because I'm playing properly.

What i'm trying to say is that every human being is a selfish bastard when they are able to hide invisibly behind a gamertag and be as much of a prick as they want to without any consequences. Thus, in all multiplayer games, people will always try to be lone wolves and fight against each other when they are on the same team, making the game not fun for everyone.

Although, I am not a PC gamer and since most console developers are think enough to not make a kick/ban system for multiplayer, I am willing to give the PC multiplayer scene a try... When I can actually afford a good gaming PC.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

I don't have a problem with multiplayer specifically, but I always have a problem with the people playing it. BF:BC2 is the best example I can think of. The multiplayer was built extremely well and had HUGE variety in gameplay... The problem with it and the reason I stopped playing it was the simple fact that everyone playing it has no idea what they are doing. It's a team based, objective based game, why is everyone always hanging back, trying (And failing) to get a huge amount of kills, every time leaving me by myself to slowly make my way to the objective.

I do really like the AC:B multiplayer though, mostly because in wanted, the mode I like playing the most, I win almost every time because I'm playing properly.

What i'm trying to say is that every human being is a selfish bastard when they are able to hide invisibly behind a gamertag and be as much of a prick as they want to without any consequences. Thus, in all multiplayer games, people will always try to be lone wolves and fight against each other when they are on the same team, making the game not fun for everyone.

Although, I am not a PC gamer and since most console developers are think enough to not make a kick/ban system for multiplayer, I am willing to give the PC multiplayer scene a try... When I can actually afford a good gaming PC.

You would be amazed at how far the simple ability to kick griefers from the server goes to making online multiplayer a civil place. If you find a good server, people actually know how to play, and you don't have to worry about people raging at you. In all my years of gaming, I've never come across anything in the world of PC gaming that is as bad as people claim Xbox Live is.

 

[TAGM]

I think it's less "games must have single player aspects" and more "If you have single player aspects, make them fucking good."

It's all very well saying "play single player based shooters then," But how the hell are we supposed to tell? Just about every shooter has some sort of single player aspect - are we ment to be able to tell by sight if the campaign is really worth playing at all?
Personaly, It's not a lack of single player that I have a problem with - it's tacked on single player that's shit that gets me down. I think that's Yahtzee's problem to an extent, too - that, and he just hates people in general.

 

[blankedboy]

Gfffff

Look, it's an opinion. The guy likes singleplayer. Get over it.

 

[DarkChoclate]

...I think halo is a prime example. So with developers and publishers looking at Halo and saying "that really works" they basically copied that design. Sure there are differences with story, setting, weapon design, etc., but a lot of it obviously ties back to that original design. Yeah there can and are so new innovations to them, but these ideas get copied too, like perks for say...

So with that statement you say that HALO is one of the only original games with multiplayer?

"shooters have been basically copying some of the first shooters that established the genre like Wolfenstein or Doom. (don't crucify me if those are bad examples)So shooters then copied their basic gameplay elements. Now, look at what game(or games) really had the first success and defined multiplayer."

If you look back on the part right before you quoted me I say "games" and the fact that if halo was a bad fps, the multiplayer would have gone to shit. What makes it the shooter that it is? Games like Wolfenstein and Doom (I'm looking at you >_> -->Owyn_Merrilin)halo just came to mine, and last time I check its not a bad example. You can prove me wrong but hey i tried.

MrJKapowey and I were calling you out on your claim that Halo was the first game to really define multiplayer, when online multiplayer had been a standard feature of FPS games for a good 7 or 8 years by the time Halo came out, let alone Halo 2, which introduced online multiplayer to the console versions of the series. The PC version, interestingly enough, had online from the get go. I'm not arguing that you didn't see a lot of games copying Halo after it proved to be so successful, but you need a lesson in gaming history if you think it was the first successful shooter or multiplayer game on anything but the Xbox. It did define the modern console shooter, but I'm not alone in thinking that that definition was a step backwards from the one put forth by Rare and, later, Free Radical, which was much better suited to a gamepad than Bungie's school.

I sound angrier than I really should about this, but basically there's this perception among the PC gaming community, or at least there was around the time Halo was new, that there were a lot of people who thought Bungie single handedly invented the multiplayer FPS, which rubbed those of us who had been playing the genre for years the wrong way. Pretty much any time someone starts talking about Halo like it invented online multiplayer, those old wounds get reopened.

okay.












I'm 15, I obviously wont know a lot of early games because hell I was probably younger than 7 years old and I don't care enough to research it. All of that was to prove the point that if a game can't stand on single player alone its a bad game. Its tacked on because your doing to the same thing capture the flag, death match, and etc. over and over again. What makes the fun is not really just the setting or event. Its the people you play it with. I assume people play with other people they like or at least don't hate most of the time. Or at least are killing the assholes they hate. A game company has no control over that. Yes it can be stream line and awesome gameplay but eventually didn't modern warfare 2 get a little bit boring after the thousandth time of going through an event? After the initial awe of it, games and multiplayer can really lose there shine.

Oh i just reread your paragraph, and I'm not saying it didn't have a mutliplayer or didn't made what halo's multiplayer became but, Did one game literally have the numbers behind its multiplayer that showed growth in that part of the genre like Halo. I'm not saying other games didn't, maybe they had a better multiplayer than halo but did get the publicity halo got. Me? I don't know, the the way you phrased sounded like pc gaming is and/or was being undermined at least for multiplayer in certain genres. Honestly I'm just asking you a question at this point. I remember seeing this thing on X-play about it too.

 

[pigsnoutman]

Yeah, I bought a chess set, and the single campaign sucks. I can't believe its like a millenium old.

 

[Fidelias]

The problem with multiplayer is that it relies so much on other players. Sure, the multiplayer can be awesome if it has no lag and none of the players use cheap tactics and such.

The problem is that this is not a perfect world, and almost every multiplayer game that I go on has ridiculous amounts of lag, annoying players, and horribly un-balanced weapons(or perks. Yes, I'm looking at you Call of Duty.)

 

[Anathemic One]

I agree with Yahtzee's opinion, but not because of blind-faith, but because that's the way I view games.

I don't dislike multiplayer, I play StarCraft 2, WarCraft 3 (basically any Blizzard game excluding WoW), but there's also the fact that these games are help up by decent if not intriguing single-player (again excluding WoW).

If a game has multiplayer that's fine, but I always always always complete the single player first? why? Because it's just me, it feels wrong NOT to complete it first because I'll always have that nagging feeling in the back of my head telling me I didn't get to receive the full content of the game. And if said remaining content comes out to be sub-par then the game will fail (in my eyes).

 

[Cj Vanek]

I would rather play MAG which has no singleplayer than Black Ops which has a crappy singleplayer. When they put in a crappy singleplayer the developers are basicly saying they only care about the multiplayer, however if a game has no singleplayer the game is design in a way that stands on its own without any singleplayer. Ideally both singleplayer and multiplayer would be good, but I've never found a game like that.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

while i do like me some multiplayer, nearly all my games these days are single player oriented, and if they are multiplayer, i generally play with bots or heads up vs. the computer depending on the game.

1) online communities die out. single player games last forever.

2) dealing with douchebags online is annoying as shit (the high pitched kids are nowhere near the worse offenders, simple mute is easy as pie compared to anything else)

(subpoint of 2) i hate dealing with people playing the game THEIR way (yes yes i know we all paid for it and can do what we want, but when the faggots are only using cheap strategies and are being the biggest cunts in every sense of the word, i'll immediately go back to my singly player games)

3) lag. lag lag/hit detection. it is one of the most frustrating things on the planet when you pump over half a magazine into a person to have them end up being behind you in the killcam and you didn't even move from their point of view.

for the most part, these 3 reasons keep me away from multi-player oriented games

 

[Cj Vanek]

(subpoint of 2) i hate dealing with people playing the game THEIR way (yes yes i know we all paid for it and can do what we want, but when the faggots are only using cheap strategies and are being the biggest cunts in every sense of the word, i'll immediately go back to my singly player games)

Like guys running on the roof in Brotherhood. The multiplayer was perfect in theory, but then people started playing, and there's always that 10-20% of people that fuck it up. The point of the game is to blend into crowds as you stealthy head to your target and stab him in the back. Not sprinting across rooftops and attacking people from above.