Is the internet going to kill single-player campaigns?

[Nillz]

What is with all the " Are Singleplayer games dying" threads? Its getting as bad as Mw2.
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Just to let you know, I haven't seen as many of these threads as you have, and I find them quite interesting to be honest.

And also, why are so many people hating the attention modern warfare 2 is getting. Imagine this: say this was discussion forum about books and a new harry potter just came out - it's kind of like that. It is the biggest (5-day at least) entertainment launch in history, expect it to get a lot of attention.

 

[Daimes2000]

As i see it, this is mostly a problem of FPS games, which, if you think a bit about it, even makes sense.
We're talking about how campaigns suffer from multiplayer, so (most) racing games, sports games and music titles can be ignored as they don't have a classical story mode. That leaves strategy games, action adventures and 3rd person shooters - which for the most part have a solid campaign and (aside from strategy games) an often gimmicky multiplayer mode which doesn't steal the focus from the campaign.

And then we have the first person shooters, which mostly had a short (compared to other games) campaign to begin with, and offered little variety when you replay the campaign. Multiplayer then saved the long-term playability, and many people began to buy the games mostly because of the multiplayer (or: reject an otherwise good FPS because the multiplayer wasn't good), so developers shift focus away from the singleplayer campaign, which in return get shorter.

(of course these are all general assumptions, Half-Life 2 had an awesome campaign both in length and quality for example)

 

[aarontg]

Probably, unless developers do something new and different with it of course.

 

[VanityGirl]

Assassin's Creed II anyone? It just came out! It's pretty long so far and of course there's no multiplayer in it. Lots of people on my friend's list on XBL have been playing it.

 

[DesertHawk]

All valid replies, I guess since FPS is my preferred genre I'm getting hit harder than others.

Why not have a go with the Stalker game and expansion(s)? To a lesser extent, games like ARMAII and OP-Flashpoint 2 have their strong points in single player scenarios. I'm sure I could dig out a few more if you would like.

 

[TPiddy]

No. Online has had no effect on single player. However I do believe that local multiplayer is suffering because of that.

Agreed. Everyone's got bigger and bigger TV's now but no one outside of Mario Kart Wii will do 4 player split screen anymore. The Wii understands that sometimes you just want your buddies over to play a game. I am critical of Borderlands for this. It's got a story designed around 4 players and yet you can only play two locally? WTF?

And don't give me that "it's too hard on the processor" shit... it's just an additional camera angle and some rendering... if they could do it on the 8 bit platforms they can do it now. What it really is, is a sales tactic. More people will have to buy copies of the game.

 

[TPiddy]

And also, why are so many people hating the attention modern warfare 2 is getting. Imagine this: say this was discussion forum about books and a new harry potter just came out - it's kind of like that. It is the biggest (5-day at least) entertainment launch in history, expect it to get a lot of attention.

Please stop drinking the Bobby Kotick kool-aid. It's the best selling VIDEO GAME opening in history, yes... but you can't compare it to other entertainment mediums when a single copy of the game costs $70 and a single movie ticket costs $10.

MW 2 deserves all of the criticism, and praise that it gets.... it's a very good but also very flawed game. Personally I didn't feel it was worthy of being the best selling video game opening because what does that say about us as a society?

 

[bjj hero]

Dragon Age would like a word.
....................................................
Single player is here to stay.

Assassin's Creed 2 would like to agree.

All in favour say Aye...

Motion passed. Long live single player.

I really want to play AC2. Currently I'm not sleeping, eating or showering due to buying MW2 and DA:O close together. There are just too many quality titles this winter.

 

[lvl9000_woot]

Assassin's Creed II anyone? It just came out! It's pretty long so far and of course there's no multiplayer in it. Lots of people on my friend's list on XBL have been playing it.

....or God of War....or Devil May Cry or...(you get the idea)

 

[alinos]

no way known i actually expected this to be about dragon age or sumthing since mmos are killing them as SP games but in a shooter there now keyed for 6-10 hours that way the console guys who arent gamers but do game feel like they got there moneys worth when they finish it

MW2's SP has terrible they said it was short for the story to work but the story failed on about every lvl IMO i felt like i was playing through a bunch of 90's action movies jumbled together and put into a future setting

they gloss ove some stuff(like the president got shot) and really focus on unintresting tidbits

and thenit had the predicatable ending

 

[ravensshade]

no it's not because the rpg genre is still around

 

[BlueInkAlchemist]

Not if BioWare has anything to say about it.

 

[DrDeath3191]

No. Online has had no effect on single player. However I do believe that local multiplayer is suffering because of that.

Agreed. Everyone's got bigger and bigger TV's now but no one outside of Mario Kart Wii will do 4 player split screen anymore. The Wii understands that sometimes you just want your buddies over to play a game. I am critical of Borderlands for this. It's got a story designed around 4 players and yet you can only play two locally? WTF?

And don't give me that "it's too hard on the processor" shit... it's just an additional camera angle and some rendering... if they could do it on the 8 bit platforms they can do it now. What it really is, is a sales tactic. More people will have to buy copies of the game.

And people only complain if there is no online mode, not if there is no local multiplayer. What the hell is up with that? Has multiplayer gaming really become that impersonal?

 

[TPiddy]

Agreed. Everyone's got bigger and bigger TV's now but no one outside of Mario Kart Wii will do 4 player split screen anymore. The Wii understands that sometimes you just want your buddies over to play a game. I am critical of Borderlands for this. It's got a story designed around 4 players and yet you can only play two locally? WTF?

And don't give me that "it's too hard on the processor" shit... it's just an additional camera angle and some rendering... if they could do it on the 8 bit platforms they can do it now. What it really is, is a sales tactic. More people will have to buy copies of the game.

And people only complain if there is no online mode, not if there is no local multiplayer. What the hell is up with that? Has multiplayer gaming really become that impersonal?

Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate online multiplayer because most of my friends live at least 30 minutes to an hour away from me, but every so often when they come over, our options are pretty much Wii and Rock Band.... I loved Borderlands and thought it would be wicked with 4 player local... maybe for Borderlands 2?

 

[Daimes2000]

No. Online has had no effect on single player. However I do believe that local multiplayer is suffering because of that.

Agreed. Everyone's got bigger and bigger TV's now but no one outside of Mario Kart Wii will do 4 player split screen anymore. The Wii understands that sometimes you just want your buddies over to play a game. I am critical of Borderlands for this. It's got a story designed around 4 players and yet you can only play two locally? WTF?

And don't give me that "it's too hard on the processor" shit... it's just an additional camera angle and some rendering... if they could do it on the 8 bit platforms they can do it now. What it really is, is a sales tactic. More people will have to buy copies of the game.

That's actually a very good point. And to be honest, one of the biggest reasons why i bought a 360 (i only played on PC after the NES age) was my impression of "console games have splitscreen multiplayer, yay!". Granted, it's still featured a lot more than on PC for various reasons, but i wish more developers would give more attention to splitscreen multiplayer. I played the Gears of War games only once in singleplayer, but at least 3-4 times with different buddies because it's so much fun.

 

[Monkfish Acc.]

God, I hope not.
The day I'm forced to play with a bunch of strangers or not play at all is the day I quit gaming forever.

 

[TPiddy]

No. Online has had no effect on single player. However I do believe that local multiplayer is suffering because of that.

Agreed. Everyone's got bigger and bigger TV's now but no one outside of Mario Kart Wii will do 4 player split screen anymore. The Wii understands that sometimes you just want your buddies over to play a game. I am critical of Borderlands for this. It's got a story designed around 4 players and yet you can only play two locally? WTF?

And don't give me that "it's too hard on the processor" shit... it's just an additional camera angle and some rendering... if they could do it on the 8 bit platforms they can do it now. What it really is, is a sales tactic. More people will have to buy copies of the game.

That's actually a very good point. And to be honest, one of the biggest reasons why i bought a 360 (i only played on PC after the NES age) was my impression of "console games have splitscreen multiplayer, yay!". Granted, it's still featured a lot more than on PC for various reasons, but i wish more developers would give more attention to splitscreen multiplayer. I played the Gears of War games only once in singleplayer, but at least 3-4 times with different buddies because it's so much fun.

Yeah it's definitely very fun both local and online. I had heard they were talking about 4-player co-op campaign for Gears 3, but will it be 4 player local? That remains to be seen.

 

[DrDeath3191]

Agreed. Everyone's got bigger and bigger TV's now but no one outside of Mario Kart Wii will do 4 player split screen anymore. The Wii understands that sometimes you just want your buddies over to play a game. I am critical of Borderlands for this. It's got a story designed around 4 players and yet you can only play two locally? WTF?

And don't give me that "it's too hard on the processor" shit... it's just an additional camera angle and some rendering... if they could do it on the 8 bit platforms they can do it now. What it really is, is a sales tactic. More people will have to buy copies of the game.

And people only complain if there is no online mode, not if there is no local multiplayer. What the hell is up with that? Has multiplayer gaming really become that impersonal?

Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate online multiplayer because most of my friends live at least 30 minutes to an hour away from me, but every so often when they come over, our options are pretty much Wii and Rock Band.... I loved Borderlands and thought it would be wicked with 4 player local... maybe for Borderlands 2?

Yeah, the Wii seems to be the only console with 4-player local this generation... but even the Wii has its share of games that are online only (*stern look at the Conduit*).