Comments on: The Death Of Single-Player

By: Optimus!!!!

Optimus!!!! — Sun, 30 Jan 2011 13:17:12 +0000

I find it funny how everyone posting a response is like “Youre wrong Article Writter.” “Id stop playing games if Single Player died.” “Its why I play games.” If these statements (from actual gamers) are true then why is single player dying? Good developers (unlike movie producers) try their best to make games people will like/play. If single player shouldnt/isnt dying, why is it then? The devs give ppl what they want. And right now based on the fact they cram MP into well crafted SP games like Bioshock, thats what ppl want. So either some of you are 1)Lying or full of crap or 2)Not making your voice loud enough to devs. I was born in the late 70s so I remember the early pong game screen tape on the tv, Atari, Commadore 64, Sega Master, and the VG revolution starting NES all the way to now. Multiplayer was the 2nd controller and that was just fine. I was peeved when I started playing modern day FPS and the stories were tact on but the MP was the bread and butter. I remember playing Doom and Wolfenstien and those FPS had no MP and were considered classics because of yhe stories. And the removal of bots from FPS and 3PS is also taking away from the experience. Thats why I love Gears Of War so much they program bots for an extended SP experience.

By: Dean

Dean — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 00:05:38 +0000

I don’t understand your point. So what if multiplayer/co-op is better? (and that’s debatable). Why does single player have to go? How does the fact that single player exists affect you or your MP experience? You sound like you’re afraid to do anything alone.

By: Hans

Hans — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 12:00:41 +0000

While you do have a valid point when you say that Singleplayer is mostly scripted, and multiplayer isn’t, thus ensuring a more fresh and new experience, you seem to be forgetting that as multiplayer is evolving, so is singleplayer.

I’m a singleplayer man at heart. One of the singleplayer kings out there is Bethesda (well obviously before they took over ID). I love roaming around the capital wasteland (FO3) or Cyrodiil (TES4) till late at night, walking through caves, looting everything I find and storing them in my house in Megaton or Chorrol. Meanwhile completing quests and gathering valuable collectables.

I hate the thought of wanting to join the Dark Brotherhood and finding a line at the door, or finding that secret cave behind a waterfall and finding a bunch of people jumping repeatedly up and down. I know these points are a bit silly, but they do illustrate my thoughts. I love being the only wasteland wanderer and champion of cyrodill.

As for bonding to a ‘scripted’ character, that depends on every individual player. I am someone who gets sucked into a story and does his best to save and defend NPC’s. Would I want to marry Alyx? No. Would I be sad when she dies, or for that matter when Ely died at the end of EP.2? Yes. Maybe that’s childish, I don’t know. But that’s just the way I feel.

I don’t think singleplayer will die, not for a very long time. It will evolve just like home-experiences (wii/move/kinect) and multiplayer will. Singleplayer will be far less scripted in the future and stories will depend more on player choices, which also will greatly increase. Singeplayer will also be a fresh new experience, every time.

Great column and keep it up!

By: Tim

Tim — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 00:17:29 +0000

This article sums up absolutely everything I hate about the modern game industry. You take lazy developers and mix it with retarded people satisfied with the same old multiplayer game over and over again and you get people like me who have been playing games for 25+ years having terrible thoughts of giving up the hobby. Multiplayer is so overplayed, boring, and almost never introduces anything new. Sandbox games are ruining single player. We need more strong narrative games, that really focus on delivering top notch single player experiences. It’s almost impossible to find nowadays, but I’m not giving up yet. Sadly, it seems more and more people are starting to think like you and are okay with playing multiplayer forever, Terrible

By: Fernandez

Fernandez — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 17:57:51 +0000

For you to say the single player is dead and no longer needed is the same as when people were saying that video games didn’t need a story. I am sorry sir but get your head out of your ass and look around. If anything showed us that single player is very much so alive it was COD: MW2. Also for someone to be talking about CO-OP you forget that many Xbox users still do not have live let alone friends. The amount of systems sold and the amount of people online just don’t add up. I imagine when you were researching for this article you didn’t look into the amount of online gamers to offline gamers. If single player is taken out of games then sir I believe that one is handing me crap. Gaming is about options, thats what keeps us playing the games we play. If you take out that core option of a single player experience then you are going to have a lot of angry gamers. As much as one would love to argue that Co-op is better when it comes down to it, it’s really not. When one plays with a friend one tends not to fully pay attention to whats going on. When one plays by them selfs then it is easy for the story and events to sink in, due to the fact that there is no friend talking in the ear piece to divert ones attention. Now I will say I enjoy multi player games more then single, but the games I play tended to not have any sort of single player in the past (i.e. Battlefield). Yet if they were to take away any sort of single player from halo I would dismiss it and most likely rent it instead of buying it, and believe me thats saying a lot. I believe this article to be nothing more then just someone over analyzing a current trend. like I said before this is just as bad as when people were saying stories are not important to a gaming experience.

By: Brendan Keogh

Brendan Keogh — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 02:03:40 +0000

While your argument is well-written, I think it is fundamentally flawed.

You are arguing that people should not play golf because soccer is fun. You are arguing that people should not eat chocolate because candy is delicious.

Certainly, multiplayer games are best for allowing emergent narrative play where the players own unique, unscripted narratives can emerge. However, it is a flaw to pressume that this is the only meaningful experience gameshave to offer.

Single-player games (when done correctly) can offer other great things, such as enacted narratives (I am stealing terms from a Henry Jenkins article, btw). Single-player games allow you to enact the narrative of a specific character (Niko Bellic, Commander Sheppard, etc.). They also allow for games such as Super Mario Galaxy that pit a single player against specific challenges. Though you may not personally enjoy these experiences and narratives, it is wrong to assume they should all die because of this.

Games can do many amazing things. Multi-player competitive and co-op games are just a fraction of that. Single player games are another. Both are equally valid forms of play.

By: LordCancer

LordCancer — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 20:21:16 +0000

I do not understand why an individual feels the need to pronounce the one true path for all. Maybe I don’t want to drink your brand of soda, worship your god, or play only the one kind of game type you think is the only one worth playing. Grow up Nathan, the world doesn’t revolve around just you and your ridiculous proclamations.

By: Nathan Hardisty

Nathan Hardisty — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 19:18:51 +0000

I am saying that single-player needs to die, but I think you will agree that an experience in single-player is always better with a buddy.

A co-operative story that’s still capable of being played by yourself can still have the effects.

By: Grand Theft Angel

Grand Theft Angel — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 19:17:45 +0000

I see what you’re saying and I couldn’t disagree with you more.
Maybe it’s just me and how I grow up as a gamer… never having siblings to play with, but enjoying games nonetheless. Back then there was no XBL/PSN and when I was a child I never heard of online gaming before, however I got on just fine!
Or maybe it’s just because I am not that social of a person in general and I do not play games to be social. I understand that this seems to be the “in” thing this gen, but I am just not crazy about it like everyone else appears to be. I’ve just never been much of a social gamer. I know that it is extreme popular these days (with things like the wii and some great MP games) but damn the thought of losing all the awesome experiences I have had in SP disturbs me greatly.
I for one truly get immersed in the story and you know what else? I was Gordon Freeman! and no, my name is not Gordon. Despite your inability to relate, I happened to BE every character I play from Nathan Drake to Niko Bellic, from a badass super soldier to a sword wielding legend etc…. I put myself in their place and get lost in their world! That is why gaming is so awesome to me! I don’t want to be me; I want to be a badass! I don’t want to play with friends I see everyday I want to get lost with new characters in the game! This all comes down to one thing for me –Escapisms!
I remember when I first got a PlayStation as a birthday present and started getting into survival horror genre around that time. If you had told me than that I would be playing a franchise like Resident Evil cooperatively and it would have a versus mode… I would have laughed at you. Hard. This is not bashing RE5, which I do find to be an awesome action game, but it has lost all survival horror appeal to me.
Regardless of what your experiences may have been, there have always been games where I truly cared about its characters, and or its world etc. I know that is difficult for some to comprehend. The only way I could describe it, is by trying to describe a survival horror game like Silent Hill for example. I would play a game like that so completely immersed in its world that I would actually feel its fear. Even though you are completely aware you are not the character and it is not you trapped in the nightmarish realm of Silent Hill. You are still able to feel emotions that the game triggers, and that is why single player never should die. You could never have that same experience in a MP or coop game.

By: Red

Red — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 18:58:55 +0000

I don’t buy the “games as a social endeavor” argument. Games, despite becoming more and more multiplayer centric, are also somehow becoming less social from a substantial standpoint.

What we get these days is the mass proliferation of multiplayer separation. In the old days of online multiplayer (and still today on the PC), you got to know the people you played with, even if none of them ever made it onto any kind of friends list. Games had communities that knew each other, and these communities shared knowledge about the games through these shared channels. There was a deeper understanding of the game you were playing because you the lines of communication were much stronger, allowing information on players and the game itself to find its way to more people more easily.

Fast forward to now, and the landscape is almost designed for a sedentary experience. Dedicated servers, where you found a few you liked and got to know the people who also played on them, have taken a backseat to matchmaking, which forces you to either only play with people on your friends list (or the lists of your friends), or play with complete strangers. There is no encouragement of community forming in this model, you always see people on opposing teams as faceless enemies.

We’re given all this “social” bs like forums, Facebook, and Home, but these things are a far cry from real interaction with the people you are sharing a gaming experience with. Five years ago, we hardly had any of the social features that are pushed on us from manufacturers, yet we were all much more connected with each other than most console gamers now will ever understand. Social gaming means playing games in a social manner, not uploading your gameplay to Youtube and updating your Facebook status to “ghostin noobs”.

Social gaming is as much a joke as social networks, and for all the same reasons. You want real social gaming? Bring back the ability to talk to people on the other team; bring back custom servers that allow you to play the way you want with anyone who also wants to play that way; do away with matchmaking; bring back a real sense of community.

Single player isn’t dead, its just less profitable.