I was reading a couple different game reviews, and then a sort of "review of the reviewing process" article, and I was struck by how a lackluster multiplayer section was enough drop a game in the standings. Even for the game that got a 10/10 (I forgot the name, unfortunately, it's the new shump on XBLA), people in the comments were saying "it can't be perfect, since the reviewer mentions problems with online multiplayer. It got me thinking. Even if we ignore that we've made game review numbers almost meaningless, and become fidgety about how we score. People argue that any score about an eight or nine is a "must buy", but that's a cop out. If there's no difference between 9.9 and 9.8, why use numbers at all?

But, I digress. We would never consider grading a Mario game down for not having multiplayer. When Zelda tried it (and largely failed), it was at least hailed as innovative. Is it only the games that make a good attempt at multiplayer, and come up short, that we bemoan, or has it become completely standard to have multiplayer (especially online multiplayer)? Is this a good thing, or should some games be allowed to be without multiplayer, and still be perfect for what they are?

I've never been much of a multiplayer, over the internet at least, but I think that's because I can't get a decent broadband connection out here in the Dales.

It doesn't seem unreasonable to mark a game down if there was potential for good multiplayer but the devs couldn't be arsed to implement it. The GTA IV multiplayer looks amazing, for instance, but that's because it can work. Mario or Zelda multiplayer seems a less natural development: they're built as single player experiences, and I'm quite happy with them staying single player.

It's a fad. Pure and simple. If a game has multiplayer at all, it needs to be good. Pure and simple, not just an afterthought.

Multiplayer can extend a game's replayability by an incredible amount, potentially to an infinitessimal degree. People still play Starcraft after 10 years because of its multiplayer.

That said, if it doesn't suit the game or you're not going to put much effort into it (the latter of which, I think, was the case with Meroid Prime 2's multiplayer) then they should definitely not bother with multiplayer at all and and focus on refining the single player experience. Because either of those would just prevent it form being worth it. Bad multiplayer does nothing to extend the lifetime of a game.

TheNecroswanson:
It's a fad. Pure and simple. If a game has multiplayer at all, it needs to be good. Pure and simple, not just an afterthought.

Truth spoken, truth heard.

I shall strike thou down in GTA IV Gigantor.

TheNecroswanson:
It's a fad. Pure and simple.

I disagree, much of the architecture of the current generation of consoles is geared towards multiplayer. Not only that, multiplayer is popular. Unless there is a significant shift in the tastes of the game buying public, I think multiplayer will be with us for the foreseeable future.

TheNecroswanson:
It's a fad. Pure and simple. If a game has multiplayer at all, it needs to be good. Pure and simple, not just an afterthought.

The whole damn game industry obviously dosen't think its a fad. Ever since Microsoft managed to make XBox live nearly cheat free, it has expanded tremendously. Many people such as my self prefer to play humans than predictable and often stupid AI. Humans are much more diverse and more satisfying to kill than AI enemies and repeating scripted sections. Many young gamers, such as my self, play mutiplayer competitively and only play campaign when we have friends over. Kind of ironic isn't it?

When AI became thick and killing became pleasurable.

I'd say Counterstrike and Halo 2 were the biggies that caused this plague upon FPS gaming.
Counterstrike proved a game need only have multiplayer to be loved by fratboys.
Halo 2 pointed to its multiplayer and said "See? That excuses how much my singleplayer sucks ass!". And people bought it.
Aaaand voila, the multiplayer fad was born.

I think online multiplayer has become a symptom of lazy developers.

Balanced multiplayer was pretty much perfected all the way back in Quake. So all developers have to do is build a bunch of enormous maps with roughly similar layouts either side. Then let people loose in them. No need to write a plot, somehow link all the settings together or give the levels some replayability.
Since humans are inginuitive and unpredictable, there is no need to write complicated AI or scripted events as people will find ways of doing cool things for them.
It also means when people call them out on the crappy/criminally short singleplayer mode (#ahem# Bungie#) the developers can say "but look at this shiny multiplayer set". Even when its still doing exactly the same thing it was doing near fifteen years ago.

Multiplayer has never been a fad. Why is it that the console industry only really took off in the early to mid 90's whereas before it was a palpable joke with no required punchline? That's the period where most 2p games first started flooding the market, whereas previously it was thought of as a novelty. To say that something which is almost twenty years old is a fad is borderline ignorant.

Wide multiplayer formats are more popular because as the world grows increasingly connected, it is nice to be able to play with friends which you might otherwise never have contact with. Say, ..if one moves from Chicago to Florida, they can still chat and not feel uncomfortable about it while playing an RTS or whatever it is that PC gamers play these days. You'll find that the best multiplayer games are the ones that involve infinately more complex scenarios that you, yourself build. While an empty, meaningless online multiplayer mode (I'm looking at you, brawl) can actually serve as a detriment to a game, an intuitive coercing one that brings many different people together under the same virtual construct, each actively involved for the group goal, can bring about a sense of comraderie that you simply don't get with lobotomized AI support.

I think multiplayer has always been on developers minds, but the technology avaliable for, say, the nes generation was far inferior than the one we have this days. Go back to the magnavox odyssey, see the ad. What do you see, a guy playing on his own, or playing with a friend? Do not mistake "multiplayer" with "online multiplayer"

Truth is, games were made for fun before they were even thought to be an art form. And like most pass time activities, it's a lot funner when you're playing with people than on your own.

Keet: This isn't about "when did we start multiplayer?", it's "When did we decide that good multiplayer somehow 'excuses' a games single player for sucking royal amounts of ass, ala the second two Halo games?".

Well just one thing: I thought Zelda: Four swords was AWESOME!!!

Well I say: blame counterstrike, team fortress and TFC... VALVe started it...

Anyhow... I don't think it's a bad thing.

propertyofcobra:
Keet: This isn't about "when did we start multiplayer?", it's "When did we decide that good multiplayer somehow 'excuses' a games single player for sucking royal amounts of ass, ala the second two Halo games?".

Because the multiplayer is genius. It's an oft mentioned sentiment, but with Halo, you really are paying for a multiplayer game, with a single player campaign thrown in on the side. It's like criticising Unreal for it's single player.

Anyway, multiplayer is so popular now because it introduces a whole load of unpredictability to a game. To use the Halo analogy again, the game's AI will use tanks and warthogs to run you over and to shoot you with big shooty guns. Only a fellow human being could be so inspired as to ram a warthog into a Scorpion tank, thus propelling it with force into the enemy and turning them into splattercakes (that actually happened to me, and my God, I almost shit myself when I saw 60 tonnes of virtual tank come flying towards me).

Multiplayer started excusing bad single-player games when people found out that playing humans was infinitely better than playing against AI.

I myself do enjoy multiplayer, but because I don't want to pay for Xbox Live (I'm cheap, runs in my blood), I need some good singleplayer games. So, I've got slim pickings, and so does everybody else.

To make matters worse, I'm a FPS fan, so... Anyone heard of any good FPS games, with an excellent singleplayer mode (yes, there's HL, but what else?)?

- A procrastinator

When AI started to become lame and predictable.

fix-the-spade:
I think online multiplayer has become a symptom of lazy developers.

Balanced multiplayer was pretty much perfected all the way back in Quake. So all developers have to do is build a bunch of enormous maps with roughly similar layouts either side. Then let people loose in them. No need to write a plot, somehow link all the settings together or give the levels some replayability.
Since humans are inginuitive and unpredictable, there is no need to write complicated AI or scripted events as people will find ways of doing cool things for them.
It also means when people call them out on the crappy/criminally short singleplayer mode (#ahem# Bungie#) the developers can say "but look at this shiny multiplayer set". Even when its still doing exactly the same thing it was doing near fifteen years ago.

Most definitely.

stompy:
Multiplayer started excusing bad single-player games when people found out that playing humans was infinitely better than playing against AI.

I myself do enjoy multiplayer, but because I don't want to pay for Xbox Live (I'm cheap, runs in my blood), I need some good singleplayer games. So, I've got slim pickings, and so does everybody else.

To make matters worse, I'm a FPS fan, so... Anyone heard of any good FPS games, with an excellent singleplayer mode (yes, there's HL, but what else?)?

- A procrastinator

i would recomend Bioshock myself its pretty inovative but it is a tad short

Multiplayer became important when it became simple enough to join in, no extra cables or anything, just add a couple bucks (in the 360's case) and BAM1 Multiplayer.

Now should MP be an excuse to get out of a bad Single Player campaign? Not if that campaign is the main selling point.

Multiplayer is hailed so well because you can have a lot more people that are real than you could ever hope to fit on a single television screen. Games like Resistance 2 couldn't pull off 60 person multiplayer if it didn't have online play.

But I agree that a game that has bad multiplayer or no multiplayer at all shouldn't be docked for it. But I guess people think that if a game can be bumped up for multiplayer why can't it be bumped down?

I became obsessed with multiplayer around the Secret of Mana came out. COOP is, easily, the greatest thing to ever grace gaming.

Sadly, games that revolve around COOP gameplay (Army of Two) is terrible. A game needs a solid core in order to have solid COOP. Most single player games would do nothing but benefit from COOP, and those that have it usually do benefit by having increased sales.

A game like Oblivion would be considered the greatest game of all time if it included multiplayer as, most certainly, someone could create mods for any sort of game modes. COOP, deathmatch, arena deathmatch, capture the flag, etc. Just like games like TQ and D2, you would need the same mods others had.

Since this would mainly effect PC sales of the game, and only those who are seeking an online experience with the game, it wouldn't be a big deal. Hell, even the inclusion of a simple LAN feature would make the game flawless thanks to programs like Hamachi.

Also, there are tons of Mario games that would be knocked down for not having multiplayer. Brawl, Kart, Party, Tennis, Etc.

Seldon2639:
I was reading a couple different game reviews, and then a sort of "review of the reviewing process" article, and I was struck by how a lackluster multiplayer section was enough drop a game in the standings. Even for the game that got a 10/10 (I forgot the name, unfortunately, it's the new shump on XBLA), people in the comments were saying "it can't be perfect, since the reviewer mentions problems with online multiplayer...People argue that any score about an eight or nine is a "must buy", but that's a cop out. If there's no difference between 9.9 and 9.8, why use numbers at all?

Even though it is not the point of this thread, it still needs commenting. Go to any game magazine that uses a number or star system (1-10/1-5/1-5 stars, etc), and every few months you will see this question pop up, "If a game is not perfect, why does it get a perfect score?". And the reply is always the same, "10 out of 10 is not a perfect score, it is simply as close to perfect as we feel that particular game can get. It is the highest praise that we can give to a game". In fact, that's one of the reasons I like the official X-Box magazine (aside from agreeing with about 99.9 percent of their reviews), they have descriptions for their ratings, 1 through 10, and include an 11 score with the description being "Mecha-Godzillas choice, the unicorn, will never happen. Ever."

As to the part about there being no difference between 9.8 and 9.9, well there is one. It's just very small. The best way I can explain it is, take a pen and paper, and make a shape. Something simple, like a figure eight. Now, make another one right next to it. See a difference? Odds are yes, but it is a very small one. Now pick the one that you feel is better looking then the other. Get it? The two are near identical, but one is just a wee bit better then the other. That's the difference between a "9.8" and "9.9".

I always take the review as an indication of how much time the reviewer spent enjoying the game. If they give the game a score of 7.5 then they enjoyed 75% of the game. If they give it a 10 then they enjoyed 100% of the game.

Multiplayer is always seen as half (maybe more) of a game. Therefore if a game has bad multiplayer then that means the reviewer on enjoyed 50% (if the Single Player is perfect).

Why is Multi Player so popular? Well because its fun. Can you blame people for wanting to do fun things?

I don't think that Developers that focus their games on Multiplayer are lazy. If a company wants to focus a game on Multiplayer then thats what they want to do with THEIR game. and you don't really have any right to say that they can't. Saying that a developer is lazy for wanted to make a multiplayer based game is like saying an artist is lazy for not using large amounts of your favourite colour.

I think developers sometimes need to gauge their product / market more accurately. Will this be single player, multiplayer, or both? I love Stalker, but why does it have a multiplayer mode? Is it really necessary for a free form fps set in a nuclear wasteland to have a half arsed online shooter bolted on? Does Unreal Tournament 3 really need a hugely contrived and ultimately pointless single player campaign?

Most single player games (at least in the realm of fps) should stay that way, unless you are prepared to put huge amounts of money and time into developing both sides of the equation - CoD4 would be the most obvious current example.

I like the way Valve does it - have single and multiplayer games that are based on the same engine, but which are distinct from each other. So you have HL2 and episodes for single player, and CSS and TF2 for online.

As an aside, as far as I am aware Valve did not develop either the original Counter Strike or Team Fortress.

I believe that you should choose one or the other. Look at Metroid Prime 3. Single player was godly, but no multiplayer. Now look at TF2. No single player, but a godly multiplayer. In fact, most of the great games focused on just one of these aspects, rather than having a half arsed attempt at both. Bioshock, Galaxy, Starcraft, CS, OoT. All had one or the other.

Also, i just realized that Shigeru Miyamoto doesn't make many multiplayer games. Maybe that has something to do with it. Grrrr. Snarl. Metroid.

neems:
As an aside, as far as I am aware Valve did not develop either the original Counter Strike or Team Fortress.

You are correct. The original TF was a mod for Quake and CS was simply a mod for HL. TF2 isn't very much like TF at all. The only thing they have in common are the classes =\.

Haven't we always been obsessed with multi-player?

Anyway, I think recently though, we've been sacrificing one mode for the other, so, I say you have either one or the other, and if you are gonna do both, then make them BOTH good, don't make the other mode "just an add-on".

Really got into multiplayer somehere around Phantasy Star Universe and the Dreamcast.
Good times.
*sob*
='(

It came to a point where some gamers felt that multiplayer has to be included in EVERY game in EVERY genre no matter what, and that the absence of that feature will bring down the quality of the rest of the game, good or bad. This would be, say, around the time games like Halo became popular and reviewers thought that it's an essential feature in every game, even in those genres that were never a good match for it.

An example of a game that was criticized for lack of multiplayer under a genre not fit for it was Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, a purely story-driven single player action-adventure game with some shooting elements built into it. It was built as a single player game, nothing more nothing less, and is a great one at that, but for some reason, people thought the game's lack of multiplayer is something worth marking down everything else for. Comparatively, neither Ninja Gaiden and its expansions, nor the Devil May Cry series, Tomb Raider, etc. were criticized for this aspect. Make of that what you will, but I think it's a case of expecting too much out of something that it was never made for.

Multiplayer became popular when the big game companies realised that players were willing to pay more than an initial outlay for online gaming. Thus, the PR departments raved about how their game had 'kick ass multiplayer' and then of course we all flocked online to experience this 'kick ass multiplayer' which amounted to 12 year old kids trying to sound 17.

Hey Joe:
Multiplayer became popular when the big game companies realised that players were willing to pay more than an initial outlay for online gaming. Thus, the PR departments raved about how their game had 'kick ass multiplayer' and then of course we all flocked online to experience this 'kick ass multiplayer' which amounted to 12 year old kids trying to sound 17.

Teehee.

What was the first online game? Wasn't it worms or something?

As somebody already said that before, as long as Microsoft's STEREOTYPICAL DEMOGRAPHIC is "retarded 20 somethings with cash.[sic]" we'll always have games with bad SP and mediocre MP(CoD4 was a failure imo, and the only thing that saves Halo is forge) that will still sell millions of copies.And because we have those two bloody shooters dominating XBL, hardly anybody plays other MP games.I guarantee you that there are a lot more people playing Q3/UT/UT2004 on PC than GRAW on 360.

It's quite interesting though.The first Gamer Stereotype was a "Nerd/Dork/Geek" but now it seems to be more like "Da Cool Guy".Talk about evolution of gaming...

I don't have enough friends that share my interests to make me care about Multiplayer. Honestly, I use games to escape my life, I don't want a game that's centred around interacting with my peers TYVM.