So folks, does anyone feel like there is a serious lack of dual wielding in shooters these days?
Why is it that this feature doesn't show up on a more regular basis? Does anyone care to hazard a guess as to when we might see dual wielding in the enhanced state of being able to aim independently with each gun? What would it take to accomplish this, and would it be worth it? Would it possible to add this and still make it functional? What are your thoughts?

Yeah there does seem to be lack of dual wielding in FPSs. I am hoping for another Timesplitters game. I am not sure we will see the state of using guns independently because I guess it will be harder to use, than the one crossfire to two guns approach.

I'm going to assume "realistic" shooters are pretty much out of the question here, as the practical applications of wielding two handguns are few if any.

It would definitely take some interface evolution to make it workable. Two mice perhaps? But how do you control movement? Foot pedals? I'll leave that for someone more creative to figure out.

Also, as someone who can barely walk and chew gum at the same time, I would probably not do well trying to control two guns.

That all being said, if someone can figure out a way to make this workable, you've already got my money.

You know what? You're right. I love dual-wielding guns because A) it makes me feel like a total badass and B) it's really cool.

The last game I played that had dual-wielding weapons was The Darkness, which in itself was not a horrible game... it just wasn't good. I was also hoping that there would be dual-wielding in Grand Theft Auto IV considering there was that element in San Andreas. Although it might just be because of the more "gangster" feeling to SA compared to IV.

So yeah, I'd love to see a lot more dual-wielding elements in shooter games.

Dual wielding has been diminished because of the realism that games tend to contain nowadays. There's nothing quite like timesplitters though.

Each gun thing would take three analogs. Either that or do it like Call of Juarez. Have a special move which makes it go into bullettime to control each gun without having to be rooted to the spot for too long

The first instances of multi-direction dual wield will likely be for pre-set moves in third person shooters, e.g. do a combo to charge forward a short distance or dive backwards giving you control of each gun on one thumbstick.

meatloaf231:
Dual wielding has been diminished because of the realism that games tend to contain nowadays. There's nothing quite like timesplitters though.

Nothing like virus mode for hours on end, with dual wielding shotguns. I need to find Future Perfect and get it in my Wii.

I prefer duel welding.

I like dual Wielding for some things, Lightsabers and Pistols are bad ass when you can do it well, but not for shotties, AKs, M-16/14/4s, or any real sword. If I know it can't be done it goes from fun to annoying. my friend and I used to practice our lightsaber fighting using Kendo sticks, and I realized that although dual wielding them looks bad ass, it is about 500 times harder than a single blade, but only about 10% harder to block. I had no problem blocking both of his blades when he dual wielded, and he had no problems from what I could see blocking me. Melee weapons aren't worth it except for looking like a TOTAL bad ass....

I think controller's need to be redesigned in some way, again. Like the inclusion of the second analog stick. Now, don't expect me to be the genius behind this idea, but the controller's as of now are simply too unreliable for some of the more sophisticated things to be achieved, like multi directional dual wielding. Another evolutionary jump is in order, soon.

its quite simply really.

One 2 metre sword is cool

2 2 metre swords must be...

impossible, but so. damn. cool.

Darth Mobius:
I like dual Wielding for some things, Lightsabers and Pistols are bad ass when you can do it well, but not for shotties, AKs, M-16/14/4s, or any real sword. If I know it can't be done it goes from fun to annoying. my friend and I used to practice our lightsaber fighting using Kendo sticks, and I realized that although dual wielding them looks bad ass, it is about 500 times harder than a single blade, but only about 10% harder to block. I had no problem blocking both of his blades when he dual wielded, and he had no problems from what I could see blocking me. Melee weapons aren't worth it except for looking like a TOTAL bad ass....

its possible though, some martial arts do it

for realistic games like call of duty 4 and the like, your not going to find dual weilding, but games that are run 'n gun, like halo, dual weilding fits perfectly; but you know its only a matter of time before you will be dual weilding the plasma swords. but realistic old western games (there really isn't enough-if any-goodwestern games) could have dual weilding seeing as some people did do it.

Dual weild:

• knives: I guess these work.
• Pistols: requires you to be ambidextrous. Otherwise, I guess this is reasonable.
• Swords: Awesome
• Rifles or Machine guns: No way.
• Desert Eagles: What are they doing in games anyways? Dualies of those would just be retarded.
• Vulcan Miniguns: Either I just came up with a horrible idea for the next Halo wannabe, or a sweet power-up for Brutal Legend.

the monopoly guy:
its possible though, some martial arts do it

Of course it is POSSIBLE, I just said that I CAN do it... but I also said that it wasn't worth the extra work required to use both blades because it is way harder to fight with two blades than block an attacker who HAS two blades...

I can't say I see any good method to aim with two different weapons at the same time and still manage to walk around. If there was a style of double-dicking wiimote, where you can plug two pairs of nunchucks into one 'mote, but the nunchucks would need the optical aiming of a normal wiimote, left chuck controls WASD directions while right chuck looks up and down and turns l/r. Much like using the classic controller, the wiimote itself would just sit there, and so you'd only have two triggers and two other buttons, so it would be a very simplistic game.

Dual-wield Goldeneye style I like, not as realistic but fun. Crysis did it with pistols, worked well. I can even go for dual assault rifles or SMGs, but nothing bigger.

It's a useful game mechanic if its simplified to A: Only wielding 2 of the same gun, B: Fire button shoots both weapons and C: Second gun is discarded when its empty instead of reloading it.

Then is basically acts as a simple, temporary power boost for a certain weapon, albeing one that consumes ammo a bit quicker. This was what was used in Area 51 on the PS2 and it was a huge help without being imbalanced. The only annoying features were that it stopped you from using the SMP's scope and that you couldn't dual wield pistols for some reason. I guess thay thought no-one would bother to use the pistol once you got your hands on better guns, but letting you use two at a time might have actually solved this.

But they at least did it in a way that was mostly useful and decently balanced. It's a good example of how is generally should be done.

Uh, I think dual-wielding is really just a gimmick. A single weapon is fine for me...

wilsonscrazybed:
I prefer duel welding.

Indeed. Oxy-acetylene at 20 paces! Ahem.

I can think of a few melee weapons where it would make sense (sai, punching daggers, or any sort of knife really) but I can't think of a situation where it would make sense with a firearm. Even with a pistol, you lose all accuracy for no real gain. Maybe if you were using a pair of machine pistols/ SMG and just wanted to spray as many bullets as possible... Oh, and reloading would be interesting :(

Give me a single firearm any day.

I really am all-for dual wield on pistols. In the real world, I'd prefer two good pistols and a sizeable number of clips over any SMG or most assault rifles.

Well IMO Dual Wielding firearms (for the most part) = cheesy

Khell_Sennet:
I really am all-for dual wield on pistols. In the real world, I'd prefer two good pistols and a sizeable number of clips over any SMG or most assault rifles.

*Sits on a roof 500 metres away and downs Khell with a well-placed burst from an AK-47*

Though I do like dual-wielding-because as we all realise, the idea that a game is realistic is rubbish. If it was realistic, you'd die so many times it would lose all fun in the game.And the Area 51 system was an excellent idea- much better than the HALO-'know i has two SMGs I fire so much lead that world implodes!!'

why does everyone characterize halo fans as gibbering morons?

Ultrajoe:
its quite simply really.

One 2 metre sword is cool

2 2 metre swords must be...

impossible, but so. damn. cool.

most people who dual weld have a shorter blade in the off-hand or use 2 short blades

Well, I liked the Halo approach...

**dodges flaming barrels and rotten tomatos**

Well, they, IMO, didn't cock it up. So, what's wrong about having a Halo-style duel-wielding weapon control scheme?

And, as some people mentioned earlier, it would only work in run-an'-gun shooters, so don't bother 'bout the realistic games having duel-wielding. It wouldn't be practical.

Anarchemitis:
Dual weild:
[snip]

In respone to these points i say the following:

• Knives - Go for it, but they have -50 damage to Emos
• Pistols - Not really ambidexstrous unless you try and go gun kata style with them...which really doesn't work as well as in the movie Equilibrium
• Swords - broadswords are heavy :( Maybe short swords tho heheh
• Rifles or machine guns - YES WAY! Pass me Arnold Schwarzenneger (?) and I'll show you how it's done.
• Desert eagles - why would they be retarded? I mean yes the kickback would wreck most people but soldiers can fire them one handed, and if you wanted to look awesome 2 of these is how to do it :D
[li] Vulcan Miniguns - Look at 5:50 on this video http://www.gametrailers.com/player/usermovies/57998.html and say it wouldn't be AWESOME.

Ultrajoe:
why does everyone characterize halo fans as gibbering morons?

What does this have to do with this thread?

FEAR did it right, with the akimbo pistols. So did Max Payne.

If a game's going to include dual-wielding, then at its core, said game should focus on style over realism.

There's a reason soldiers aren't issued with two sidearms. Your aim suffers, it's harder to reload, you'll fatigue faster because you're not supporting the weight of the gun properly, and at the end of the day, if you want the better rate of fire, why not just use an SMG?

Dual-wielding with firearms is stylish not practical.

With melee weapons, the same is (loosely) true, although there are a number of martial disciplines which emphasise it. Kamas are generally used in pairs, for example. For the most part, though, melee weapons that are designed to be dual-wielded come in recommended configurations, one smaller than the other. The Samurai carried two swords - one long, one short - for that reason. Similarly, Western duelling and fencing styles have a number of specialist weapons, such as the "Main Gauche", that were designed to be wielded in the user's off-hand, opposite a longer blade.

Desert eagles - why would they be retarded? I mean yes the kickback would wreck most people but soldiers can fire them one handed, and if you wanted to look awesome 2 of these is how to do it :D

If not handled carefully, the recoil on a .50AE can easily break the wrist of even an experienced shooter, and just being strong won't be enough to stop it happening. Desert Eagles are designed to be fired from a braced two-handed stance, and ideally you should keep your arms slightly loose so that the gun's kick raises it above your head, diverting all that energy so that it doesn't hurt you.

Anyone who tries firing one single-handed is just asking for an injury. An injured soldier is a liability. Rumour has it, in fact, that in SAS training they kick your arse for jumping over low obstacles, because if you twist your ankle on landing, then you're going to be slowing the team down and endangering the mission.

Dual desert eagles = double the risk of breaking your wrist = BIG no-no.

A good way to solve dual wielding in games is co-op. Player 1 controls the characters movment, jumping... while player 2 controls both the guns with two separate analog sticks and fires them with two different buttons

Ultrajoe:
why does everyone characterize halo fans as gibbering morons?

Because we are

"I need to find Future Perfect and get it in my Wii"

They've announced TS4 ... *drools* and it FP was da bomb

The only way I could think of getting separate aiming to work would be a similar concept to the deadeye feature of Red Dead Revolver, with each thumb stick controlling one pistol. Would be bloody hard to aim both, but would look really cool once you fired.

Resistance: Fall of Man had a pretty good separate aim system for the Reapers (dual-wielded alien SMGs), where the two weapons fired on the primary and secondary fire buttons.
The weapons individually locked onto targets, separate or the same one. It's easy to use, intuitive, and not considerably worse than single weapons, and yet FEELS like dual-wielding (unlike dual wielding in, oh, let's say... Halo. Which if you removed the graphics of the weapons would feel pretty much exactly like single wielding).

Of course as others have stated, for ANYTHING that tries to even keep a SEMBLANCE of realism, dual-wielding is only for complete and utter morons.

Edit: Oh, and I agree with everything Angryman stated.

propertyofcobra:
Resistance: Fall of Man had a pretty good separate aim system for the Reapers (dual-wielded alien SMGs), where the two weapons fired on the primary and secondary fire buttons.
The weapons individually locked onto targets, separate or the same one. It's easy to use, intuitive, and not considerably worse than single weapons, and yet FEELS like dual-wielding (unlike dual wielding in, oh, let's say... Halo. Which if you removed the graphics of the weapons would feel pretty much exactly like single wielding).

Of course as others have stated, for ANYTHING that tries to even keep a SEMBLANCE of realism, dual-wielding is only for complete and utter morons.

Edit: Oh, and I agree with everything Angryman stated.

Halo didn't have dual wielding Halo 2 did. Also even then your analysis is somewhat flawed seeing as each weapon's fire was controlled by it's own trigger. You would have been better off comparing it to the dual wielding of pistols in most games (Counter Strike, FEAR, Crysis, etc.)

AngryMan:
There's a reason soldiers aren't issued with two sidearms. Your aim suffers, it's harder to reload, you'll fatigue faster because you're not supporting the weight of the gun properly, and at the end of the day, if you want the better rate of fire, why not just use an SMG?

Dual-wielding with firearms is stylish not practical.

More RL than game, my preference for dual pistols is that you are really only aiming with and using the right hand gun, but the left pistol is there for when the right one goes empty-clip on you, you still have something to keep the f**kers heads down while you eject the clip (though you still can't insert a new one and fire, it cuts your vulnerable time in half). Also comes in handy as a backup if the primary jams, you can holster the defective pistol and swap to the other.

Also, I'm a pack rat, and FPS games just kill me how you leave perfectly good guns lying around. Doom! You kill a rifle-armed zombie for ammunition for your pistol? PICK UP THE FUCKING RIFLE YOU DUMBASS! Farcry and Fear always have a place in my heart because aside from the supersoldiers, every gun-armed enemy carries a weapon you can pick up.

I agree that a single weapon is more realistic and often more practical, but theres nothing quite like the feeling of dualweilding RCP90s in Goldeneye and shooting the piss out of everything.

Im not sure about dual wielding guns, but my favorite game of all time dual wielded guns and magic.

Clive Barkers Undying went with a system where you fired a weapon with one hand while casting spells at the same time with the other. Their is just something pleasing about dealing with an enemy using a shotgun or revolver in one hand while tossing lightning and an explosive storm of skulls with remarkable precision with your other hand.

if you havent played it you may be able to find a copy somewhere.