233: In Defense of the Friend Code

[Ghonzor]

I play with people (on PSN) I know.
Stuff like MW2's online...well, I manage with the random 12 year olds and overweight middle-aged men.
It doesn't bother me so long as I mute everyone I don't know going into a game.

 

[JourneyThroughHell]

It might actually sound perry reasonable but it still sounds like "talking out of your ass".
I think the inability of Nintendo to make a normal network system shouldn't be defended.

 

[theironbat46]

@#$% Nintendo, @#$%* Mario, and @#$%$ the Wii, I'm not wasting money on a cheap PS2 dressed up like a MAC.

 

[theironbat46]

I just got voice-chat 2 days ago. I am still hiding behind my curtain.

 

[Snotnarok]

I keep forgetting the thing has online play. I played smash brothers a few times and gave up all together with it being the laggiest game I've ever played. It sat on my router and still had issues. Oh well. :\

 

[smudgey]

It would be alright if you just had ONE friend code per console, but one for EVERY game? And with next to no voice support/in game messaging, who are they protecting?

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

Friend codes suck. But now...they suck less, thanks to reading this.

 

[BehattedWanderer]

Yeah, but that you need the friend code and the game code and the Wiimote code and the TV code...It's protective, which is nice, but it's also a pain in the ass to connect to. Its drop rate is pesky, you can't (at least not in my experience) just jump on the net, you have to get in then force it to connect, then wait for it to register your friend codes...It's one of the least user friendly interfaces around. Almost like it doesn't want to be used...

 

[slopeslider]

I keep forgetting the thing has online play. I played smash brothers a few times and gave up all together with it being the laggiest game I've ever played. It sat on my router and still had issues. Oh well. :\

The lag in that game is solely your fault or your opponents. If both of you have 10Mb conections no one's going to lag. If one has 768kbps and their little sister's watching twilight trailers on youtube, yes there will be some lag. Not like its smash bros fault.

 

[Snotnarok]

I keep forgetting the thing has online play. I played smash brothers a few times and gave up all together with it being the laggiest game I've ever played. It sat on my router and still had issues. Oh well. :\

The lag in that game is solely your fault or your opponents. If both of you have 10Mb conections no one's going to lag. If one has 768kbps and their little sister's watching twilight trailers on youtube, yes there will be some lag. Not like its smash bros fault.

That's all and well but had they simply put an ethernet port directly on the unit rather than selling it separately maybe it wouldn't be a problem.

 

[Sharky200]

Well i have had some trouble online but its mostly with the lag . i don't mind exchanging friend codes online. The people I have on my list are people I know from online or friends which like the article says gives you a different feeling than random play.

 

[Cousin_IT]

Never played a Nintendo game that I wanted to play the multiplayer part sat on my own with a mic on. I prefer them with other people around, or not at all. XBL players I just view as NPCs with varying degrees of Asperger's.

 

[TimeLord]

Friend codes need to burn, they are an annoying inconvenience

 

[AfterAscon]

Just imagine if MAG needed friend codes!

They tried that friend only thing on firefight in ODST and all I remember from it was people screaming on forums about it, even trying gametags was barely enough to guarantee a good game.

 

[InvisibleMan]

I absolutely disagree with John Constantine's conclusion that Friend Codes make online gaming "safer" for younger players via having to exchange codes outside of Nintendo's network: The risk is higher precisely because this system forces players to contact each other outside the game's network... A child/teenager has to join a forum or a blog in order to exchange the codes, and typically they will exchange more information than just codes.

Also, John Constantine seems to have missed a couple of bigger problems with Nintendo's online system: First, it is not the codes, it is the fact that you need a separate code for each game you play! Even if you had alphanumeric ids, it would still be a messy labor of love to collect and keep all these classified by their respective games.

Another big block to playing a Nintendo game online is the almost astronomically small chance that you will be playing the same game as your friends at the exact same time so you can find each other. Since there is no general game "forum" (like Xbox LIVE or PSN), you cannot see what your friends are playing or if they are playing until you go online on the same game at the same time!