Multiplayer- It's Not Just Online

[TheRightToArmBears]

I feel I should warn you; this is (kind of) a thread about MW2.

Lots of people seem to moan about MW2's multiplayer, and to be honest, I find this confusing. I love the multiplayer, and I keep getting into small arguments before realising that the person I'm arguing wih forgot to specify online multiplayer.

Now, I find it hard to believe that this happens to me alone. I actually find that most of my gaming time comes from offline multiplayer, especially MW2 now. Can I be the only gamer with friends? Offline multiplayer is constantly being forgotten now, thanks to online multiplayer I shoud think. Is the end off shooting my friends in the face (not in that way) on a Saturday night with a crate of beer and pizza nigh? In 10 years, will any game still have offline multiplayer?

Doesn't this piss you off at all?
[sub]Do I use to many questions? Yes.[/sub]

 

[tomtom94]

The LAN format and dedicated servers will slowly be phased out, if not in the next 10 years, maybe the next 20.
I think in 10 years (ie 2 generations time) physical discs will have gone too and the vast majority of all games will have online multiplayer capabilities. That's a good thing. Linking the players of the world together in trust, harmony, and whiny racism.
It doesn't annoy me at all really, but then again I never really play offline multiplayer. Every time I try to play offline with my sister she ends up getting ridiculously competitive and thus starts shouting at me and then it usually escalates. And she NEVER learns.

 

[Aunel]

split screen+GRAW+Nonpoint+some friends=devastatingly awesome event.

 

[Nevyrmoore]

The LAN format and dedicated servers will slowly be phased out, if not in the next 10 years, maybe the next 20.
I think in 10 years (ie 2 generations time) physical discs will have gone too and the vast majority of all games will have online multiplayer capabilities. That's a good thing. Linking the players of the world together in trust, harmony, and whiny racism.

Not really...LAN will always win over an Internet connection in terms of a ping rate, until the entire world can develop an Internet infrastructure that can rival the connection rate of LANs. Though I have doubts about that.

As for dedicated servers, they will always win over using a player as a host. With dedicated servers, you can maintain a blacklist of player IPs, there are (almost) no problems with ping compared to connecting to a player with a shitty connection, and on the same note, there are no issues with reconnecting to each other if the host leaves. Honestly, I the only problem I can see with consoles using dedicated servers is if the developing company decide to shut them down. In which case, there should be an effort to see if you can have third-party servers.