Poll: Is pvp/multiplayer a copout for creating real game content?

[Twilight_guy]

HA HA HA HA AH HA HAH HAH HA, no. I don't think so. I think it might be a dumb decision in some games but I don't think making multipalyer is something that is easier then creating content, as a matter of fact, they're both difficult on different departments, programming for multiplayer and level design/artists for other content development (programmers too, but assuming 'content' refers to levels and not mechanics, msotly those two).

 

[Mr Pantomime]

Let me answer your question with another question. If a developer does add pvp and multiplayer simply so they dont have to bother making a decent single player mode,why would you play their game? Why would you even care?

if the gui is better than say, facebook's and supports this stuff http://www.braingate.com/intellectual_property.html and has been beta tested on old peoplee to control wheelchairs and i can play basketball in a 3d real physics environment and intricately control my avatar then someday i might pvp a little bit, but ultimately its just a place to talk to people and maybe a few pixels and such

also: if girls is there. but i will not play farmville. if girls choose farmville over sim city then i will say girls why don't you just make sim city multiplayer and i will quit subspace and play that.

also, do you know any cool free multiplayer online games like continuum which 1) have girls and 2) these girls is not afraid to give me their names and addreses and heats?

can i play the night of the walpurigis and hentai mmorpgs with smart real girls? where are the really swmart girls? am i won? have you ever been played by a mmorpg by a dev who stalks your avatar? it is one of teh coolest things in the game to notice the develpopefrs noticing what u are ding in a dynamic world, just to even think about the possibility that in the world where you game there is real magic and gods and such, and you can have relationships with them and you can decide what's fair, what's not fair, and anyways you can control some things on the internet, like spaceships.

if you liked spaceships alot and only singleplayer games, i'd go with escape velocity, by matt kestrel. I would say buy a kestrel and fly around and you will enjoy taking over all the planets, and the first planet you capture will be evildrone and ill tell you how if you pm me.

and if you liked spaceships alot and only multiplayer games, i'd say play subspace.

but ppl in your generation don't play subspace they play counterstrike or whatever is the next iteration of good pvp, but does/does not have persistent levelling, etc.

and in subspace there is ppl who likes single player and i like it when those ppl goes into zones by themselves and builds cool worlds and then says "i think i will bring some ppl here" and there are such zones where 1 or 2 or 3 ppl aer hanging out in a 2d environment sliding ships around, repelling each other, playing capture the flag, etc. There are some legendary gamers that we talked about in jacuzzis for 20 minutes the other day.

do you like good memories?

my buddy who was teh best at subspace, Mr. Stupid/Nymphe, joined the airforce.

It's a club, you know.

I am going to sleep tonight with your words in on my mind, spinning faster and faster around my head until they are screaming at me. It will never end. This is my life now.

 

[Spearmaster]

I really cant see there actually being more content in a multiplayer game than a well made single player game. Yes the cost to moderate games and balance games is there but only if they actually do it which many don't. The reason for asking about this is the fact that some of the most notable starts to online multiplayer games were user made mods so I doubt they took a whole dev team a year to make, or had a $60 price tag.

 

[ZeroMachine]

Say that to a multiplayer developer and see how long it takes for them to hate you.

 

[TrevHead]

Yes and no. MP generally has very little content in it, it's all balancing, although alot of the MP content and balancing is grown organically from copying from whats come before it. I think some balancing is harder than others depending on how complex or different it is from other games. Devs do have alot of new tools to enable them to balance their games due to the internet as they get feedback on how gamers play their games and tweak it.

Imo the hardest games to do are single players or co-op in the SP style game which need 100s of devs designing beautiful content for us to explore, with tight gameplay and balancing. It's why I love Platinum Games and think ppl should give devs like Ninja Theory some slack.

Shame more and more games think of "balancing" as tweaking F2P / Mmo style loot drops and monetisation than anything else.

To answer the OPs question is it worth the money? Yes OFC, any good game is worth the money if it does something well. It's just a shame that some games get a free pass while others don't like arcade beat em ups or the best shmups that have a great deal of balancing put into its deep gameplay and highscore systems.

Still it's nice to see so many ppl here saying ballancing is important

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

No as good PvP/Multiplayer is hard to balance.

Do you know in games balance is not important because it is not 100% related to fun, and fun is the only thing that's important.

For example, if you were Vietnam, and America sent Dr. Manhattan, it would not be fair, but it would be cool and fun and not many ppl would need to get hurt or anything before whoever Dr. Manhattan sided with won.

What you would do in your multiplayer game is make it more fun for Dr. Manhattan to explore Cydonia than to kill players. Killing players could weaken his blue glowyness via karma, and he could be very sensitive to karma. If he has bad karma, he is vulnerable to being mind controlled by etheral aliens. In fact there is a subquest to stop Dr. Manhattan from being mind controlled by an Etheral named Deridda the Theroetican.

This kind of stuff is not balanced, but is cool anyways. Dr. Manhattan could also be called upon to help during events such as when Asheron is sick with grief because Mytrhandnia cast some spells on Elysa Strathlear and is trying to displace her as the high queen of alluvia, and so he cannot stop the shadow spires. oh noes, where is someone else besides Asheron? We will go to earth and find oppenheimer and he will give us Dr. Manhattan, and this man will, in tandem with Adrian Veidt, finally allow us to explore the universe. This will be fun for ppl who train lockpick. we needs to make lockpick useful in pvp. How can we do that?

You do know balance in a multiplayer game is tantamount to fun, variety and choice? All that is well and good for a singleplayer game but not a multiplayer PvP experience. The only people enjoying the abuse of imbalanced and cheap mechanics is the people abusing them.

There is nothing more important to multiplayer than balance, well designed areas and a stream of content having either one out of whack ruins the experience.