Traditional Single Player Experience Gone in 3 Years?!

intheweeds

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Apr 6, 2011
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megaman24681012 said:
here's a different scenario, I would have a hard time appreciating a book if I had to read it to someone!
I agree, but this sounds even worse than that. This sounds like if you had to rely on a bunch of random internet strangers to log in and out taking turns reading it to you. Ew.

Seriously though, I don't think this will ever truly happen. Different types of games come into the field and things change, but you never lose any genres. We had early consoles like atari and colecovision and it was all platforming and space shooters, then you started to see more puzzles after tetris and then you started seeing fps after doom and bigger better rts after warcraft and whatnot. Now we have a huge overflow of facebook games because zynga's making a mint with farmville. But nothing ever actually dies off. You just get more styles.

This might just be a new genre. Sure I think it might be hard to find a truly single player game for a while if it becomes popular as every company jumps on the bandwagon, but eventually everything runs its course and things even out again. Besides there will always be indie games picking up the beloved genres that are being overshadowed.
 

Lawlhat

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I'd still buy plenty of games if this was true, but probably not many at full price. Multiplayer games are good and fun and all that, but they are never quite as fulfilling as straight-on single player games for me. I usually walk away more sated from a single player game.
 

Zantos

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Ah, the classic "someone says something, so it must be true" scenario. I'm glad no one so far has a post consisting entirely of *rage! rage! nostalgia, rage!*. Even if this does happen and single player campaigns fundamentally change, the only people who will complain and threaten to boycott are the same people who complain there isn't enough innovation in the games industry. The rest of us will probably have a gradually changing and fairly enjoyable transition to look forward to.
 

Stall

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Thanks to the folks who are actually taking time to read the article and my general summary instead of just throwing out half-baked statements that have absolutely nothing to do with the proposed topic, although you guys are in a relative minority.

Sinclair Solutions said:
As for my feelings about, I'm still a bit skeptical. I play single player because I don't WANT to deal with other people. Sometimes, I just want to be in the world the game gives me and not be bothered by the masses. If there is the option to turn it off, like Demon Soul's, then I guess I'll allow it. That might be nice for other people, but I'm not really interested.
I think there is a lot of opportunity here to set up an experience that is engaging and connective like Demons Souls, but not allow you to deal with other people. The best idea I can come up with is vendors selling items people sold to them in other separate game worlds, so you might randomly stumble upon an awesome piece of loot or some good potions. There's definitely a lot of potential and ideas to be tapped, and interesting and col innovations to be seen. I don't think they totally have to change a game, but they could just add interesting touches that really go to expand replay value. There is definitely the possibility that we are looking at a new epoch of single player gaming.

Although, the ability to turn it off might not be a bad idea. It certainly would be a good idea to ensure that it could function offline, as servers and networks can come down and such, and if the game sets up this whole concept in a rather invasive way.
 
Sep 14, 2009
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I would sooner cut my ethernet cord than give up single player games..

so nice try, but overall i will refuse to buy games without single player unless it is something along the lines of team fortress 2 (which has single player with bots even)
 

Booze Zombie

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Hmm, funny... in Yahtzee's review of that bodyswapping game it seemed pretty shit when they merged the two. And in my experience, the other players aren't there for you most of the time, anyway.

Nah, I don't buy this.
 

KaWaiiTSuKI

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I honestly doubt that quite a bit.
There are just too many gamers who simply don't like multiplayer games. Myself included.
Now, if you're talking about Demon's Souls where everything's connected... yeah, maybe but that's not really a bad thing. I kinda liked that. Of course, it won't work at all in horror games. Demon's Souls is scary, yes but you can't have that in something like Silent Hill.
Just a thought but I think there are too many aspects of gaming that hinge on the single player experience for them to just drop it.
 

lord.jeff

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This type of thing well become more popular but take over no, it's a very hated idea and limits your target audience to require an internet connection. Really this is just one companies idea of the future.
 

EcoHulk

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*Disconnects console from internet*

Personally I like playing a game solo without some guy coming in and hitting me in the head with a big hammer.
 

NoNameMcgee

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Yeah its my biggest worry about gaming at the moment, despite being a social person, gaming is my alone time. and the kind of people who play games online are generally not the kind of people I like spending time with.

Besides that, online gaming has no purpose, no progression, and no structure outside of MMORPGs (which are all terrible games from my experience) COOP (which I just wish would be singleplayer) and FPS games like COD which give you XP to unlock more things (of which there arent many yet) Even singleplayer with online/social elements just annoys me and gets in the way.

So basically if this happens I'll probably end up ditching my gaming PC, getting a console, and buying/renting about one or two games a year.
 

DustyDrB

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Jan 19, 2010
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The way the fellow in the article describes it, it doesn't sound like a bad thing. It doesn't sound like a good thing either. I really didn't care about the online component of Demon's Souls, but it didn't bother me. It was there and I ignored it mostly.

So if that's the way gaming goes, then fine. I guess some people enjoy it and it won't really affect me (unless it's immersion-breaking crap). Who knows? Maybe something will come along that actually adds to the experience (like a game in which the online community votes and represents an in-game political body).

Of course, most people are going to read this as "All Games Will Be Online Deathmatches bn 2014" (especially with the thread title as it is. The word "traditional" saves it some, but people will still not think about what that word means much). Anyone who really believes that gaming could become that is an idiot. Every game is not going to become Call of Duty, and neither the OP nor the article he links suggest that. That's not a valid fear. It's sensationalist and neglects the fact that companies don't want to all compete for one market while ignoring every other market.
 

ultrachicken

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I don't think this is really the case, or at least it's possible that it isn't. If the upcoming Elder Scrolls, Batman, Bioshock and Deus Ex (to name a few) succeed, then that will be a push backwards, for better or for worse. Even if these games don't affect the industry meaningfully (which is hard to imagine) and we go through a time period of part multiplayer campaigns, I imagine we will eventually reach a point where devs will release games that go back to traditional single player experiences, citing their game's "classic feel," and we'll partially revert if the game is successful.

So long as the multiplayer components remain optional as they were in Demon's Souls, then I don't even care if this does become a required feature. If I got sick of getting invaded or wanted to play the game "pure," I could just unplug the ethernet cable and play it that way.
 

DustyDrB

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Jan 19, 2010
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Dreiko said:
Maybe in the US, Japan won't stop making Jrpgs in 3 years...and that's my main thing.
Well...Demon's Souls is the game referenced in the article. That is a Japanese game, right (though not a JRPG. It's a...RPG from Japan. Damn, we need better nomenclature in gaming).
 

siffty

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kman123 said:
Well then I'll be hanging up gaming altogether in 3 years.
I'll be going along with kman on this, the loss of singal player would give me no reason to play anymore if I have to keep listening to some snot nosed Fuck when I try to enjoy my game time.
 

AtheistConservative

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Mcoffey said:
The most critically acclaimed games for the last few years, -Red Dead Redemption, Fallout 3, and Grand Theft Auto IV- Largely single player games. Most of the GOTY contenders this year -Skyrim, Deus Ex, Batman, L.A. Noire etc- are also focused on a single player experience. Which makes me very skeptical that we'll be seeing them go any time soon.
I absolutely agree that the collapse of pure single player is certainly not going to happen within 3 years.

While I don't like multiplayer in general, including some aspects of it single player would not be an awful idea necessarily. Imagine for instance in Oblivion being able to see builds that your friends have done, especially if you got to "test run" them? Also one of the number one complaints in video games is low quality AI. Even good development companies run into getting AI controlled characters to never act like complete idiots. An obvious solution to this is to have either the players friends or strangers control enemies or friendlies.
 

Sean951

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You keep your multiplayer the hell away from my Zelda! I don't care how much you think ANY form of multiplayer would benefit the game, keep it away. I don't want to play with other people, if I did, I wouldn't be playing Zelda.
 

LittleBlondeGoth

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Mar 24, 2011
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Interesting article.

Hope it's left to gather dust though, I love my single player gaming experience. Stuff other people, I don't like them. I like to do things my way, be engrossed in a story and sod anyone else. When I want multiplayer, I will buy something that is focused on it - I played EQII for five years quite happily. But the sort of games I enjoy in the main, are very much based around just me and my console.

In my opinion, the biggest drawback to having games dependent on this social aspect is what happens after. Say a publisher releases Shooter 1, and you and everyone else are loving it, all socially and everything. Then they release Shooter 2, and suddenly the original game audience dries up as they've all jumped ship to the new game. What if you still want to play the old one? Will your experience be diminished now that the player base is no longer there?

Oh, and other people are often wingnuts. Make that two drawbacks. ;)
 

Manji187

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It feels more like they've decided that this will be the course for the future and are planning to gradually implement it (worst case scenario: shove it down our throats).

I wonder...will they try to make money off of it somehow? Do they expect it to be more profitable? I wouldn't be surprised if ads started to show up during loading and/ or gameplay (as set pieces).