gaming in person VS online gaming

[MrPopo]

That's one of the nice things about the standard PC dedicated server model like how most FPS's use. Each server is an independent entity (though many games had a central repository of known cheaters) and could have as few or as many admins as needed to keep things clean. On a good server you'd usually have one admin on at any given time, so if someone is being a douchenozzle he'd get banned quickly. With the console multiplayer model it's all up to a central authority to keep the servers clean, and they're just always going to be slower. They operate in waves of mass banning instead of removing individual infractions as they occur.

[MidnightRider]

Reasons like that keep me mostly offline. That and the fact that while Nintendo can ban cheaters, cheaters can use codes to un-ban themselves and continue to f-around (so glad there's no voice chat). My wife and I play Mario Kart Wii online together sometimes and it's fun but it's obvious when someone is cheating when you see 100 blue shells etc start to fly before the '321start' has commenced. We just play to do as good as we can and have fun while not caring about the racing score.

So with the cheaters outdoing the companies that run the online service and rage-anger-psycho-venting players, I'll stick with local play. It's nice having friends come over, having pizza & cokes, having a mini-tournament, and just trying to have fun with people you know and like, make in-person gaming much, much better and appealing overall.

I'm pretty much an antisocial solo player, but I wouldn't have any complaints if someone wanted to do some multiplayer offline over here. Still, I've never been a challenge seeker, so I've never had any problems with cheating, in 1 player mode. I'd never brag about kicking the games ass if I did either, but I'm not a terribly patient person, so if I have to see the games ending, or finally get past that one boss.... Still I'd like to think I'd have a hell of a lot more sense than to use cheats for multiplayer. This isn't you vs. cheap ass PC/AI/whatever you'd call it, it's against other players to see how well you stack up. I think I could lose rather gracefully to another person, since competitions is never about seeing the end of the game or anything.

Hell, things like that make me kind of afraid to try to do any online action coop, as years of playing RPGs/adventure games(which I've since severely burned out on) have really dulled the hell out of my action gaming skills, and I wouldn't want to slow the group down in a coop beat em up or something.

1 on 1 fighting is not something I've ever really gotten into, but I'd at least earn my ass whooping if I did any multiplayer. That'd be bull if I was supposed to be getting my ass handed to me, and I had an invincibility code on or something.

Generally if I do cheat though, it'd be to mess around with the games mechanics anyway, which can actually ADD to the challenge (love the no TKO code for Mike Tysons Punch-Out!, though you have to turn it off for Bald Bull, because he never stays down, and you will still TKO Von Kaiser).

Anyway, I would definitely rather have a person here if I was gonna bother with multiplayer at all.

[fastbilly1]

I am probably in the minority in this situation. Like most gamers my age, I grew up playing at friends houses and the arcade. But as soon as I got a chance to play Descent online I became a hardcore believer in the online only multiplayer model. I bought several pc games solely to play online – ie Command and Conquer: Sole Survivor. And while I do love Goldeneye and played it far more than I am willing to admit, I did play a lot of Red Alert, Total Annihilation, Jedi Knight, and Outlaws online. When I was in college I use to play TFC for hours on end on the connection – going from a baud modem to a full 10 meg was just awesome.

I joined the same club that Ack spoke of and it was inherently a lanparty every Friday. I had only attended a few lan parties prior and was smitten. Once I graduated college I had trouble playing online with strangers. I missed the yelling out to people on the other side of the room option of communication, among other things. Voice chat has helped but it just isnt the same. Multiplayer gaming itself hasn’t been the same.

Sure I still play the occasional game online, but its just not the same. I mean when I tried to play UT2k4 online recently I got booted from a server for telefragging with the translocator – thats a valid tactic where I come from. I guess the acceptation and development of wild tactics for a few years is more of a problem when playing pubs.

And Im not goign to get started on MMOs - ruined several of my friends lives.

[(-_-)]

A+ topic!

For all this technology that is supposed to connect us, it distances us in some ways too. I was thinking earlier today about making a cell phone call, but I didn't want to spend the minutes. The cell phone has made it so the only friends I call are ones in my T-mobile "favorites" that won't cost me extra money. I try to use the minutes wisely so I don't go over.

I have yet to create a facebook account. Perhaps I'm stubborn. In the meantime, my friends have shifted most of their social dialogue to the world of facebook. I'm now effectively ostracized because I won't join, yet they don't have much real face-to-face contact anymore because they spend too much time on facebook.

It's weird to me. Both of these technologies are supposed to facilitate social communication, but they seem to get in the way somewhat. Likewise with the online multiplayer. It's nice for keeping in touch with friends in other states/countries or friends that are just online friends, but it is no substitute for hanging out on the couch, eating pizza, drinking mountain dew, and playing games side by side with real-life trash talking and arm punching.

Social technologies seem to be making us less social, at least in the traditional sense of the word.

I'm in the same kind of a situation. I feel that friends are the people who I physically keep in contact with. The people who put just as much effort in the relationship as I do. The people who will call you up to go out for a burger because they're bored, play some hockey, or video games. I have a facebook account but I've logged on maybe once a yera since it has been created. I don't feel comfortable investing time in people I don't care about, or relationships that don't mean anything. I miss out on a lot of stuff that happens because I"m never invited or no one tells me. The reply is always "really? the info was all up on facebook." It feels like a lot of people I meet in university are really uncomfortable with hanging out in real life untill they've invested a significant amount of time doing so in facebook first.

[wip3outguy7]

My challenge to everyone:

Get together with some friends this coming weekend and game in person. It doesn't matter what you guys are playing as long as it is in person and not online. Disconnect from XBL/PSN, put down the headsets and get cramped. You have a week to put something together. Go.

...and then come back and tell us about it.

[MrPopo]

My challenge to everyone:

Get together with some friends this coming weekend and game in person. It doesn't matter what you guys are playing as long as it is in person and not online. Disconnect from XBL/PSN, put down the headsets and get cramped. You have a week to put something together. Go.

...and then come back and tell us about it.

Beat ya to it. Yesterday we had a TF2 LAN party. We had 11 people from 11:00 - 7:30, then 7 people from 7:30 to 9:00, when we broke. The teams ended up being pretty even too, which was nice. Usually what's happened with past LAN parties with this group is me and my coworker Lynn (who's my in to the group) are the two best people with the LAN host being the third (but noticably worse than us). But now we had a new guy who played on the host's team, letting me and Lynn play together. Giving them the 6th player was enough to balance things really well.

I was also the source of much cursing from the other team. The first thing we did was me and Lynn both went Medic with regular mediguns and Ubersaws. For those not not familiar with TF2, the medic's standard medigun has a meter that fills as he's healing. When it reaches 100% he can make himself and his target invincible for 8 seconds. The Ubersaw is an unlockable melee weapon that instantly fills your meter up 25% when you hit someone with it. So here's what we did; we both built up our meter to 100% during the setup. Then we ran out the gate and Lynn ubered me. I ran around with my ubersaw nailing the opposing team while they could do nothing. This cleared them out of the initial area. The invul wore off and we ran to their spawn. I then popped my uber on Lynn and he started nailing the opposing team with his ubersaw. By the time my uber wore off he had a full charge, so he turned and ubered me. You can see where this is going. We proceeded to spawn camp them while our team completed the mission objective. Now, for those who haven't played TF2, this is very beatable. The pyro can use his air blast to push us back, preventing us from hitting anyone. Or they could have just ran back to their base and wait out the 8 seconds (the spawns are locked so only people on the same team can get in). The second time we did this the tactic was summarily banned from the LAN.

The other thing I did to get people pissed at me (but in a good natured way) was running spy. I was able to use my disguise and cloak to continuously backstab the enemy team over and over. I nailed so many medics and heavies which completely blunted their attacks and defences. It was great. What helped was the poorer players on their team didn't really understand the concept of spychecking, while their good players kept playing classes who couldn't spycheck well (but they were good classes for meeting the objectives).

[MrEco]

I'm sorry but there's just two sides to the coin. Heads - People who prefer local multiplayer and are disappointed when a game comes out that doesn't have split screen, and tails - people who prefer online multiplayer and are disappointed when a game comes out that only has split screen. I personally don't have many friends because I'm a somewhat shy/emotionally-withdrawn/pessimistic person. The few friends I do have all have work and school and household chores to take care of. I am in the same case as them and therefor the little time we get to spend gaming isn't enough to go over to each others houses. In fact our schedules rarely match up enough for us to play online together let alone offline.

It happens. Deal with it.

Regardless of all that, how am I suppose to spend time playing split-screen if developers don't make games that support split screen? Yes some modern day games support split screen, but just because a game has split screen doesn't mean I think the game is fun enough to bother playing it. So that decreases the number further. And just because a few games I happen to like support split screen doesn't mean my friends are going to necessarily like them. That decreases the number even further. So on and so forth and eventually you're left with a very, very, small list of games. And even those games eventually are no longer fun for at least one party involved simply from having played it so much.

It's really a terrible shame but when the only alternative is having easy access to fun online multiplayer content with random strangers I'm not gonna spend my time whining about it and instead will be busy playing some online deathmatch or getting knocked off of a ledge by Maneater for the twelfth time.

[GSZX1337]

My challenge to everyone:

Get together with some friends this coming weekend and game in person. It doesn't matter what you guys are playing as long as it is in person and not online. Disconnect from XBL/PSN, put down the headsets and get cramped. You have a week to put something together. Go.

...and then come back and tell us about it.

Guess I already failed.

[Bradtemple87]

I miss the arcades!

[wip3outguy7]

So what happened? Did anyone get together and game? Sadly, I failed. LOL

I miss the arcades!

Amen, brother. Amen.