I Hate Single Player Games
Posted March 7th, 2008 by Gaston
First off, let me say that it's great to be back. I'm not harboring any delusions that the site is currently operating at our most lofty expectations, but it's still a good place to be and it's only getting better. So let's get down to business: I hate single player games.
They are just intolerable to me. At an EB recently (acronym: Enormous Buttholes, lol), I perused through the ever-diminishing PC games cart. Much to my surprise I came across a mini-bioware section. Staring me in the face were Baldur's Gate 2, Neverwinter Nights, and SW:KotoR (Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic to everyone with girlfriends), all sitting next to each other in alphabetical order. The thought creeped into my mind that maybe EB had gotten its stuff together, but then I just figured that some nerd had come through and organized the shelf himself.
But I digress. Rearin' to go, I bought all three titles for $19.99 each and crammed the disks into my CD-RW. For the purposes of geeky nostalgia (and physical proximity) I decided to fire up Baldur's Gate first. After fifteen minutes of tweaking, my player-character is born:
Name: Gandalfo (slick, no naming restrictions)
Class: Sorceror (because I played one the first time around and the pwnge was epic)
Race: Half-Elf (because I'm indecisive)
Alignment: Lawful/Neutral (because I'm a huge wuss when I talk to NPCs)
Alright, intro movie slide show; not a problem, nostalgia still holding. Nice, my character is locked in a dungeon and has to fight his way out. Alright, my party is captured in the cells around me and I have to free them first. Hmmm, freeing them involves engaging them in lengthy conversations.
After about ten minutes of clicking through random dialog trees, I decide to try something new. I fire up KotoR and twenty minutes later I'm on to Neverwinter.
A half hour later and I'm queued for AV.
So what's wrong with me? The aforementioned are all fantastic games. In my gaming hall of fame I would place these titles on the visitor's brochure. But for one reason or another, I can't stand them today. And I really don't think it's because I played through them several years ago, they're just lacking something.
Apparently I'm not alone in my disdain. A study conducted recently at Syracuse University, concluded that people would rather play an extremely crappy MMORPG, than play an extremely good RPG. The study also showed that people who play MMOs look like the Wood Elves in the Lord of the Rings cartoon.
I'm not sure why I find MMOs so much more entertaining. Perhaps, like Leslie Banks, I find humans to be the most dangerous game. Single player games of Battlefield 2 have always yielded fields full of enemy soldiers that don't move as I come within two feet with a rocket launcher. I also don't get much satisfaction from crouching on their faces after I ace them with my Glock.
Sitting in a single player game for more than ten seconds makes my skin crawl. I start getting antsy. Turning on the t.v. will alleviate my anxiety for a few minutes, but it isn't long before I start feeling unproductive.
Great, now I'm feeling unproductive when I'm not playing WoW.
But I don't think that productivity is really the - only - reason for my addiction to MMOs. In KotoR I looted a drone that had a pretty nice gun on it. After about 3 seconds of joy, I realized that there was nothing that would stop me from punching in a code that would open up every weapon in the game to my level one pudu smuggler.
There's no real sense of achievement here. Epic weapons go completely un-adored by passing players. I can't lawl at the abortion debate going on over general chat. There's no one to arbitrarily kick me from a PuG mid-dungeon. As annoying, unkind, or sophomoric they can be, people are what make MMOs great. Even at its worst, humanity proves to be an entertaining distraction. Don't believe me? Imagine grinding motes for six hours in a single player game.
There are still single player games that I will regularly play, but after close analysis (read: 4 beers), I realize that there are distinct reasons that I play them. I have found that a good way to increase my play time is to play games that my wife and I both enjoy. Ahhh, but if I play them with my wife, does that not make them multi-player games?
I also love rocking out to Guitar Hero 3 in my parent's basement. Yes, I know that Guitar Hero 3 has multiplayer, but I will play this game by myself because it is the only way to channel the spirit of David Coverdale. And I don't want to look like an idiot at local competitions.
I am not so ignorant as to state that I will never play a single-player game again. I fully intend to play any games that come out that receive a global score of Cramazing. But in the interim, I will always be looking for the next online game to feed my pathetic addiction.
I started felt the same way after playing WoW for a few years.
It's like, single player games have no real point to me anymore... You beat it, and you're done...you can't go Pvp with all the stuff you spent so long to get, it just goes back on the shelf.
I agree with most of what has been said, I would jus tlike to add something. I play single player games more for the story and less for unlocks (there are exceptions to this rule, for example I absolutely love Ape Escape series and I can tell you now I don't catch monkeys for the story). If the story is amazing to me then the game feels more like a movie or a really good book to me and I just can't put it down. People can say that MMOs have decent stories but its just not the reason why I play them. Because I play single player games for the story they have almost no replay value to me, so when it's done it's done. I would have to agree in the end though multiplayer games just hold my attention for way, way longer.
I find this especially annoying, as I hate single women!
lol @ ape escape. we call it "Saru Getchyu" in japan and i LOVE the series. it's pleasantly playable, and doesn't punish you for wanting to play. it's an honestly fun platformer with the focus on fun and exloring the world they've created. i had totally forgotten about it until reading your comment.
i feel the same way about playing an RPG or whatever in the single-player vein now. there's no "point" to doing it, if no one else can bask in the benefits. at the same time, i find spam linking items in-game to be annoying in WoW, wether guild chat or trade.
i think the biggest draw for me with MMOs is that it's the most glorified expression of a Co-Op game there is.
Problem with MMO's - Story goes nowhere, no real 'epic' adventure as you can do the same thing over and over again. no real satisfaction since to quote Arthas 'Does anybody stay dead anymore?' ((I like killing the guy and never having too see him again))Good thing is with LOTRO when you had to kill somebody importent you went into a instance. So you didnt ever see them again, What WoW needs is to let the story progress...Not add new area's but to actually show a change in the way the war is going by all the stuff that the players are doing.
Problem with SP/RPG - Story ends, you replay and the story is pretty much the same until the last 2 levels of gameplay (like KOTOR) and replayability dies due to simply knowing everything about the darn story. KOTOR also made Light and Darkside influence pointless since you get to pick your side at the end anyway, Oblivion i got bored of because they was no real feel of a 'change' like Kvatch keeps burning for months and months even during constant rain.
((Yeah i know, bit of a novel comment. But i have little else to do atm))
I agree entirely with what you have said. I've recently started playing the classics that I haven't played the first time around - Half Life, Doom, things like that (mostly FPS games). I dont really feel interested in playing for any other reason than just beating the game and advancing a level. Cutscenes are important to make the game feel like its still important, but when I go more than an hour with the same old fighting action, I'm totally bored. I've played the single player of somewhere around 30-40 games, and only a few have actually enthralled me enough: Red Alert, Madden, and surprisingly Halo. The ones with a more immersive story or diverse facets of gameplay usually are the most interesting.
Still, hands down, facing other people and playing multiplayer is a far more rewarding experience. No AI or computer bot can match that. Teamwork and cooperation makes a game really fun.
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