Counter-Editorial: Halo's Not Killing Multiplayer, People Are Just Lazy

By Andy Keener: 2008-11-03 20:23:54

Counter-Editorial: Halo's Not Killing Multiplayer, People Are Just Lazy

Mere hours ago, Assistant Games Editor William Usher unleashed a steaming pile of lies about the negative effect of popular titles like Halo 3 to the online community, stating that they are "killing console multiplayer." My sir, you could not be more wrong. Now, this isn't a "Halo is the greatest game ever made" article, but rather a more in-depth perspective on what should be done if you're ever jonesin' for a round of Blacksite: Area 51.

The chief complaint from the aforementioned article seemed to be that since everybody's playing Halo, nobody's playing the lesser known games. Regardless of it being on Xbox Live or XBConnect, Halo 3 is king. Everybody's playing it; it's the game people play when they're not playing anything else. That, or Call of Duty 4. There's something about these games that everybody decides to fall back to.

Gaming has always been a social hobby. Starting out in bars (a place where people gather), they soon made their way into arcades (another place where people used to gather). Even single-player RPGs, like Final Fantasy, were a substitute for the group sessions of Dungeons and Dragons. Regardless of being competitive (Mario Bros.) or co-operative (Bubble Bobble), games have always pushed gamers to play with others. Why do you think there's a high score on those old Galaga cabinets?

Here's my point: Matchmaking is lazy. Yeah, you heard me. Auto-Matchmaking programs for video games are a lazy person's way of trying to connect with other players. Think back to the days of yesteryear when Goldeneye was the best game ever. How many times did you fire it up and hop online and start playing against random people? What was that? You never did that? Weird, ok. So what about this. How many times did you call your friends over (or work your way over to a friend's house) to get some multiplayer action going? That was the way things were done back in the day, and since then we've grown complacent and lazy.

Now, I'm not saying "get some friends and invite them over" but instead wish to encourage conversations about multiplayer games. If you're reading this, you obviously have access to the internet outside of your consoles, and I'm sure you could find a message board and set up a play-date. I started small with just two other people, but I ended up creating an "Online Gaming" night on one of my forums, and every Sunday, we'd gather and play games together; Halo 2, Bomberman Live, even Big Bumpin got a few plays. We actually had to have separate groups because there were just too many people for one server. Reach out to your fellow gamers, take the initiative. I can guarantee that you're not the only person online who wants to play Chicago Enforcer online (ok, maybe you are.)

Another issue is that most multiplayer sucks. Not even sticking with the first-person shooters, but most multiplayers are cheap, tacked on bullet points for the back of the box. There's nothing about them that makes them special. I'm sure Fatal Inertia is a fun game in multiplayer, but so is Burnout Paradise, and the options for that are much more open. The reason Call of Duty 4 and Burnout Paradise and Halo 3 are still played today is that the developers took the time to focus on the multiplayer. With games nowadays, gamers play through the story/campaign once, then want to play with other people. If the tail-end of your product sucks, nobody's going to keep with it. I've played a lot of multiplayer in my day, and I honestly can't distinguish most of them from each other. They're just all so similar.

So make some connections with other gamers, and tell developers to get off their lazy asses and figure out if they want their multiplayer to be memorable. I think Halo's an easy scapegoat for people to target; it's popular. It's obvious that people aren't playing other games because of it. But maybe if we had a reason to play the other games, be it friends wanting to try something new, or developers making them fun, we would. Now excuse me, I have to go grief some people in Call of Duty 4. So who's right? Is Halo killing the console multiplayer for everybody else, or should people try to find new games? Be sure to let us know in the forums, and tune in to Blend Games for all the latest in gaming news.

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