430°

Why can't developers get multiplayer gaming right?

Dualshockers: Online multi-player gaming has, for me, completely eclipsed the single player experience so much so that it takes a rare gem such as God of War 3 to pull me away from my buddies on the virtual battlefield. That said, nearly every multi-player game I play has some kind of bizarre aspect built into it for no apparent reason other than to make it a pain in the ass to enjoy. Now I’m not talking about game-play mechanics here or unbalanced maps. I’m talking about design choices built into the multi-player setup – let’s look at some examples.

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tdogchristy905027d ago

they had it right a long time ago. O the days of golden eye and halo 2. The days when you could play online and or splitscreen with your buddies. If anything they just kind of pushed it too far, mucked up the water persay. KISS, keep is simple stupid.

Chadness5027d ago

I agree. I think part of the problem is getting away from split screen and focusing too much on online aspects. Not that there is anything wrong with that in and of itself, but I long for the days of people actually wanting to get together with friends in the same room for a night of Golden Eye.

Perjoss5027d ago

devs are too stubborn to copy Halo matchmaking, this is why they are failing. To this day you can log onto a Halo3 game as a noob and play against other noobs, instead of getting mowed down by veterans.

Winter47th5027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

Matchmaking is the worst thing that ever happened to online gaming. I'd take a server browser + filters any day of the week and twice on Sundays.

Lich1205027d ago

@Winter

I completely agree, I don't know why they feel the need to add matchmaking to games... Gears 1 had a better system than Gears 2. Let me pick my gametype, don't assign me to one vaguely similar to the one I actually want.

ECM0NEY5027d ago

Agreed Winter. Gears 3 better have a server filter like 1.

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Hitman07695027d ago

I'm gonna go ahead and say online gaming rules. Party systems have really been a serious let down for a long time now and these are some prime examples of game design gone horribly wrong in this particular feature set. Why would you ever create a game with so many players as 16, 32, or even 256 and then limit the parties to groups of 4, 8, etc?

I am totally 100% with Rob on this one. It really is not rocket science to have bigger amounts of friends joining up together, it has been going on in the PC gaming world for longer than online gaming has existed in the console realm.

Looks to me like maybe everyone is playing catch-up still to the old concepts...

Ninferno5027d ago

KISS... my teachers used to use that on me, but i agree... just keep it simple.

DarkSpawnClone5027d ago

Eww, you're teachers use to kiss you ?..wtf.

IaMs125027d ago

Hey i wouldnt complain if some of my (Girl) teachers kissed me :)

PopEmUp5026d ago

that some after school kiss :P

DA_SHREDDER5027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

I think MAG has the best online for fps on consoles, but most of you guys are so blind for your love of COD and Bad Company that you guys have yet to realize the answer is right before your eyes. Sver 4 life!

Nicaragua5027d ago

You clearly didnt read the article. Its not talking about which is the best FPS and for what it is talking about then MAG is one of the worst offenders.

Trroy5027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

MAG has a clan system coming in like a month.

And the VAST majority of MAG players are NOT affiliated with clans at all -- so 8-man squads WAS a good idea.

Honestly, the game's biggest flaw is the lack of a "just you and your buds" chat channel. The rest of the game is really fun, IMO. The clan support, although it will be cool when it comes (and it is coming soon -- they talk about it all the time on the MAG boards), will still not address the buddy chat issue.

Yeah... that's not a feature in any other game either. MAG could have been an even more phenominal MP shooter with it, however.

Chewy1025027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

Zipper is working on upping the group limit in the next patch or 2 when clan wars come. (damn Trroy beat me to it)

Id also like to put out that neutral maps are coming in SUP and SABO soon (the 64 player modes). Zipper tested them last night by making the SABO maps neutral for a few hours. You should have see the forums when they slipped that in without telling anyone.

RedDead5027d ago

I don't think the shooting mechanics are great compared to KZ or Cod

Nicaragua5027d ago

Wow, thats just great! As long as they are just "talking" about upping the limit just 6 months after launch...well if I had only known that i would have kept my mouth shut! Hopefully it will be part of a DLC pack that i will have to pay for - YIPPEEE !!!

God forbid that they just include these features at launch - thanks for sharing this great bit of news.

Garnett5027d ago

MAG is awful, just because its exclusive to the Trey doesnt make it better than Too human.

Both are isht!

Chewy1025027d ago

I agree that the 8 man limit on groups was a bad move in MAG and it needed to be 32 max. But why the hell did you have to respond like a total ass and bring DLC into this? There is no why Zipper is going to charge for the clan wars or upping the group limit. They said it on their forums and (I think) in one or two of the Zipline podcasts.

Also the way Zipper does DLC in MAG isn't like most other games. Most other games you only download the DLC if you buy it. In Mag you download the DLC in the patches/updates and you get an unlock code from the store. Just like MGO.

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Blaze9295027d ago

They are the only ones who get this multiplayer stuff right especially with TrueSkill:

http://research.microsoft.c...

"TrueSkill is a Bayesian ranking algorithm developed by Microsoft Research and used in the Xbox matchmaking system built to address some perceived flaws in the Elo rating system."

Bungie is only taking it to the next level with Halo Reach and it's multiplayer innovations, UI, and matchmaking. With them, it actually WORKS.

On a second note, is this an Xbox LIVE exclusive feature or something? It's damn awesome and more games need to use it.

gamerzBEreal175027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

the next level with halo reach? by doing what adding sprint? better graphics? jet packs? how will they raise the bar next? aiming? xD /sarcasm

PirateThom5027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

TrueSkill is amazing in theory, at the end of the day, you're still matched to whoever happens to be waiting in a lobby. It may filter it more, but you're still going to have a mix of good and bad players every game... the theory behind it is fantastic though, it just needs to be applied more heavily for players who do want a similar skill challenge, which is undone entirely by matchmaking anyway.

Lich1205027d ago

I hate trueskill (not really, but kinda). Let me tell you why.

I loved Halo 3 while I was in the low levels. Getting a steak dinner every team deathmatch is tons of fun. Sure enough, after I ranked up a bit (high 40's) I found that I'd hit my skill cap. That is to say, I had to fight with everything I had to pull out a win. Im not a great halo player after all. I was glad when they reset the rankings so I could relax for awhile.

It gets stressful having to actually try every game, sometimes you want to just relax and play some people that are terrible.

pustulio5026d ago

TrueSkill is retarded.

Me and a bud where both 49's in Team Doubles we won 48 matches, Fourty Fucking Eight! and we never went up to 50 then we lost one against two 50's and we went down to 48.

I will always remember that day, it was a kick in the nuts. Hard one.

Marquis_de_Sade5026d ago (Edited 5026d ago )

Lich, that's the single most idiotic comment I have seen on this site. If you want to chill out and trash people, then just play unranked games, to complain about TruSkill putting you in a game where you have to actually try to win is plain stupid, that's what it does, match you with others of a similar skill range.

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dinkeldinkse5027d ago

Bubble for the picture of my hero George Patton.

mantisimo5027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

until uncharted 2 and love it, there's rarely a problem with the servers, the players are well balanced and I think its great fun, could do with a couple of new maps now though.

WLPowell5027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

I hate being grouped with level 40-pluses from foreign countries who don't know how to play coop!!! Voice chat or not you're screwed at that point.

It's funny because a lot of matchmaking MP games are trying REAL hard to basically be the lobby system by giving all these extra "preference" selections. Just be the Lobby system and work like it used to.

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Nicaragua5027d ago

I just think that somewhere in the complexity of squads and parties and all that crap they have skipped the part where they just make a simply intuitive multiplayer setup.

What the hell was wrong with just picking a server from a list and then joining a game? Why am i being forced to play with guys from Bangladesh just because the matchmaking wants me to ?

Multiplayer needs to go back to basics, the PC had it right.

Games4M - Rob5027d ago

Totally agree. I got into gaming playiing Counterstrike a looooong time ago and the system of just picking a game works fine.

Party systems are all well and good but they should exist as a supplement to a server list, not instead of.

LiquifiedArt5027d ago

Lobbies are NOT the answer to "Intuitive" multiplayer designers.
Wrapping it into a party/matchmaking system is far more streamlined for the average user.

I will agree that Lobbies give more fidelity to MP options, but its really for the serious gamers, not the average gamer/casual gamer.

Games4M - Rob5027d ago

Then surely the best option is to have both in order to keep everyone happy ?

Party up systems are fine but when they put a limit on the number of friends you can play with then where is the benefit? Its not like casual players only have 4 friends.

Nuclearwinter5027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

The things I hate most about online gaming are matchmaking instead server lists and lobbies, and open mics. With matchmaking you really can't pick what maps you play, or who you play with. Its the reason I got rid of COD4 for PS3, and got the PC version instead. I was tired of playing with random people, who cough and have all sorts of ambient noises in their mics, and then if the host left that was it game over. With the PC version I could play on the same server, with same group of people, on the maps I wanted to play, with the rule mods I wanted to play with, and with up to 30 or more players. With the console version I all I got to pick was the gametype. This is also the reason why I just didn't buy CODMW2 at all.

And You really think the average gamer can't navigate through a list of servers and pick the one with the most players by the map they want to play?

dragonelite5027d ago

One way dedis are awesome if the community themselfes can make them on consoles.
But take for example EA Bad company 2 had for a long server problems we as buyers can't shit about it. And when the next big EA shooter comes out we need to hope they dont butcher the server of their other games. I believe with BF1943 the took the some BC1 server to accommodate the people playing.

We had a solution for getting user created dedicated server with section 8 but that game bombed. Hope for next gen we could use the 360 and ps 3 as dedicated server we can use i would pay $10/year to get that option.

JoelT5027d ago

that actually works. Casuals with casuals, elites with elites, and average players against.. you guessed it, average players.

Bungie is the only team to truly get this right and it started with Halo 2. The game had splitscreen, system link, and Trueskill matchmaking.

But because it is a MS title, here come the disagrees. lol

Hitman07695027d ago

I like the ideas of a much better matchmaking system like Trueskill or Uncharted 2's attempt at such.

But really there is no point in giving me a good matchmaking system if I can't play with my friends properly! I don't buy games to run in solo, but yes we need matchmaking improvements too it's getting ridiculous (i'm looking at you MW2).

Games4M - Rob5027d ago

I totally agree that trueskill was a good matchmaking system but i dont really have that much of an issue with any matchmaking system just as long a it dosnt limit who i can play with.

T9X695027d ago

Matchmaking sucks balls, SOCOM's lobby system is where its at.

MikeTyson5027d ago

I agree, where you actually pick your match like mgo. Course their is quick match in confrontation :P

Blackfrican5027d ago

Here is a list of all games with a better matchmaking system than halo 2:

-Halo 3

Like the games or not, the entire multiplayer feature set in their games are unparalleled. And most importantly, they work...always!

Independent_Charles5027d ago

and thats the truth halo had over a million people playing at one point last week and not a hitch, and the servers are upgraded as of last week. there now on halo reach servers.

Christopher5027d ago

If they were to combine TrueSkill with your friend's list... it would be perfect. I remember the old days of going to a friend's house, playing SF2 on the SNES and no matter that one of us almost never lost a match we still kept playing each other because we were playing with the people we enjoyed playing with the most.

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Hitman07695027d ago

MAG was the worst offender. Talk about a let-down:

http://dualshockers.com/201...

DoucheVader5026d ago

95% of the people that rag on MAG only played the BETA.

So their opinion isn't a very well informed one.

chak_5027d ago (Edited 5027d ago )

Dice got multiplayer gaming right

with BF1942/2/2142

Then they scraped SDK and added DLC, it's now all fucked up.
I'm 99% sure BC2 won't live as long as BF2.

And valve got it too with TF2

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140°

Ranking the Devil May Cry Series

VGChartz's Mark Nielsen: "Upon finally finishing Devil May Cry 5 recently - after it spent several years on my “I’ll play that soon” list - I considered giving it a fittingly-named Late Look article. However, considering that this was indeed the final piece I was missing in the DMC puzzle, I decided to instead take this opportunity to take a look back at the entirety of this genre-defining series and rank the entries. What also made this a particularly tempting notion was that while most high-profile series have developed fairly evenly over time, with a few bumps on the road, the history of Devil May Cry has, at least in my eyes, been an absolute roller coaster, with everything from total disasters to action game gold."

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VersusDMC3h ago

First to last for me...3,4,5,1,2.

VersusDMC1h ago

Me leaving it out should be telling of my thoughts on it. Better than 2 as a DMC game.

Still a good game though.

Friendlygamer2h ago

3,1,4,5 to me, never played 2. 5 gameplay is amazing but level design was really disappointing to me, just a bunch of plain arenas, the story felt like a worse written rehash of the 3rd and the charater models looked weird ( specially the ladies ). Another problem with 5 was that there was not enough content for 3 charaters so I could never really familiarize with any of them

monkey6022h ago(Edited 2h ago)

2.
Dmc.
4.
5.
1.
3.

God DMC2 was an awful game.
And in case this isn't obvious it goes worst to best

Yui_Suzumiya20m ago

1 and DmC. The rest are unimportant.

DarXyde13m ago

Order changes depending on your focus. I tend to focus on gameplay/fun factor, so...

5, 3, 1, 4, 2.

I really didn't like 4 but commend Dante's weapon diversity. The retreading of old ground was pretty unacceptable to me.

But even then... Still more enjoyable than 2 for me

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