Five 2013 Games Ruined by Multiplayer

David Jagneaux of TheKoalition.com writes:
First of all: we know these games are not out yet and we have not played them. We cannot say with certainty that the multiplayer aspects will “ruin” them, but our informed opinions and personal insight into the industry seem to paint a rather grim image. Hopefully we are wrong, but if not: we told you so.

Multiplayer sure is a hot-button issue these days. Sure, you could argue that a lot of developers have separate teams working on each mode, or that “more content is good content” – but at what cost? While it may on its face seem like developers are deciding to give gamers more bang for their buck, you have to wonder what are the sacrifices they made in that process? The list you find below isn’t designed to say any of these games will be bad games, necessarily, but it is designed to say that these games are looking to be negatively affected because of the decision to include multiplayer.

[rbailey]

Interesting opinions. I'm curious to know what everyone else thinks

[Abash]

The God of War: Ascension beta proved that the online was well done and is a great addition to the series. The game wasn't ruined at all by it

[pixelsword]

The key was they didn't get too "god of warsey" in the multiplayer.

[iChii]

Exactly. I was one of the people that said God of War with Multiplayer? Come on, really?- Level 19 on a single day of the beta.. It's that good. Now the real disappointment is in Dead Space 3.. I swear I'll never forget EA if they ruin my favorite horror franchise just to add a f*cking co-op.

[Ezz2013]

most sites and most ps3 owners loved GOWA MP
it very well done and amazing
the dude who made that article have no idea what he's talking about
and his time machine is broken

[Skips]

Pretty much, the beta has like a 4.9 out of 5 rating on PSN. lol

Pretty much every preview I've seen has been very positive.

[Lord_Sloth]

I think it's ignorant to say these games (none of which are out at all) were ruined by Multi-player.

[jrbeerman11]

Thank you, i thought that was a little presumptuous.

[Majin-vegeta]

GOW:Ascension muli is actually fun and it does not feel tacked on like 99.9% of the other games.

[MysticStrummer]

Breaking news from the future...

[ChocolateGiddyUp]

"It's time we look into the future...all the way to the year 2000..."

Apparently Tomb Raider's single and multi-player are being worked on by two completely different studios, so there shouldn't be any potential for game-ruinage there.

[Y_5150]

But really you've seen the multiplayer? It doesn't look too well to me. I'm guessing two seperate teams are working one it but the MP team had way less time crafting out the multiplayer.

[Kurt Russell]

It looks a bit ropey, but it had some fun looking elements. As long as the single player isn't effected then I have no problem with it.

[jrbeerman11]

Max Payne 3 had multiplayer that I never touched and I thought the game was brilliant

[Heisenburger]

Great Scott!

Any day with a Back to the Future reference is a good day for me.

[InTheLab]

" we know these games are not out yet and we have not played them."

Yeah...I don't know what to make of this. I know it's possible to look at a game and tell whether it's your type of game or not but this....is a step too many over the line. I can't even read the rest of it...

[Riderz1337]

Change title to " Five 2013 games ruined by multiplayer which we HAVEN'T EVEN PLAYED YET"

Jesus Christ you people never cease to amaze me.

[BanBrother]

*cease

The article is kind of pointless, granted, but they are going by what they have seen. It is more of a filler article, as nothing is happening lately....... *crickets

I know in the article they mentioned their reasons, but I still had to laugh when I first saw the mention of The Elder Scrolls Online. Like saying Planetside 2 was ruined by MP lol.

The list is more speculation to start a discussion, that is at least what I interpreted it (try saying those 2 words together 5 times lol) as, and should be treated as such. I myself am probably only going to get GOW:A from that list, and I'm happy as long as the single-player can fill my hack 'n slash needs.

[Ezz2013]

this site just want to downplay god of war ascension before
it even come out
and they even lied about playing it in this article
but the users cought them
http://thekoalition.com/201...

" The mode we played was a 3 vs. 3 arena brawler where players fought to take control of the map and brutally annihilate a large titan who looms in the background. Unlike Gary, I actually enjoyed my time spent with Ascensions multiplayer however I still feel conflicted about its longterm viability."

those guys didn't even play the game
because if they did
they would know it's 4 vs. 4 not 3 vs. 3
this no name site is just looking for hits

[Blastoise]

I have complete faith in God of war Ascension. Something tell's me it's just gonna be epic

[shivvy24]

i havent seen sp , but i know its gonna be epic ! its santa monica studios man !!

[omi25p]

How do we know they are ruined.

[JasonXS12]

You can't say shit about a game's multiplayer until you've actually experienced it yourself. Coop to me for Dead Space was something long overdue. They should've replaced Dead Space 2's multi with coop. Nothing can be said about Elder Scrolls because practically nothing has been shown yet.

[Tontus]

I hate sites that feel that HAVE to slag off the multiplayer in God of War: Ascension just because they assume that gamers don't want to like it and that it's just to make more money. God of War was always huge before multiplayer so more money isn't the motive, we're paying the same price as usual for a God of War game but thanks to the new multiplayer component we have something to possibly sink 100's of hours into and finally be able to play with friends and socialise with the huge & incredible God of War fanbase.

I rarely see anyone dislike the beta, the overwhelming majority love the beta and if you consider the fact that it is just a beta and that the final game will be more balanced, polished and content packed then it's going to be an amazing addition to the God of War series.

Also, just to inform the uninformed, Sony Santa Monica had around 80 developers who made God of War III, after that was a HUGE success they grew massively to around 200 people. They split the team in half and have 100 people working on a new IP directed by Stig Asmussen for the PS4 and then have 80 working on the single player which ensures the campaign will be just as amazing as ever and have 20 developers dedicated to making the multiplayer awesome. The multiplayer will NOT ruin the single player AT ALL.

[vikingland1]

I don't play MP because I'm usually awfull at it. As long as the SP is fantastic I guess MP is ok to add on for people that do like MP.

[shivvy24]

yea same i dont play sp , i love the good old SP experience

[OC_MurphysLaw]

Won't even bother to read... you titke the article like its fact (for site hits) and proceed to tell us you dont really know but your 'informed' opinions should be enough apparently. And what kind of credentials do you really have beyond "we play games"?

[porkChop]

I understand Tomb Raider and Dragon Age. But GoW: Ascension's mp is great. And Elder Scrolls Online just makes sense really, it has a lot of potential. Not every game needs multiplayer, a lot don't, but for some games it just makes so much sense.

[isarai]

Kinda hard to say they are ruined when you haven't even played them yet, when they showed just sp of these games people weren't any less excited, it looked great, up to par if not better than what we were expecting. so how about you wait till you play the full game to make that jusgement

[SephirothItachi-]

You can't judge a game if you have not already played through all of it. So don't go calling out games and saying they've already been ruined by multiplayer. You can say that you think they'll be terrible, but people thought Uncharted 2 was gonna have terrible multiplayer but I will defend that online portion forever. I loved it.

[Roccetarius]

Tomb Raider, Dead Space 3 and Dragon Age 3 will be bargain bins for me. I have no faith whatsoever left in those games.

[mt]

I knew god of war would be there without opening the link, actually the beta is fun despite the fact that I got my a$$ kicked many times in the multiplayer. I don't it will affect the others as well.

[Coach_McGuirk]

yep, some people don't want to find out how bad they are at their game compared to others.

[icecoldfire]

''Yes, I know: the game has to have multiplayer because it is an MMO. Clearly, I know this. However, I want to talk about what transferring the Elder Scrolls world into a multiplayer setting will do to the series as a whole (hint: I think it ruins it.) People have been asking Bethesda to include coop in a main-series Elder Scrolls game for years, for good reason. You can already have companions and it would be fun to adventure throughout Tamriel with a real-life friend. However, an MMO is far different than “including coop” in a game. This is changing the underlying notions of the game itself.

First of all, Elder Scrolls games are so great because they let you do whatever you want. Typically, this includes “breaking the game” and/or making an extremely powerful character. While the MMO will allow for similar character development, it just will not be the same. Making an MMO (which includes both coop and competitive play) necessarily requires that they balance the game, which takes away a lot of the fun. Second, the entire atmosphere and tone of the game will be entirely different. Instead of exploring a world and getting lost in the environments and quest lines, you’ll have to deal with several smaller “fetch” style quests that are a staple of the genre and watching players bunny-hop across the countryside. Finally, it’s not even being developed by Bethesda Game Studios, it’s being developed by Zenimax Online Studios (both of which are owned by Bethesda Softworks.) Sure, they probably have help from BGS, but I highly doubt it will be the same.

The Elder Scrolls is easily in my top 3 or so game franchises of all-time, but I fear that this drastic shift in focus will ruin the experience. Maybe I am wrong, but I feel like it’s turning into “just another MMO” that happens to carry the Elder Scrolls name. This is in stark contrast to an Elder Scrolls game that is also an MMO. Those are two vastly different products.''

Clearly he/she has not seen the videos about the game or have little to no information at all about it other than the 'MMO' as a genre for the game.

[Tzuno]

When you try to do good games like Uncharted and spend some time on multiplayer you loose focus from the single player and release a good game that could've been epic if all the attention was on the single player. There are games that don't need multiplayer. Same story with tomb raider.