Single-Player Game Model 'Finished,' Says EA Exec 439
Frank Gibeau, label president for EA Games, recently spoke with Develop about the publisher's long term development strategy. Gibeau thinks developing major games without multiplayer modes is a passing fad:
"...it’s not only about multiplayer, it’s about being connected. I firmly believe that the way the products we have are going, they need to be connected online. ... I volunteer you to speak to EA’s studio heads; they’ll tell you the same thing. They’re very comfortable moving the discussion towards how we make connected gameplay – be it co-operative or multiplayer or online services – as opposed to fire-and-forget, packaged goods only, single-player, 25-hours-and you’re out. I think that model is finished. Online is where the innovation and the action [are] at."
Piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
It's about money (Score:5, Insightful)
They just look at Zynga and hope they can make the same amount of money making crappy games.
Bollocks (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, that's why everyone is still waiting and crying out for HL2:Ep3, Duke Nukem Forever, etc. It's got nothing to do with whether the game is single- or multi-player. It's just that single-player games you have to actually put more work in so the player *doesn't* feel alone (or feels *suitably* alone in the game's environment). Whereas any shit that has a multiplayer mode saves you from having to write tons of AI and instead just keep a couple of servers up.
Multiplayer was/is a twist on a game to increase longevity. Now it's *replaced* bothering to make the game's have longevity themselves. I play tons of multiplayer games, but as they age, they die except for the ones that were *always* going to be played by people anyway (e.g. Counterstrike). Single-player games and LAN-playable games and games that you can just connect to random IP addresses TOO last forever.
Stop tacking on "multiplayer" as a feature and instead make a decent game. Apart from a handful of exceptions, almost every Steam game I own is primarily single-player. I own very, very few multiplayer-only games for the same reasons.
Pub, social, dollars (Score:5, Insightful)
co-op instead please (Score:5, Insightful)
retarded EA exec says PC games are finished. (Score:5, Insightful)
wasnt EA one of the slave shops who claimed PC gaming was finished too ?
hint to EA execs :
DO NOT WANT stupid asshats and 12 year olds who whine incessantly in your spyware laden voip enabled gaming franchises.
DO WANT games which are engaging, fun and can be picked up with no significant time investment.
DO NOT WANT incessantly annoying DRM which requires online servers AND a CD in the drive to validate the game is "legal". Oh and typing in a 80 digit serial number.
DO WANT games which have a compelling storyline, decent graphics with no advert ware built in and are engrossing enough to keep people occupied for the 60 bux you charge which is more than movies, theatres and any other reasonable form of alternative entertainment costs.
DO NOT WANT monthly fees ON TOP of the 60 bux you charge for the game.
DO WANT to resell games once I have finished plowing through your inevitably buggy DRM infested pile of franchised crapware.
Re:It's about money (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, they've got half of that equation down.
Re:Piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, kind of works.
Seeing as multiplayer is shit and not worth playing for around 95% of games that come out, I don't think it's particularly effective.
Look at Assassins Creed, AC2 was fucking superb because they concentrated entirely on single player. This year they released Brotherhood with multiplayer and whilst it was still good, it wasn't a touch on AC2.
If anything AC2 was proof that focussing on single player can lead to a far superior experience, even if it means sacrificing a multiplayer mode, which will be dead in the water within a few weeks, or couple of months after release anyway.
It wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact companies tie achievements to their shitty multiplayer modes no one plays either, because it basically means if you are a completionist and like collecting achievements and don't get them on release week then they'll be permanently unobtainable a few weeks later.
I'd rather games which are primarily single player stay that way and focus on that, rather than cut single player features/quality in favour of a waste of space multiplayer mode.
It isn't dead; you want to kill it! (Score:5, Insightful)
If playing with your freinds is so great, then why are developers taking away support for lan and dedicated servers? It's a whole load of crap! I don't want to spend $120 on a game only to play it on a server on the other side of the world, with a ping of 500! It's not the players' demand for connectivity, it's studios want to charge subscription fees!
Re:Piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
in another related news, gamers say that EA as publisher has finished.
if player want 'quickies' they expect to pay 10$ for them, not 60$.
Re:Bollocks (Score:3, Insightful)
Not to mention Fallout 3 or Fallout New Vegas that are single player only and both huge successes and amazing games.
Saying it wont make it true (Score:5, Insightful)
and it wont make us stop wanting to spend weekends sunk in some game where no one will bother us. Sometimes its about being disconnected.
Hey EA Brainiac... (Score:5, Insightful)
You're right - please stop making single player games.
Sincerely,
Bethesda Softworks / Obsidian Entertainment
(you know, the people who brought you Fallout 3 which sold 4.7m copies in the first two weeks of release in 2008 and Fallout: New Vegas - which just happened to sell 5m copies in the 1st three weeks since release in 2010)
Re:Bollocks (Score:4, Insightful)
It's cool. I don't play multiplayer as a rule, so unless a game has a decent single player mode, I'm not going to buy it.
Of course, it's a long time since EA produced anything I wanted to play in the first place, so it's not a big deal.
EA can do as they please. It's not going to affect me :)
Re:Pub, social, dollars (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bollocks (Score:5, Insightful)
Lately I think, what makes a game truly great is the art, period. The whole is greater than the sum. I agree with you: the multiplayer/singleplayer axis is completely orthogonal to both the goodness axis and the longevity axis. The goodness is in the explicable combination of graphics, sound, writing, controls, UI, and that viscerally felt response to the user input. And that other thing you know, but I am forgetting.
Counterstrike I will give you, even though I personally was never a fan. It just feels so crisp. But also Quake, and Commander Keen, and the whole multitude of godly platformers. And all HalfLife. And Diablo I and II, as different as they are. And most (but not all) games starting with Sim. And ditto for games starting with Sid. And pretty much everything done by Interplay and Black Isle. And, like, every PC adventure that didn't suck, which is a good chunk of them. And I cannot even begin to name console titles, since I am a PC boy, but I am fully aware that I am barely scratching the surface here. There are dozens of excellent games from every genre, ancient or relatively recent, that I could put in this list right now, so I'll just stop.
What the EA drone is trying to say is that they cannot design an effective copy protection for a singleplayer game, so they are not going to finance one. And nothing of value is lost.
Re:Piracy (Score:2, Insightful)
>>>not worth playing for around 95% of games
Plus my wallet is not infinitely deep. All the games I buy are $20 or less in cost and never expire (I'm still playing 30-yr-old games) while online games are constantly sucking money month-after-month and eventually die (when the server shutsdown) so all the money I invested is wasted. The online multiplayer model is as bad a ripoff as the $80/month* CATV charges.
Which is probably why EA thinks multiplayer is so innovative (for them). It's like printing money.
*
*$60 base plus $5 per tv plus tax
What he meant to say (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bollocks (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Bollocks (Score:5, Insightful)
I am a player who avoids multiplayer games as the devil flees from the cross. I hate to interact with brats addicts that are unable to act civilized, much less playing a game without nasty and dirt tricks to win at any cost.
And the story of "the singleplayer game is over" is completely bullshit. It's only a stupid excuse for not need to make a decent AI and to force the user to stay connected with the company's servers responsible for the game.
Re:Bollocks (Score:5, Insightful)
The point is, trollface, that a company already infamous for churning out tired, low-quality sequels is adopting a policy aimed at further alienating a sizable portion of the market.
They're acting like they have enough of a grip on the marketplace to dictate trends, but I very much doubt that is the case. There are too many other game developers out there
The problem with multiplayer is... (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with multiplayer is you can't play casually. The servers are full of people with absolutely no life who get their jollies fragging newbies (usually shouting obscenities as they do so...)
It might be somebody's idea of a 'game' but it's not mine.
Re:The problem with multiplayer is... (Score:5, Insightful)
And that is why single player games will never really go away.
Multiplayer is fun when you have time. but games that keep on going and going means that people who only play casually won't ever truely be a part of it.
Re:The problem with multiplayer is... (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree. I don't game much because I suck at the game and I don't have the time to be proficient at a game. My life has many more pressing goals to achieve then mastering a game. However when I play a game I done want to suck so much that it isn't fun.
Re:Bollocks (Score:5, Insightful)
A traveller came upon a village and asked a man by the gate what the people ithe nside were like. The man asked, "What were the people like where you came from?"
The traveller replied, "They were mean spirited, petty and cruel." And the man said, "You will find them much the same here."
Some time later another traveller came to that same man and same village and asked about the people inside. Asked about the people where he came from, the traveller replied, "They were kind, honest folk, and always friendly." The man replied, "You'll find them much the same here."
The point being you will find what you expect. When I play these games I usually meet friendly, helpful and fun people. Oh, I'm sure there are jerks but I just don't pay them much attention since I'm having fun with the others. It works for me, and means I don't have to miss out on things that are fun because some people suck.
Re:Piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
Bingo and then some. If you listen closely EA is not saying "single player games are dead". What they're saying is "we have to work harder to produce a profitable single player product, therefore we are killing it."
Re:Piracy (Score:4, Insightful)
FPS won't go away, just like soccer and poker don't go away. The rules and equipment don't need perpetual novelty; it comes from the people playing.
Not to Mention (Score:5, Insightful)
No everyone wants to play in an environment populated by potty mouth teenagers jumping around like monkeys.