Are Game Stats Important to You? 98
Nehle asks: "In almost every new multi-player game there is a way of keeping statistics about the games that are being played. Whether it's fan-based services or a service created by the game creator. Unreal Tournament 2004 can write nice HTML files for you, Bungie keep an insane amount of stats about games played over X-Box Live. For my favorite shooter - Enemy Territory, there is an application called Enemy Territory Teamstats and I wrote this little script to keep track of my games.
Are stats any important to the average /. reader? Is it interesting how many times you shot 1337h4x0rg4m3r in the head, or is winning all that counts? Do you even want people to know if you lost 14 games in a row?"
TFC w00t w00t! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:TFC w00t w00t! (Score:2, Informative)
No, I don't wanna see "5-15" (Score:1)
Stats (Score:5, Insightful)
While I'd much rather have more interesting externalities involved (earning cash, switching to advanced servers, getting more control over game settings, etc), stats in some progressive form or another are a great thing to have.
Re:Stats (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Stats (Score:2)
Its nice to use to compare yourself to what you did a while ago, but the competition for "best x" makes it too distracting.
Re:Stats (Score:2)
Make sure you don't play a pvp MMO because those same pvp kiddies will come into the game and bring the
University (Score:5, Interesting)
There were stats and it got really competetive.
Some people were totally manic about it, we did a corolation between high scorers and people who failed their courses, it was ugly.
Anyway I consistently had the highest games won average and kill/death (and kpm which shows I'm not a camper!)ratio but could never seem to reach #1.
There were roomates who would put one computer on as idle and the other one would just shoot him in the head for a while till other people joined.
By the end of the semester someone broke 5000 kills.
It was pretty unifying, but I think it might have discouraged new players.
It was good at forcing people to consistently use names which helped to keep names and faces lined up.
Re:University (Score:5, Interesting)
Good point. Running up against extremely experienced players while trying to improve my own meager skills tends to be pretty discouraging in online games and has actually driven me away from them on occasion. Apparently, Halo 2 has some mechanism in place to at least attempt to place gamers of similar levels in competition, which is helpful to those of us without the copious amounts of time that students seem to have.
Re:University (Score:2)
Skill placement (Score:2)
Also, the level system is rather nice... a certain amount of experience points gets you to a higher level, which probably means almost nothing anyhow but I have found myself playing "just one more deathmatch" to try
Hell yeah! (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not personally interested in how many headshots i've had or how many times i captured the flag, but there are plenty of stats that can help you improve your game. It is also a good opportunity to see the tactics of the l33t gamers.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Another Question (Score:1)
Head, no... (Score:5, Funny)
Not Really (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Not Really (Score:1)
getting the highest score in CS with dualies or the pump shotgun always got a laugh from me and my buddys
Stats are nice (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Stats are nice (Score:1)
Re:Stats are nice (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Stats are nice (Score:4, Interesting)
"Infinite landmines"
"Airstrike thru walls"
"1 hit kills"
"Super fast ammo charges"
"Starting campaign with top level abilities"
I am not making this stuff up. I talk to enough ET admins who monitor their servers up close. Even they don't know how to actively ban and kick 24/7. As if ET pro bringing down everyone's performance wasn't enough to affect stats.
Re:Stats are nice (Score:1)
I've played this game *way* to much since the day it came out, both on public servers and in clan matches. I run a fairly popular public server myself (with my clan-mates), and cheating has never been a problem for me. Sure, I've seen a few, but they're either really easy to pick out, or they're just so bad that their cheating really isn't helping.
There are some really awesome players and clans out there though, it amazes me
Re:Stats are nice (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Stats are nice (Score:1)
Sadly, yes... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Sadly, yes... (Score:2)
Re:Sadly, yes... (Score:1)
You could also always just edit the registry entries and give yourself a
No, get rid of them (Score:2)
Re:No, get rid of them (Score:1)
No. Here's why: (Score:2, Insightful)
All I care about is having fun above all. Games shouldn't be about stress but how many times have a joined a server where I saw people yelling at their teammates or saying how their team is useless, simply because they're a stats whore.
Here are things that matter:
- ping
- staying connected
- fun
That's it.
Re:No. Here's why: (Score:2)
At one point in time, I would have said "hell yeah!" but now that I'm living in the real world, I just want to have peaceful fun.
Yes. (Score:2)
It was (Score:3, Interesting)
By UT2003 though, when I realized how little stats had to do with how well you played, I used them only to actually review performance.
I make no claim that I am an average gamer guy though, I was pretty focused on competition at a high level.
All that matters... (Score:3, Interesting)
Grand Theft Auto? (Score:3, Interesting)
Now in San Andreas, it's just amazing the amount of stats that are kept. Not just your character stats like muscle, fat, stamina, sex appeal etc, but stuff like how many times you've failed a mission, how many times you've been to hospital. How many good and bad dates you've been on. How many times you've been laid. The longest you've managed to survive with 5 stars worth of police chasing you. How much cash you've spent on haircuts or tattoos or property or food or clothes.
Adds another level of depth to the game IMHO.
So far... (Score:5, Funny)
For stats: 6
Against stats: 8
Position undeterminable due to crappy and/or confusing comment: 4
Snide comments instead of discussion: 3
Total comments: 21
Most comments by: Anonymous Coward
Average mod score: 1.3333
Headshots: 0
Sex budget: $0.00
some things are missing ;) (Score:2, Funny)
- avg days without changing underwear
- avg weeks without shower
- avg years without girlfriend (AKA "age")
- Un*x/Windows user percentage
- GNAA member percentage
- avg cups of coffee drunk by users
- avg amount of crack taken by moderators
- times this story was already posted on slashdot
- percentage of really hot chicks
- percentage of nearly rot chicks
Not important to me (Score:3, Interesting)
Stats are awesome... (Score:1)
Once you've implemented a decent physics/game engine, stats are just a matter of implementation, it is not a large task in itself to gather the data, it's more how you interpret the data you've gathered.
Stats (Score:2, Insightful)
Its interesting to see how your performance changes over time, and what metrics you can use to measure it (accuracy, kill/death ratios, etc). There are also stats that have entertainment value, like who killed you the most, and what your favourite weapon or map i
Fun for some, no harm for others (Score:2)
Personally, I love them. Fun to compare with friends, see a cumulative effect of games played, etc.
Why I dislike Stats. (Score:3, Insightful)
He had three keys bound to changing his name, one was for when he was about to die(which was ranked on this servers stats at almost the end), one for when he was spawning and moving towards the action(which was in the middle of the stat pool) and one which he used when he was in the thick of the shooting(which was ranked seventh on the server stats).
Stats are good for showing you what the best people use to win(if they show that at all) but so easy to abuse that its often times not worth using.
Re:Why I dislike Stats. (Score:2)
Re:Why I dislike Stats. (Score:2)
On a particular counter-strike server, just for shits and grins, I bound my fire button to an alias which changed my name and fired, then changed back when I let it go.
So, I had one name active for whenever I was firing (and presumably, whenever I was getting any kills), and another during other times.
The only problem was that cstrike printed a "foo has changed name to bar" message to every player connected, and that amount of spam was annoying
Yes, they add to the game (Score:1)
Oh, and there's an excellent Enemy Territory stats site at http://www.wolfet.org/ [wolfet.org].
Nope; I die. Quickly. (Score:3, Insightful)
Doing things that get me killed again and again and again is often the only way to make that one manuver that tips the game in your team's favor -- or at worst keeps your team from loosing as fast.
Players love them (Score:2)
current rankings [sillysoft.net]
weekly winners [sillysoft.net]
16 week seeded averages [sillysoft.net]
most played maps [sillysoft.net]
recently played games [sillysoft.net]
and every user has their own page with their stats and recent game list.
They get a ton of page views, so I would say that many users enjoy their presence. Of course, some will be obsessed and some will not care at all. It's a spectrum, blah blah blah...
Stat whoring is not your friend. (Score:2)
One of the best acknowledgments of this I've ever seen is the half life mod Natural Selection. Kill stats for marines are -not- shown, but they are for the aliens.
Successful marine teams will typically will play in very tight cooridination, and individual contribution to kills is not important to the bigger picture.
Re:Stat whoring is not your friend. (Score:1)
Worthless (Score:1)
Yes, sometimes they are. (Score:2)
As for the only other game I give a rat's ass about stats in: TFC...stats are nice, but the point systems used really don't differentiate or account for classes. A Soldier, Sniper or HWG, o
I love my UT2004 stats... (Score:2, Funny)
...because I can see how I'm getting old as the clan kids dominate me. It's a nice reminder of how time passes and makes campers of us all.
The stats also shows I'm such a flak monkey [epicgames.com].
Re:I love my UT2004 stats... (Score:1)
Wow, you play a little too much Deck 17. That explains the lack of decent vehicle stats and likely the poor minelayer performance as well-- I'm only seeing a few Onslaught matches.
Probably want to play a bit more Onslaught to even out the numbers a little. You've actually got a positive win-loss there, after all.
(Since this is kinda offtopic, I'm modding myself down-- no karma bonus.)
BF1942 (Score:2)
The problems with stats in BF1942 are that many people play for purely for stats, doing things like sitting back on the wrong side of the river in Battle of the Bulge in a Tiger, shelling the allied spawns and not actually capturing flags.
Re:BF1942 (Score:2)
When you join a game and the side you are on contains 75 percent snipers you know you are playing with a bunch of stat whores......
Re:BF1942 (Score:2)
What did they do? Sit around the Axis uncappable base as snipers trying to spawn camp, oblivious to both the fact that there no Axis were going to spawn because noone else was killing them, and the constant stream of flames directed at them over the chat.
Re:BF1942 (Score:2)
they don't add to a game (Score:1)
Usually I play with one or two friends I've known for about four years now. We've always played Quake 3 CTF before, again because of the teamplay aspects. And that's where we get our kicks from. I know that one friend is usually be
Not on pubs. - Do it when it counts. (Score:2, Insightful)
As Brian "DKT/Destrukt" Flanders (Great q3/CS/probably cod now but I'm just guessing player who has his own mousepad(DKTpad)) once said, "Do it when it counts"
The only time stats are important are when the game is entirely under your control -- No teammates to give you an advantage, No unskilled enemy to take advantage
Don't forget about the buggers! (Score:3, Funny)
ET Server: Beginner's Park 3 and systats (Score:1)
systats is a fairly active project and has a really nice stat tracking system but it is very person centric. IMO, it's great for public servers but f
Bungie's Stats are REALLY Cool (Score:1)
Re:Bungie's Stats are REALLY Cool (Score:2)
Planetside (Score:2)
A) Those for whom stats are the be-all, end-all reason to play the game. They tend to be rather uncooperative (considering it's a team-based game), caustic individuals; the type that view the game less as something to be enjoyed and more a competition that acts as a virtual penis. Almost invariably these players use infantry with heavy assault weapons
Re:Planetside (Score:1)
Game Stats Changed the Game (Score:1)
Stats... (Score:1)
I remember playing a UT2003 game at which point a player always runs for the redeemer and launched it whenever the opportunity was there. Enemies would be standing 2 meters away, but that didn't stop him using the weapon... S
ngworldstats (Score:2)
When I played Unreal Tournament regularly, ngWorldStats were incredibly cool. It used a modified chess ranking system. A highly ranked player kills a low-ranked player and little to no points are gained. Flip it around and a low-ranked player kills a high-ranked player, and that player receives points galore.
The local stats aren't important -- I liked the online stats, comparing me to other players. I liked knowing that I had a high efficency (high kill to loss ratio). I was totally tickled when I f
I love statistics (Score:1)
A good example for nicely done statistics is Super Smash Bros Melee for the Nintendo Gamecube. I like how there is a statistic for nearly everything.
Travel, jump and fly distance, Total damage given/taken, times/hours played and lots of others.
There's not just all-time stats: At the end of every match you'll get a higly detailed statistic for the game. You'll get several awards which all have a certain (positive or negative) meaning - and there are lots of awards - there's a ingam
Play Madden 2005 online (Score:2)
I'd like to see my individual stats (Score:2)
There was one stat I really wished for back when I played bunches of TFC - a simple plus/minus cap tracker. Every time the team you're on captures the flag, you get a point, Get
Original UT (Score:1)
When I finally broke the top 1,000 I called all my friends. For me it was as one player described what EXP is to an RPG player, stats were for me in UT.
Grandmar was not so
Not Important, But Stats Provide for Clearer Goals (Score:2)
Let's take the obvious current example, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. It keeps more statistics than any game I know, including measurements of various skills and accomplishments li
Stats are total bullshit. (Score:3, Insightful)
I started UT as a CTF Player, and became quite good. I played about 30-35 hours a week, and I was in the top 100. I would look at the stats to see what weapons I was effective with, and just what was going on in my games in general. The win loss percentage of my teams was very impressive. I started to notice that players in the top 10 would have good kill/death ratios and a lot of points, but their teams would lose a lot. Then I watched them ingame and saw what they were doing..
Instead of defending their base, they would let players from the other team sneak in, and grab the flag. They would camp out somewhere near the flag and once the enemy took it, they would try to kill them. This resulted in a +5 points rather than +1 for a normal kill. This is clearly a less effective way of defending in the overall scheme of the game, but players would do this just for the stats.
I adapted, and upped my playing time for a week, and of course I was ranked #1.
In Mortal Kombat Deception for PS2, I'm currently ranked in the top 10. I can tell you that the #1 player is padding his stats (No, I wont tell you how but it's fairly obvious) and I can tell you that I will take #1 probably this weekend since I figured out what he is doing and how to do it in a more efficent manner.
In closing, I can tell you overall stats are bullshit, the only way to settle who is the best is VIA tournament play or ladders. I played in the 1v1 OGL UT league and worked my way up to play the #1 ranked player on that ladder, and the players on there were 100x better than any of the stat whores could ever hope to be.
Stats are nice to help your gaming skill though. Knowing that you die 70% of the time with the Chaingun as compared to 30% of all the other weapons can quickly make you realize fairly quickly that you shouldn't use it or that you are using it in the incorrect situations.
I'd like to see online games in the future have built in ladder or tournament systems rather than plain out stats, since in my experence purely statistical systems are always exploited.
Perfect Dark (Score:1)
It depends.. (Score:1)
I play mostly on the xbox and I do care about the stats/stop myself from throwing the controller when I am playing a game like Top Spin (singles) where I, and only I, am responsible for my scores. Yes, I do want to be one of the best in this case.
OTOH, while playing games like Rainbow Six3, stats have little importance to me as they depend on many factors, one of them being who you play with. I do not belong to a clan so my game stats vary depending on the team-communication/
If anyone had a clue how to collect stats... (Score:2)
That is one game where stats fail to tell the whole story. How many points do you get for fixing stuff? Or repairing the heavy at the main entrance who racks up 83 kills and no deaths, largely because you keep him alive with the repair pack and run to and fro with ammo? How many points is piloting the APC that drops off the team what takes out their generator?
I did get invites to a couple of different clans at different times, but I guarantee you, i
No. (Score:2)
single player too! (Score:1)
For San Andreas and Katamary Damacy, I've had to create a page that we can all individually update. Not so bad for KD, but for San Andreas' level of stats, it just gets a little crazy updating everything all the time.
If I could export the stats into an xml file, I'd be in heaven.
Not really (Score:2)
I like... (Score:1)