Edge arcade: Multiplayer hopes
Ian Davis
Issue date: 11/11/09 Section: The Edge
In the past few years, video games have taken leaps and bounds beyond anything ever imagined.
The Internet has created an unparalleled avenue for all kinds of innovation within the industry, but one thing stands above all others as being the best addition: cooperative gameplay.
I'm not a big fan of deathmatch style games. They just get too serious, and people get too angry while playing them for me to have any fun.
This isn't a condemnation of all online gaming, though. Cooperative games, like "Left 4 Dead," are a thousand times more fun.
I love the idea of video games bringing people together and forcing them to actually work cooperatively to accomplish something. It's a value that too many other things in the world don't emphasize.
I'm not saying that video games should be used to educate anyone, but I am saying is that even middle school encourages so much competition that kids have a hard time with teamwork. These games, at the very least, make people work together.
I've had friends in the past who let highly competitive games like "Starcraft" and "Unreal Tournament" consume them. They start living solely for the game, and their aggression didn't stay confined to the game.
Video games can create an environment where an already imbalanced person can just lose it, and if more people played cooperative games, they wouldn't get so worked up over what happens during play.
In online gaming, I've personally been threatened with identity theft, murder, rape, beatings and so many other things it baffles the mind. And all of them were during deathmatch games like "Halo" and "Call of Duty."
On another note, there is a more positive aspect of cooperative gaming that is just starting to resurface this year. Split-screen multiplayer has been dead for quite some time, but now developers are starting to add it back into more and more games.
I, and many of my friends, still have fond memories of playing marathon sessions of "GoldenEye" for the N64, probably one of the first multiplayer games made for the system. It was great because it was an experience unlike any other.
The Internet has created an unparalleled avenue for all kinds of innovation within the industry, but one thing stands above all others as being the best addition: cooperative gameplay.
I'm not a big fan of deathmatch style games. They just get too serious, and people get too angry while playing them for me to have any fun.
This isn't a condemnation of all online gaming, though. Cooperative games, like "Left 4 Dead," are a thousand times more fun.
I love the idea of video games bringing people together and forcing them to actually work cooperatively to accomplish something. It's a value that too many other things in the world don't emphasize.
I'm not saying that video games should be used to educate anyone, but I am saying is that even middle school encourages so much competition that kids have a hard time with teamwork. These games, at the very least, make people work together.
I've had friends in the past who let highly competitive games like "Starcraft" and "Unreal Tournament" consume them. They start living solely for the game, and their aggression didn't stay confined to the game.
Video games can create an environment where an already imbalanced person can just lose it, and if more people played cooperative games, they wouldn't get so worked up over what happens during play.
In online gaming, I've personally been threatened with identity theft, murder, rape, beatings and so many other things it baffles the mind. And all of them were during deathmatch games like "Halo" and "Call of Duty."
On another note, there is a more positive aspect of cooperative gaming that is just starting to resurface this year. Split-screen multiplayer has been dead for quite some time, but now developers are starting to add it back into more and more games.
I, and many of my friends, still have fond memories of playing marathon sessions of "GoldenEye" for the N64, probably one of the first multiplayer games made for the system. It was great because it was an experience unlike any other.
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