In defense of single player

[Kevadu]

Kind of ridiculous that single player even needs to be defended, but that's where we are in this industry...

I don't normally like Jimquisitions (Jim Sterling's long-winded rant time), but this one is one of the best I've seen and happens to be all about a topic that I think is pretty relevant here.

It's funny that so many publishers seem intent not just on including tacked on (and completely forgettable) multiplayer modes, but now feel compelled to label single player games as something undesirable.  Can anyone seriously call playing online with a bunch of complete strangers screaming "faggot" every 5 seconds being social?

A good single player game is a conversation between the creators and the player.  They can have just as much merit as reading a book.  I guess only sad lonely people read books.

[Lard]

Handhelds used to be a refuge for single player at least, but even that's changing with things like the street pass. :/

[MeshGearFox]

What if there was a game where you literally had to scream faggot as much as possible to attack things?

You could do that on the DS, with the mic, and you could use the wifi for multi-player.

It'd be kind of like gnilley!

More on topic, I'm playing Dark Souls offline, because I don't want to deal with griefers and message clutter. Similarly, I actually prefer Minecraft offline because while the community aspect is fun, there's no scarcity of resources so the survival aspect is kind of dimisniesh beut i gie  s f

Also relevant, uh, the SimCity 4 is hardly an isolated experience. The SimTropolis community is full of city journals, user made content, and discussion. Just because you're not directly interacting with other people doesn't mean you're not collaborating or sharing your work. And I don't think they're taking too well to SimCity 5's approach because there's this growing feeling that the game is turning into farmville.

[Yggdrasil]

What if there was a game where you literally had to scream faggot as much as possible to attack things?

Someday that game will exist.

[MeshGearFox]

Actually what if there were different swearwords that different bosses were weak to? Some of them were really OBSCURE swears, or compound swears, like douchelizard or tithat? So you'd get this whole Scribblenauts aspect.

While shouting them at the screen. With friends.

This actually is starting to sound kind of fun.

[Ashtrot]

Handhelds used to be a refuge for single player at least, but even that's changing with things like the street pass. :/

Street pass isn't prevalent enough to affect single player, though. At most for the games that support it it's a novel feature. Like Kid Icarus, all it does is give you the chance to buy other player's custom weapons. Or Mario, where it's just time attack scores.

Also, I don't think single player is going anywhere. It's a bit alarmist to say that right now.

[Aeolus]

What if there was a game where you literally had to scream faggot as much as possible to attack things?

Someday that game will exist.

I thought it all ready did.