I'd be lying if I said I wasn't surprised by the amount of
mail I've received since posting yesterday. Seems I've hit a
nerve somewhere, as a lot of the replies I received reflected
my own feelings toward Valve. That's not to say I haven't
received any pro-Valve replies, but it does seem the general
impression with Half Life is the same lingering disappointment
I feel myself. Setting aside the multiplayer bias of most of
the BarrysWorld readers, it must be said just about every mail
praised Valve for an amazing single player game, but then went
on criticize the lack of apparent thought that went into
translating that single player excellence into an efficient,
networkable engine. And at the core of most complaints, as you
would expect, was Team Fortress 2. Which is fair enough, but
as a couple of readers, including the original webboard poster
pointed out, aren't we asking a little too much?
Well perhaps we are, perhaps we aren't. In a sense, Valve
brought the critique on themselves by advertising Half Life so
closely with Team Fortress 2, which in hind sight, was
probably their biggest mistake. Had Half Life been advertised
as "the ultimate in single player FPS" then I doubt anyone
would've slated it at all, as comparing it to it's most
obvious competitor, Unreal, it has no problems standing out.
However, as soon as they linked the name HL with TF2, they
built up people's expectations for the multiplayer side, and
as a result, were bound to disappoint. Most ppl prolly
wouldn't have minded HL dm being a bit lame if it wasn't for
the TF2 connection and they'd wait for the next few patches to
fix it the same way people did with Unreal.
Anyway, I'll leave this subject with a reader who I think
sums it up perfectly.
>Basically there's a split in the
FPS game community which I think is
>going to get wider, and its driven by the Single Player /
Multi-Player
>divide. Most of the criticisms leveled at any game are down
to how
>they play in either of these two sorts of games, and also
most of
>the praises they get is because of the same thing.
>
>HL got good reviews because it was (more) plot driven than
most of
>the other FPS games out there, but its DM games were crap.
Unreal was
>the same. A lot of this was down to networking code, but
that's by the
>by really - the problem is Valve and Epic weren't designing
with
>that type of game in mind which is why they need patching
afterwards.
>
>If a game is going to be good in Single Player then it needs
plenty of
>plot, atmosphere, excitement and a gentle learning curve -
all these
>will keep you coming back for more until you've completed the
game.
>You need to be able to install it and play straight off.
>
>Now look at a Multi-Player game (DM, CTF, whatever).
Originally (going
>back to Doom, Doom2, Duke Nukem (played that one a lot)) all
you >needed were some simple DM levels and that was it. No-one
had really >played DM game before so there was enough novelty
there for it to >become successful, leading to Quake
deathmatch and QuakeWorld.
>
>But if you look at the community today its become a *lot*
more >sophisticated than it was even 18 months ago -
Multi-Player games have >to be *highly* configurable (just see
how many times people rebuild and
>hone their key/moust configs), the levels need to be very
well designed, >and the weapons well balanced. Players are
willing to sit down, practice >and develop their configs and
skills, your learning curve is the other >players.
>
>Not only that but whereas in a single player game realism is
quite
>important to draw you in, in a Multi-Player game this isn't
rated so
>highly, or even at all. Being able to do bizarre mid air
twists and turns, >ramp and strafe jumping are all important
aspects of a Multi-Player game >and these aren't things that
developers writing a Single Player game would >think about.
Hell, if you haven't played Multi-player much, or listened in
>on the community you wouldn't have even heard about `em (I
hadn't until >the UNR jump centre).
>
>Take rocket-jumping. That was probably the first skill that
appeared in
>the community which the developers hadn't even dreamed of, I
guess >there are loads more. But now these types of features
need to be there >for people to enjoy the game. For the first
time in a long time, the
>developers *need* to be aware of the community and what they
want
>otherwise the game isn't going to cut it.
In other words, had Valve designed HL with TF2 in mind from
the ground up, none of this would have happened. Perhaps next
time, they'll think with a little foresight, or hindsight as
the case may be, rather than tag bits on as they go without
standing back and thinking, "if we do this new thing, will the
old stuff still work right with it?"
>As I said I think this split is
going to continue and I doubt any game
>is going to be able to provide something for everybody any
more. id are
>leading the way. Q3Arena is deathmatch only. Even the single
player
>game is deathmatch. That way they are targeting what is
probably the
>largest gaming community. And they seem to be listening to
what they
>have to say, look at the questionnaire that Brian Hook
posted, it
>asked whether ram jumping was important - course it is. You`d
never
>see a question like that asked by a developer of a primarily
single
>player game, they just wouldn't have thought of it.
>
>I`m not knocking one side or the other, although I'm all for
team
>games rather than Single Player. Its just interesting to see
the
>development in the community as more games are released, its
cool
>to think that someone was write a game and then within a few
months
>find that there are people out there doing stuff with it that
>you`d never had dreamed of. Not just mod development, but the
>skills of the players themselves.
Very deep Leigh, I'm most impressed.
J
Speaking of the
Jump Centre, 5000 hits in a day? Okay, what
do I have to do and with who to get a column
there? J
While I'm on the subject of slating software companies, as
I tend to do when there's nothing better to talk about, (can
you say, "vacuum?" hopefully one of these new commercial mods
will be worth talking about J)
what's the general feeling towards Unreal Tournament? Having
seen Unreal advertised and released as "the Quake Killer," are
we not now seeing Epic go at it a second time against
Quake3:Arena? Is this nothing more than basic copying or are
we seeing what the economic types would call "market variety,"
and "healthy competition?"
Anyway, I'm trying to get my head around the tracks on the
new MOS album,
as it appears most of them will be played throughout Ibiza`99
and at the moment, I'm scared senseless they're actually
getting a bit repetitive J
Thought for the Day:
"Did you know you could spend 3 months in jail for lying
down in front of a bulldozer?" Anyone remember those
flyers? Well for those that do, shout out to all those who on
this day in 1994, sat in the middle of the coffee house off
Claremont Road and decided they were pissed off enough to do
something about it. J
