I came across a wonderful post on Kotaku postulating the death of single-player gaming. I was thinking along the lines of the article author, but stopped myself short when I considered just how long I’ve been playing games with other people.
For those not in the know, the image to the left is of the original Warcraft. While I didn’t really play the first entry with anyone else it certainly prepped me for Warcraft 2, which I played the hell out of on many a LAN. My teenage years were full of hefting around beastly computers just so we could string piles of wires along the floor to play games like Warcraft 2, Quake, and Counterstrike. I’ve been playing socially since the early-to-mid 90s. Guess what? I never stopped playing single-player games.
I’ve spent a great deal of time since then playing lone wolf in games like Mass Effect and Final Fantasy. In fact, Final Fantasy XII has taken up most of my game time for the last several months. I’m a sucker for good story and I enjoy taking the time to flesh out and explore worlds like those found in Elder Scrolls.
That being said, I also consider myself to have sound business acumen. From the Kotaku article:
While successful, the addition of multiplayer to the multi-million unit selling BioShock may be illustrative of the changing expectations of consumers. If there’s little to do but replay a narrative-driven campaign, many gamers appear quite happy to resell their discs and move onto the next game.
What they’re saying is that BioShock 2 is pushing multiplayer something fierce. We won’t know if the single-player campaign is adversely affected until the game ships, but I prefer to put my faith in Bethesda. They made an awesome game in BioShock and I expect nothing less from the sequel.
However, I do understand the point-of-view of the publisher:
“The best way to combat people trading in your game is to simply make it better in whatever way works for you,” argues Todd Howard. “People trade in cars with poor value. Our DLC is a good way to add to the value of the base game and give folks yet another reason to keep playing.”
If your customer trades in that disc, then there’s one more used disc in circulation for someone else to purchase without having to purchase a shiny, new copy from the distributor – thus less revenue for the developer. Further, if the developer offers enough compelling content after the initial release then the more likely I am to purchase shiny, new downloadable content. Again, driving revenue for the developer.
In recapitulation, I don’t think single-player games are going anywhere. Nor do I fault developers for trying to blend cooperative modes with franchises or genres which are traditionally single player. So long as Sqeenix keeps making stand-alone Final Fantasy games, I’m all set.
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