Leave me alone: speaking out against the rise of co-op

[wraggster]

http://media.edge-online.com/wp-content/uploads/edgeonline/2013/08/Dead-Space-3-co-op-610x343.jpg (http://media.edge-online.com/wp-content/uploads/edgeonline/2013/08/Dead-Space-3-co-op.jpg)Is it too much to ask to be left alone, just for one moment? Videogaming’s two great houses – the aggressive, competitive world of multiplayer, and the solitary, immersive world of the solo campaign – are traditionally kept strictly separate from one another. But like a hedge dispute gone feral, this divide has been violently breached. The single player and multiplayer worlds are slowly merging.Sometimes, this works well – Real Racing 3 is an aggressive business model with a game loosely attached, but with friends’ times to beat it becomes shamefully compelling. And sometimes, as with poster child for unwanted co-op Dead Space 3, it doesn’t.There’s the obvious problem with inviting a friend along to a horror game, which is that fear shared is fear halved, and firepower doubled is fear eliminated entirely. It’s difficult to be frightened by a thing jumping out of a cupboard when you’re packing enough hardware to take down a hundred things and the cupboards they live in.Then there’s the issue of staying in character. Developers ensure that NPCs move and behave convincingly within the game world; despite what you might think about a series that climaxes with the moon turning into a gigantic space jellyfish – and that is the actual end – Dead Space is a franchise that takes great lengths to make you feel like you’re inhabiting a working universe, with its wonderfully high-res signage and greasy, functional aesthetic.Your average co-op partner – in any game – didn’t get that memo. There’s a disconnect between the the haunted, gruff, space marine that you see on the screen and the character you hear in your headset – a mid-thirties nerd with two kids, who’s using internet co-op gaming in lieu of a family-ravaged social life. Unless you and your friends are so embarrassment-proof that they’re willing to roleplay – not many people have the sheer chutzpah needed to pretend their spouse yelling to say ‘Waterloo Road’ is starting is in fact a vital space phone call from top brass – then there will always be this gulf between the world you’re exploring and the person you’re exploring it with.

http://www.edge-online.com/features/leave-me-alone-speaking-out-against-the-rise-of-unwanted-co-op/